KOM_TSK7

BOLDFlash – Product Documentation Artifact

Customer instructions are produced by R&D as part of the product development process. They are delivered to Manufacturing as part of the final design package, along with a product description, component specifications, required manufacturing conditions and special processes, and a quality assurance verification procedure.

During the production process, Manufacturing reproduces the installation document and packages in with the actual product. Following completion of the manufacturing and individual product packaging process, completed products are batched and packaged for shipping to distributors and retailers for eventual sale to end customers.

In a memo to the head of Sales, Jack Thompson, manager of the Technical Support Team (a sub-group of Sales), expresses his concerns with the quality, effectiveness, and impacts of documentation coming from R&D. He includes the installation/configuration instructions document for the new BOLDFlash model A23-B flash drive as an example.

As you review the installation instructions document, consider how a customer would utilize it as he or she proceeds to install and use the product. How might a customer respond should he or she encounter problems? Also consider the concerns raised by Jack, how Technical Support might use the document in preparation for customer requests for support, and how well the team might be able to provide such support based on the documentation they are receiving from R&D.

For Internal Use Only

BOLD BOLDFlash Corporation

18 Commerce Boulevard Manchester, New Hampshire

From: Jack Thompson - Manager, Technical Support Team To: Chip Bryant - Director, Sales Subject: New A23-B installation instructions

Hi Chip,

We’ve spoken several times about the quality of our product documentation, and in my opinion that problem is getting worse. Case in point, the install instructions we just received (attached) for the new A23-B flash drive.

My team is supposed to be able to assist customers with any problems they encounter, and you know it’s a small team to begin with. Instructions like this just make it worse for everyone on the team. It’s getting very frustrating because the only other information we get from R&D is the produce description, and now they’ve even gone and changed that!

I understand the pressure that R&D is under, but we’re all under a lot of pressure. Just because they don’t have enough people in their group or they run into problems with a new product doesn’t mean the rest of us should pay for it.

We really need you to speak up for us on this, since we’re not getting anywhere with Karl’s team.

Jack

Flash Corporation 18 Commerce Boulevard BOLD Manchester, New Hampshire

BOLD

BOLDFlash Flash Drive Product #A23-B Installation Instructions

1. Prerequisites

 Create a base directory (let’s call it ‘FlashDrive’)

 Create a subdirectory in ‘FlashDriver’ (you have to call it ‘Driver’)

 Download all files (and dirs) from the repository

 Put them in the ‘Driver’ dir

 Download Irrlicht 1.8 (http://irrlicht.techtoys.net/downloads.html)

 Extract it in your main dir (in the example it would be ‘/FlashDrive/’)

 Download Irrklang 1.4.0 Mac driver (http://www.techtoys.com/irrklang/downloads.html)

 Extract it in your main dir (in the example it would be ‘/FlashDrive/’)

2. Then you should have something like this:

 FlashDrive

 Driver (some cpp and h files)

 Irrlicht (some more cpp and h files

 lib (some libs)

 irrKlang-1.3.0 (the irrKlang files)

 irrlicht-1.8 (the curl files)

3. To use your new BOLDFlash Flash Drive Product #A23-B:

 Insert the BOLDFlash Flash Drive Product #A23-B into a USB port

 When you see the message that says something like OK to install new device driver? Click on OK. (Macs are different.)

 to finish – it will go through a couple of more screens and you might need to click OK a few times

 Once you get a message that says it’s finished you can begin using your new BOLDFlash Flash Drive Product #A23-B!

If you have problems, contact Technical Support.

BOLDFlash – Technical Service Communication Artifact

In preparation for a new product release, Karl Melzer, director of product development for the Mobile Division, sent the memo below to all department heads. The attached document was produced by his R&D team to describe their latest product, a solid-state disk drive.

R&D produces documents like the product description to inform other groups within the division, including Marketing and Technical Support (a sub-group within Sales). The only other product information provided by R&D is installation/configuration instructions.

Marketing is dependent on documents such as this to develop their sales product brochures, product advertising, and other customer-oriented materials. They use these materials at trade shows, in press releases, and on the company website.

The Technical Support team uses new product description documents along with installation documentation from R&D, and sometimes documents from Marketing, to assist customers who request assistance.

As you review the memo and product description, consider how staff members of the Marketing and Technical Support teams might react. Also consider their needs in utilizing such information in performing their own potential tasks related to this new product. Does the information being provided help them? Are there aspects of product information that may be lacking or missing altogether?

The following sample communication is adapted from information from Seagate Technology LLC.

