When used in an engineering context, the term ‘Technical Documentation’ generally refers to any type of documentation that is used to describe the functionality, architecture, and also handling of any technical product, as well as any product that is under development or even currently in use. This specialized form of documentation may include patents (the name given to the exclusive set of rights granted by a sovereign or head of state to a certain inventor or his assignee in exchange for public disclosure of certain intellectual property, such as an invention).

Other forms of technical documentation include test methods (certain procedures that can obtain the result of a test that can be considered part of a technical operation carried out to determine certain characteristics of a given product, process or service); Requirements of quality management systems; Item data sheets (lists of components and parts that also summarize their performance and provide sufficient detail on their technical characteristics so that they can be used efficiently by a design engineer and integrated into the overall system).

It is also possible that specialized companies that are responsible for the production of technical publications, as well as larger providers of product support services, upload certain technical documentation online. These companies and firms may provide services called ‘design repositories’ (most often abbreviated as ‘DR’) which were created to provide a secure location for the management and storage of key project data, as well as complex technical documents such as ILS (Integrated Logistics Support), Documents and Data, Logistics Support Analysis Records (LSARs), as well as TLMPs (Through Life Management Plans). Design repositories are designed to provide access to up-to-date technical documentation on the military online.

Technical Documents Online (TDOL) is used to support more than 10,000 military equipment support publications (as well as a significant number for the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force), so more than 30,000 technical publications and manuals are available electronically, greatly reducing the need for paper manuals and publications.

Companies that have access to the software that TDOL enables can provide a wide range of related services, such as the initial creation of technical documents and the modification of existing manuals and documents. These companies can also upload new and changed manuals and also produce paging files (printing instructions) as well as .pdf files in TDOL format.