Documentation tends to lag behind when innovating. So was our User Manual. The good old PDF has been replaced with a online version, powered by Wikipedia software.

Updates

Our route planner is really easy to use by design. But we’ve added more and more goodies to it since we started. And even more is coming up. If you have grown with us you’ll probably find your way around blindfolded. If you’re new, you may need some guidance.

We had a User Manual. It was a PDF file and a good read. But it had a number of disadvantages. For each update we had to generate a new file. The new file had to be distributed to servers and people. Some users kept working with old versions. And we had no statistics on the use. It felt old fashioned.

Going Wiki

For our new user manual we wanted an other set up. The amazing Wikipedia inspired us. It’s online, non-linear, easy to read and update. Everyone can help to build and extend the documentation. It has statistics and logging of changes.

The open source Mediawiki software was a breeze to install. We started to fill it up. The global outline is already done and available. It’s not complete in all details yet, but is a Wiki ever? The plan is to add more content in the coming weeks. We’ll continue to add more when new updates are made.

Check out the RouteXL User Manual

(Image: CC-BY-SA Peter Merholz)