For Internal Use Only

BOLD BOLDFlash Corporation

18 Commerce Boulevard Manchester, New Hampshire

From: Karl Melzer - Director, Product Development To: All department heads Subject: Product Description

Here is the product description for the SSD being released to Manufacturing later this week.

We all know things were a bit rocky with getting this product through development. There is still last- minute work under way on final design details, but this will be good enough for you all to get started with. And we wanted to get this out since we’ve had to move the team on to the new higher-speed drive since that looks like a hot opportunity for us.

As I mentioned at the last Quarterly Review, we are changing the format of the product description to streamline things. I trust that everyone saw the sample that we had available, so this should be no surprise.

The new format is being implemented for this new SSD. While it will look different, it still includes the important parts, so you should be all set.

Karl

For Internal Use Only

BOLDFlash Corporation 18 Commerce Boulevard BOLD Manchester, New Hampshire

New Product Description BOLDFast Product #D45-v3.21

Specifications SSD32-100 Model Number D45-v3.21 Interface Options SATA 6Gb/s NAND Flash Type MLC Performance

Sustained Data Transfer Rate (MB/s) 520 I/O Data Transfer Rate, Max (MB/s) 600 Sequential Read/Write Command Rate (MB/s) Peak, 128KB 520/450 Random Read/Write Command Rate (KIOPS) Peak, 4KB 85/11

Configuration/Reliability Nonrecoverable Read Errors per Bits Read, Max 1 per 10E16 Annualized Failure Rate (AFR) 0.58% Total Terabytes Written (TBW) Enterprise Workload Over Warranty Period 500 Total Terabytes Written (TBW) Sequentially Over Warranty Period 2630 Limited Warranty With Media Usage (years) 5

Power Management +5V Max Start Current (A) 0.5 Average Sleep Power (W) 0.5 Average Idle Power (W) 1.25 1.25 Average Operating Power (W) 2.8

Environmental Internal Operating Temperature (°C) 0 to 70 Nonoperating Temperature (°C) -40 to 75 Temperature Change Rate/Hr, Max (°C) 20 Relative Humidity, Noncondensing (%) 5 to 95 Shock, 0.5ms (Gs) 1000 Vibration, 20Hz to 2000Hz (Grms) 11.08

Physical Height (mm/in) 7.0/0.276 Width (mm/in) 70.10/2.76 Depth (mm/in) 100.45/3.955 Weight (g/lb) 100/0.220 Carton Unit Quantity 20 Cartons per Pallet 45 Cartons per Layer 9

Important product notes!

LBA mode When addressing these drives in LBA mode, all blocks (LBAs) are consecutively numbered from 0 to n–1, where n is the number of guaranteed LBAs as defined above. See Section 4.3.1, "Identify Device command" (words 60-61 and 100-103) for additional information about 48-bit addressing support of drives with capacities over 137GB.

Performance Sustained performance is the typical worst-case performance that the product will be able to achieve when the product is preconditioned as mentioned and host commands are aligned on 4KB boundaries. For models that support Lifetime Endurance Management, write values also take into account worst-case performance throttling to ensure the product meets specifications.

Time to Ready Power-on to Ready for media-related commands is defined as the time that it will take the drive to respond from the application power until it is ready to accept commands from the host that require access to the flash media. Commands such as FPDMA Read Extended and FPDMA Write Extended are examples of media-related commands. This value includes the time needed to charge the Power Loss Data Protection Circuit to a level that is adequate to protect customer data from unexpected power loss.

Nonoperating shock The nonoperating shock level that the drive can experience without incurring physical damage or degradation in performance when subsequently put into operation is 1000 Gs based on a half-sine shock pulse of 0.5ms duration.

Set Features command values 02H Enable write cache (default). 03H Set transfer mode (based on value in Sector Count register). Sector Count register values: 00H Set PIO mode to default (PIO mode 2). 01H Set PIO mode to default and disable IORDY (PIO mode 2). 08H PIO mode 0 09H PIO mode 1 0AH PIO mode 2 20H Multiword DMA mode 0 21H Multiword DMA mode 1 22H Multiword DMA mode 2

Reliability AFR and MTBF specifications assume the operating environment is designed to maintain nominal internal temperature. The rated AFR is based upon a sustained internal temperature of 60°C. Occasional excursions in operating temperature between the rated MTBF temperature and the maximum drive operating temperature may occur without impact to the rated MTBF temperature. However, continual or sustained operation at temperatures beyond the rated MTBF temperature will degrade the drive MTBF and reduce product reliability.