Version Control – Nightmare of Writers, Editors, and Clients
January 11, 2008 by Anne Wayman
Filed under Jobs
Arghhhh… I just sent off the wrong version to a client. In this case, it wasn’t all my fault, not that it matters.
For this project we’ve got three people involved. Me, the client and the client’s secretary. I write, submit to the client who edits on paper, gives that to his secretary who enters the edits and sends the revised edition to me. I should have worked with the secretary to determine exactly how we’d deal with version numbers, but I thought what I was doing was clear… chapter number, brief title, date, my initials. We muddled along with me adapting to the secretary’s file naming procedure which seems fairly random to me. Then, over the holidays the secretary missed one I sent… and I wasn’t paying attention either or would have noticed I hadn’t gotten an “I got this” from the client.
Come to think about it, part of the confusion is because when I send to the client, at his request, I also send a copy to his secretary… hind sight would say that’s too many copies floating around.
We’ve got it sorted out and fortunately the end of the project is in sight and the duplicate work isn’t too extensive… maybe not quite an hour on my part.
But I could use some advice. How do you name your files so everyone knows what version you’re working on?
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Notes, notes, and more notes.
Okay, so I’ve admittedly not worked on anything quite like what you’re describing, but if I did, I’d probably put a lengthy MS Word comment or a note in the material itself to make it clear precisely who had it when and who was next.
You can always delete the notes.
Project_Version#_myinitials…. then the next person would add their initials…so:
Craptastic_4_fp_aw
However, as you have pointed out, this won’t work if someone else has an arbitrary naming system and doesn’t want to play along. When working on an editorial board, this became a bit of a nightmare (too many editors!!)
I try to get clients/editors to use an online tool like Writeboard or Google Docs, which have good version tracking. Not everyone buys in, unfortunately.
When I have to deal with word processor files, I either include the name of the person and the date of the revision — for example, draft_brochure_Scott_010208.doc — or put the revision number in the file; draft_brochure_rev1.doc.
Of course, the Track Changes feature in Word (and the Changes feature in OpenOffice.org Writer) work pretty well, too.
Every time I either receive a new version of a file, or create a new version myself, I change the file name. Nothing complicated, though: I usually go with ‘Project Name v1.doc’ and just change that ‘v1′ to ‘v2′, ‘v3′, etc.
Each of my writing clients has their own update page, with the latest version of the file to download and all previous revisions available, as well. This has eliminated the version control headache for me.
I am increasingly using the track features function in Word, which is extremely helpful. I do use a simple file naming system:
quote number _ (date) _ client or project _ draft number
example:
123_(2008-01-11)_JaneDoe_01.doc
This varies with some clients. For short projects or articles, I may use an entirely different naming convention but the one above is a must for anything that might be revised more than once.
Thanks… I love th eidea of an update page for each client… will try that next!
Anne, I have to agree with Scott and Melissa. Word’s ability to track changes is a pretty useful feature. The challenge is getting it to run right!
Rico, I use track changes… and it’s fine as long as there aren’t a bunch of people using it on the same manuscript… but I can’t write by committee anyway… it’s in file names that I’ve had a problem.