In the second paragraph of the project description, Quang writes, "A
single subject...contain the following (this depends on the design):",
and then has a list. This can be condensed somewhat. I think that the
list is good, and we should keep the information in the list. But we
want to be careful not to include too much information about
implementation...we just want to say what the program will do.
We could take out the two sentences noted above, and the list. It seems
to me that they are implmentation details. Howewver, I really like the
sentence below the list, "These HTML...and author." If we changed this
sentence to be, "The email messages in the resulting HTML files will be
indexed by date, thread, subject, and author."
This cuts the first section down to two paragraphs, and keeps it focused
on what the program should do, without defining the implementation.
I would like to suggest more extensive changes to the User section. I
like the list, and I think we should keep it in the final copy. The
first sentence is a run-on sentence. We should end the sentence right
before, "...for example,...". The second part of that sentence should
not be part of the paragraph, it should be part of the list. The
sentence contained in () is wrong, we should not have an entire sentence
in (). I think that the idea is good though (that is, specifying one
possible task). Maybe change that sentence to read something like, "A
project manager could use this program to record the progress of a
project in HTML form, using different pages for different stages of the
project." This sentence is somewhat cumbersome, but it illustrates one
example task. Also, maybe this sentence should be placed after the
sentence, "Users of the...made public." Note, I don't think we need the,
"...especially on..."
Before introducing the list, I think we should say something about the
typical computer skills of our users, and the platforms they use. Then
we should introduce the list with a statement, "Some typical user might
be:" And then put the list in.
I think the existing applications section looks fine.
If you have questions on these suggestions, drop me an email.
Jeff
ryex0006@gold.tc.umn.edu
ryex0006@itlabs.umn.edu
jrye@pigchamp.caps.umn.edu