It is essential that you test your output before distributing it to your end users. Producing output that is ready for distribution is often a case of building output, testing, refining, re-building, testing, refining, and so on until the output is truly considered "finished."
In addition to proofreading every section of the output, you need to test and review all of the features that you have included in your project, such as:
- Autonumbers
- Browse sequences
- Conditional text
- Context-sensitive Help (CSH)
- Footnotes
- Glossary
- Headers and footers
- Images
- Index
- Micro content
- Multimedia
- Navigation links (e.g., cross-references)
- Skin
- Slideshows
- Table of contents
- Tables
- Text boxes
Tip Some features (e.g., TOC, index, browse sequences, Help control links) require you to build and view the output for the entire target before testing them. However, you can test other features (e.g., page breaks, images, conditional text) as you develop and preview individual topics. See Previewing Topics.
Tip One tool that can be extremely useful when it comes time to test and review your output is to leverage Flare's analysis tool. The tool can be used to find and fix broken links, undefined variables, topics not indexed, and much more. See Analysis Ribbon.
Tip It is also a good idea to keep a checklist of all the features you need to test throughout your project. Each time you add a new feature to your project, add it to your checklist as well.
