22 things to check before publishing a technical manual

Many of us spend a significant amount of time looking over manuals prior to publication. Even the most carefully written guide will have a few typos, pages that break in awkward locations, or a table of contents with incorrect page numbers.

Catching these issues and fixing them requires a trained eye. You need to know what to look for. In such times, it helps to have a checklist of issues to watch for during your proofing pass.

Here is a list of items to watch for when taking a pre-publication look at your work or that of your peers. You may want to keep a printout of your document template handy so that you can double check the document against the formatting in the template.

• Flip through review copies and make sure all comments from reviewers were incorporated
• Spell check
• Regenerate the Table of Contents, or at least spot check the headings and page numbers
• Verify that the headers and footers alternate correctly
• Verify that the headers match the chapter titles
• Verify that the pages are sequentially numbered
• Check the copyright date to insure that it includes the current year
• Look for images that extend beyond the margins and adjust them, if necessary
• Look for images lacking clarity and reshoot or resize them
• Check a printout for images that don't show up due to printer errors
• Scan a printout for any strange characters or font-substitution issues
• Scan for numbered lists and ensure that they are sequentially numbered
• Search for any notes to the writer that haven't been removed or hidden
• Look for pages that break in awkward places
• Verify that trademark symbols are used appropriately for your products and others
• Verify that the appropriate cover pages or end pages have been attached, if necessary
• Check for images that do not match information described in the text
• Regenerate any cross-references to ensure they are up to date
• Regenerate the Index, or at least make sure page numbers are up to date
• Check the formatting of headers and footers on special pages, such as the cover, copyright, and first pages of chapters and verify that they match your template / conventions
• Check for recent convention decisions that may have been made after the document was written
• Look for long tables that break across pages and verify that the column headings are repeated on each page

This list obviously isn't comprehensive; every document is different and offers unique proofing issues. If I missed anything important, feel free to mention it in a comment.