Overhead Forms Task

Description
Determine which forms the overhead team should use

Tasks
in the document originals binder (done) (done) stocked in overhead files (done)
 * Review all the forms in the overhead files plus the unused ones
 * Check BC SAR's web page
 * Consider 6-step forms (done)
 * identify best forms to use (done)
 * Consider whether we need to customize or improve existing forms
 * Create new forms as needed (done)
 * Verify that every new form is in PDF/RTF (done)
 * Determine how many of each form is needed (done)
 * convert form numbers to standard PCSAR Doc numbers (done)
 * update PCSAR Doc-000 to list new forms (done)
 * update inventory to list how many of each form should be
 * print the needed number of new forms (done)
 * Update the files (SARCAR and Fire Hall) (done)
 * give each manager a single copy of each form: ManagerKitTask

How to create good forms
This is our experience in creating forms.

Margins
The forms need to be printable with the PCSAR printer (HP Officejet D135).

The minimum margins are:

Portrait Landscape Minimum top right 0.5" for two-sided printing; unknown for one-sided bottom left 0.5" left top? right bottom 0.3"

Unless the form is very crowded for space use 0.5" margins on all sides.

Form Boxes
Areas where someone is expected to write should have a box around it.

One line of writing should have a minimum height of 0.89 cm = 0.35 inches.

The label for the box should be in the upper left corner. Font: Times New Roman, point size 8.

Colours
We intend to have the forms easily identifiable when they are spread, mixed, and burried on a table during the hectic parts of a search. To achieve easy identification, we use:


 * a small amount of colour on the forms, corresponding with the overhead role that primarily uses that colour. These colours are the same as the folders that we use and the vests that we have.
 * Yellow: search manager
 * Blue: planning. Standard blue doesn't show up very well so we use "light cyan" instead.
 * Red: logistics. Standard red is too dark, so we use "light red" instead.
 * Green: operations.

Check Boxes
Check boxes (tick boxes) are best created using the special unicode character U+25A1, which is a small raised box. The "Courier New" font has a particularly good image of that character.

The alternative of creating check boxes using borders around a small table element doesn't create as good a visual image.

Common Content
Each form should indicate:


 * who filled it out. This is usually described as "Writer".
 * What date and time the form was filled out. Some forms have material continuously added to them, so may have blanks for more than one time.
 * These three fields are best as a row at the top of the form. If in boxes, use italics for the field names to emphasize that they are separate from the content of the form (i.e. the date is the date the form was filled out, not the date of the occurance).

Each form should have a footer:
 * Font: Times New Roman, Regular, 8 point
 * No border -- this information should not attract attention from the rest of the form
 * in the center: who should use this form in the ICS model. E.g.
 * Search Manager
 * Operations
 * Planning
 * Logistics
 * against the right margin: the document ID, in the form PCSAR Doc-87 revised 2004-04-30. Note that "Doc" is capitalized and followed by a hyphen. The revised date is in yyyy-mm-dd. If you have to come out with two revisions on the same date, use yyyy-mm-dd.2, etc.

Common Spelling Mistakes

 * "Opp Period" should be "Op Period", short for "Operations Period"