Add use cases or requirements

[jlyle1]

I often have difficulty figuring out what an IG is for. Explicit description of the functionality, either with use cases or references to DAMs or other requirements assets, will help people not involved in the IG creation understand what it's for and how it fits in the landscape.

[lmckenzi]

There is no DAM or use-case for this IG. It's not intended to support implementation of anything. Its sole purpose is to provide guidance to authors of IGs, and perhaps to readers of IGs. Is that purpose not clear from the home page?

[jlyle1]

Amazing, amusing example of the use/mention problem. Correct, no need to include a use case for This IG, but since this IG recommends best practices for other IGs, some sort of rationale would be a good thing to recommend.

[JohnMoehrke]

I was thinking this Issue was asking for the ig-guidance IG to recommend to authors of other IG to make it clear on their index page clear purpose. That is a statement of the problem solved by this IG. In HL7 we work hard to make sure that the title and description that goes into the IG-Registry are clear, but seems this same clarity, if not the same words, should be very prominent at the very beginning of all IGs. This because some readers will look to the IG-Registry, but others will stumble upon the IG itself.

[lmckenzi]

Ok. I agree that IGs should make clear what their purpose and scope are. I'm not sure we want to say that use cases or DAMs are the best way to do that. (My experience has been that IGs that take that approach can often be less implementer friendly than those that do...)