12.3. Summary

• A document repository can be a great time management tool.

  • A repository for customers can give them the information they need so they can bother you less.

  • A repository for internal IT information can help you by creating reference material that saves you time in the future. Checklists can be particularly usefulas are short notes describing how a tricky procedure was successfully doneso that others don't have to reinvent the wheel.

  • A procedure that is sufficiently documented is easier to delegate to someone else. Thus, we can remove a task from our to do list by giving it to someone else.

• Wiki technology removes the entry barrier by making access easy and eliminating the need to learn HTML. By letting anyone edit (nearly) any page, the documents are more likely to be up-to-date.

• Creating a document repository for your IT operation does not need to be intimidating. You can control the scope of the repository by choosing what to document. The templates included in this chapter can help you get started. Wiki technology lets a document grow and evolve over time.

• It can be intimidating to start a new document. Wiki technology makes it easy to create a new document by handling all the linking for you. The initial document can be a simple checklist that will grow over time. You don't need to feel compelled to create the perfect document right from the start. Create something that is useful right now and let it evolve.

A Personal Information Repository There is some information I want to take everywhere, but it is more than I can fit in a PDA. Certain information doesn't always need instant access, but some kind of access is valuable. Putting it on the Web makes it accessible nearly everywhere, especially with WiFi access being so common. Setting up a password-protected directory is relatively easy. There is certain information that I keep in a Subversion repository. Subversion, like CVS or Microsoft SourceSafe, lets one access and update a repository of information from anywhere on the network. It's usually used for storing source code and tracking the changes. In theory, wherever I am, I can either download the latest version of the file repository or SSH to a machine that has access already established. I use my repository to store a very large address book and some other notes.