On May 13, 2013, at 6:58 AM, John J. McDonough <wb8rcr(a)arrl.net> wrote:
Within our documentation, we do not like to over use the word
"see" as
this can be an uncomfortable reminder to visually impaired readers. It
is especially challenging in the Release Notes as almost every other
paragraph tends to refer the reader to an external link. The result is
paragraph after paragraph of "for details see ..." or "for more
information see …".
The examples are idioms, they aren't meant to be taken so literally as to connote
"vision required".
Using the above proposed logic, the saying "I'm happy to see you" would
cause a blind person to become uncomfortable. This is silly.
Blind people themselves say they "watch TV" and they "read books", and
so on. The word see does not make them uncomfortable.
Instead of "see", it is preferable to use terms like
"refer to", "may be
found at" or other terms that do not imply a particular way of reading.
When referencing some user-visible change, exchange terms like "users
will see improved performance" for phrases like "users will notice
improved performance".
Simply being alert to this also helps make the prose a little less
repetitive.
Making the prose less repetitive and idiomatic, is valid. It makes translation far easier
and more accurate.
Chris Murphy