[Sigia-l] Any guidelines/design patterns etc.. on when a downloadable format ( such as pdf/word/ppt) is appropriate compared to creating a webpage?

[Donna Maurer]

Create a downloadable if:
- the thing in question is inherently 'point in time' and always will 
remain so (like a big scientific report that was produced at a point)
- you *absolutely* know that people will want to print it out and read 
it on paper (like a downloadable e-book)
- the object is demanded by such a small user group that it would be 
ridiculously inefficient to mark it all up as a web page (but there is 
demand)
- the whole context is important and splitting it up into bits would 
destroy its meaning

Can you tell I do much of my work for government ;)

Donna

Melvin Jay Kumar wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
> I would appreciate if anyone could point to me to any guidelines /
> design patterns or some source on when a downloadable format ( such as
> pdf / word /ppt) is a better option compared to creating a webpage.
>
> For example, a website that talks about policies which are large
> documents , it would be best if people are able to download the policy
> and review it.
>
> Or if its about a particular process, it would be best if they are
> able to download the process and use the printed document to reference
> while doing the process.
>
> Any help you could provide will be much appreciated.
>
> Thank You.
>
> Regards,
>
> Jay Kumar
>