Document technical design details
Most of the output can be produced by software today.
This is the most automatable shape of work there is, and also the shape that most needs a live connection to the system the record lives in. Without that connection an agent can prepare the entry but cannot file it.
| How automatable | Mostly automatable |
|---|---|
| Kind of work | Recording, documentation and administration |
| Jobs that do it | 17 occupations |
| Tool categories that apply | Tools and auth, Builders |
| O*NET activity | Documenting/Recording Information (4.A.3.b.6) |
What this looks like on the job
Not our paraphrase. These are real task statements recorded against this activity, spread across the 17 occupations that perform it.
- Prepare information regarding design, structure specifications, materials, color, equipment, estimated costs, or construction time.
- Prepare, or supervise preparation of, all data, charts, plots, maps, records, and documents related to surveys.
- Prepare reports, sketches, working drawings, specifications, proposals, and budgets for proposed sites or systems.
- Prepare documentation containing information such as confidential descriptions or specifications of proprietary hardware or software, product development or introduction schedules, product costs, or information about product performance weaknesses.
- Document equipment or process details of radio frequency identification device (RFID) technology.
- Record or oversee recording of information to ensure currency of engineering drawings and documentation of production problems.
- Prepare detailed reports or design statements, based on results of validation and qualification tests or reviews of procedures and protocols.
- Write performance requirements for product development or engineering projects.
- Create or maintain formal engineering documents, such as schematics, bills of materials, components or materials specifications, or packaging requirements.
- Create or maintain photonic design histories.
- Make system device lists or event timing charts.
- Assemble documentation packages and produce drawing sets to be checked by an engineer or an architect.
- Design electrical and mechanical systems for avionic instrumentation applications.
- Compile and maintain records documenting engineering schematics, installed equipment, installation or operational problems, resources used, repairs, or corrective action performed.
- Assist nanoscientists or engineers in writing process specifications or documentation.
- Prepare specifications, designs, or sketches for machines, components, or systems related to the generation, transmission, or use of mechanical or fluid energy.
- Complete detailed source and method notes describing the location of routine or complex land parcels.
- Write descriptions of property boundary surveys for use in deeds, leases, or other legal documents.
What we would actually use
One recommendation rather than a shortlist, because a shortlist is just your problem handed back. This is what we would buy for recording, documentation and administration, and what it costs.
The work is not writing the record, it is filing it where the record lives. Make reaches most of those systems from $9 a month, which is the cheapest honest start; Composio is for when you are writing the agent yourself.
Chosen for the cheapest thing that does the job, not the best funded. Nothing on this site is sponsored, and the full landscape is there when you want to disagree with us.
The rest of the category
Context, not alternatives to weigh up. We name the layer rather than promise a named product does your specific task.
Matched from the kind of work, not from vendor marketing. Check any of them can reach the system your records actually live in — that connection, not the model, is where these projects stall.
How people actually do it
No workflow names this activity yet, but these automate the same kind of work, with the prompts to paste and what to keep for yourself.
Who does this work
17 occupations in the O*NET database perform this activity. Each one has a full breakdown of its other tasks.
- Aerospace Engineering and Operations Technologists and Technicians
- Agricultural Engineers
- Architects, Except Landscape and Naval
- Electrical and Electronic Engineering Technologists and Technicians
- Electrical and Electronics Drafters
- Electronics Engineers, Except Computer
- Industrial Engineers
- Mechanical Engineering Technologists and Technicians
- Mechanical Engineers
- Microsystems Engineers
- Nanotechnology Engineering Technologists and Technicians
- Photonics Engineers
- Radio Frequency Identification Device Specialists
- Robotics Engineers
- Surveying and Mapping Technicians
- Surveyors
- Validation Engineers
Work that goes with it
O*NET groups these under “Document technical designs, procedures, or activities”. In practice they tend to be done by the same person, in the same sitting.
Method. The activity, its taxonomy placement and the occupations that perform it come straight from the public-domain O*NET 30.3 database. The automatability band is ours: we map each of O*NET’s 41 generalized work activities to how much of its output current software can produce, assuming a person still reviews and owns the result. It is a coarse three-way judgment on purpose. A precise-looking percentage here would be invented.