7   Writing Style

Styleguide and Style Sheets

Styleguides provide standards for the development of publications. This guidebook and accompanying template constitute a styleguide for revisable manuals. However, because the guidebook was written for general use, it does not include content-related decisions that you will need to make in the course of preparing your manual. For example, it doesn’t address the spelling, capitalization, or hyphenation of industry- or technology-related terms. Establishing a consistent standard is particularly important when working with more than one writer or editor.

To supplement this styleguide, you’ll need to create a style sheet. Normally organized in alphabetical order, style sheets simply record your decisions on the appropriate spelling or usage of various words and phrases.