Information Density in Technical Writing

Option A is correct. The rewrite splits one overloaded sentence into three focused sentences, each carrying one main idea. This is the core principle of managing information density: one idea per sentence for foundational documentation aimed at a mixed audience. Option B strips out too much — idempotency and batching matter for debugging. Option C omits all context and leaves the reader with no mental model. Option D keeps all the same information in an even worse structure by stringing clauses with "and". Breaking dense sentences apart is the most reliable way to improve comprehension without losing technical accuracy.

Option B is correct. API reference documentation for experienced developers should be dense but precise: every word carries information. Option B packs the HTTP method, path, behaviour, status code, and key response field into one sentence — the right density for a reference table. Option A is vague and useless as a reference. Option C is a verbose prose rewrite that adds nothing but words — the opposite of a good API reference style. Option D is too telegraphic: it loses the behaviour description ("enqueues a background job") which is the most important piece. Density in API docs means: no padding, no missing semantics.

Option C is the overloaded paragraph. It chains six distinct steps in a single sentence without numbering, headings, or line breaks. Each step (install, configure, migrate, seed, start, verify) deserves its own numbered list item. Dense prose works well for explanatory text but is harmful for procedural text — readers following instructions need to track their position, and a wall of steps in a single sentence makes that impossible. Options A, B, and D are appropriately simple single-idea sentences. The fix is not to compress but to restructure: use a numbered list, one imperative verb per item.

Option B is correct. Information density should be calibrated to audience and document type. An ADR is read by senior engineers and architects who need to understand the full reasoning chain — that requires connected prose with causal connectors, not fragmented bullets. Dense reasoning in an ADR is appropriate because the audience can handle it and the document's purpose is to preserve complex decision logic. Short sentences work for procedures and quick-reference docs. Bullet points break logical flow when reasoning is interconnected. The 30-word limit (Option D) would make the ADR useless as a decision record.

Option B is correct. Slack messages aimed at triggering action need high signal density with low noise: state the problem, the hypothesis, the ask, and include the evidence (link to logs). Option B achieves all four in 20 words plus a placeholder for the link. Option A is too compressed — "DB maybe" loses the mechanism hypothesis and the action request. Option C is over-formal for Slack and buries the ask at the end. Option D keeps all the hedging from the original and adds no clarity. In asynchronous team communication, density means: no filler words, but all essential facts present.