After many years of blogging, and consistent with my desire to move toward retirement, we have ended the Insights blog. Thanks to Doug Bedell for his years of blog support.

Sharing While Studying

Posted on May 31, 2012
Filed Under Communication, Technology, The Writing Life | 2 Comments

We’re in the technical writing business ourselves, but we believe in taking a community approach to the craft. (Hence this blog as a modest offering.) We can learn from each other and the abundant resources available on the Web. How abundant? Well, take a look at Technical Writing Toolbox, which is a blog on technical writing, but a kind of writer’s “resource central,” too. We’re on the Resources tab with the link here.

Blogs, social networks, an online library, LinkedIn groups and Twitter hastags – all for technical writers. Gurpreet Singh, formally of New Delhi, India, and now a full-time student in technical communication in Toronto, Canada, provides these resources, and we’re grateful to him.

“I love writing. Period.” Gurpreet tells us. “There is nothing else in the world that attracts me more than the magnetism of words.” Well, it’s one thing to love writing, most of us in the technical writing field do. But few of us are inclined to share as freely as Gurpreet has while attending classes as well. (Even if his classes develop the information he’s sharing.)

This is the kind of fraternity that the Internet encourages, and it’s awesome, and humbling, to see it in practice. Thanks again, man! – Doug Bedell

Clarity Produces a Rush, Whether It Survives Or Not

Posted on February 7, 2012
Filed Under Communication, Technology, The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

Here’s a lady who understands a prime component of good technical writing, or any writing, for that matter:

“What all the (technical writing) disciplines share in common is a need for the writer to communicate effectively within the perspective of user need from the document, and to have a strong awareness of good ways to enhance the message through visuals and good use of white space.”

The sentence, by Christine Lebednik on the Street Articles site, is a trifle awkward in terms of what a user needs from the document he or she is reading, but it gets to the two essentials of good technical writing: tight, clear expression of why the document exists (a means to a given, safe end), and ways to enhance it with illustrations and white space.

Christine isn’t in technical writing any longer. When she was, though (prior to the bursting of the IT bubble in 2001-02), she was most familiar with the fields of aviation, medical and pharmaceutical writing.

Our colleague, Dennis Owen, notes that there are many other settings in need of good technical writing. Start by looking around your house, or out the window: “IKEA furniture? Someone had to write the assembly instructions. Component stereo or flat screen TV? Someone had to create the connection and installation diagrams. Smart thermostat? Hell, mine has an entire booklet (and it’s still hard to program). Car? The owner’s manual is a serious example of technical writing. On and on…”
Read more

Writing Over a Lifetime – Now to E-Raves!

Posted on January 29, 2012
Filed Under Technology, The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

Now here’s a thought (and a little change of pace). Writing is good for the soul, including the souls of technical writers. “I’ll do it forever even when I’m not exactly sure where the story is taking me,” says John Piccarreto, who works in quality assurance for UCB Pharmaceuticals.

In addition to his day job, Piccarreto writes as a hobby and last May published his first novel, Beer Cart Girls Save the World. The tale was five years in the telling. “It has no really deep messages,” he says, “but it keeps people reading.” Piccarreto’s personal story comes to us via a feature in The Democrat and Chronicle in Rochester, N.Y.
Read more

Expect to be Writing and Diagramming on Tablets

Posted on January 26, 2012
Filed Under Business, Communication, Technology, The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

Apple’s education event in New York City this month had striking implications, not only for high school and college students and their teachers, but for technical writers as well. That’s how we see it anyway.

Written and graphic communication and learning, it’s clear, are going to become increasingly tablet-based, especially iPad-based. To glean the possibilities, we invite you to watch the video on iPad learning that Apple has posted on its website. You’ll be wowed by the fluidity and currency that can be added to texts and illustrations by formatting them as idocuments. (You’ll need to use Apple’s Safari browser, though, it’s the only one the presentation plays on.)
Read more

Procedure Writing for the ‘Masses’

Posted on January 9, 2012
Filed Under Communication, Technology, The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

On ffeathers, one of the technical writing blogs we visit, a question’s been raised about whether comments should be allowed on documentation pages, from, we presume, just about anyone in an organization, and maybe customers, too. Sarah Maddox, who presides over ffeathers, is a technical writer for Atlassian, an Australian software company.

So here we have another example of the web’s ability to promote an international discussion. The question of who might have access to documentation these days becomes wider than when paper, or a personal computer file, was the medium of expression. Atlassian produces its product documentation on a wikki – it happens to produce Confluence, one of the leading wikki software packages.
Read more

Writing to a ‘Cloud’

Posted on December 12, 2011
Filed Under Communication, Technology, The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

We’ve been accused occasionally of writing on a cloud, but writing to a cloud is something new in the annals of technical writing. The term refers, of course, to writing to an offsite server that functions as a supposedly eternal storage hub and allows ready access from anywhere to you and your colleagues or clients.

The “Cherryleaf” blog, like many other web-based scribal centers, notes that, “There are a number of reasons why a Technical Author might want to use a cloud-based application.”They’re “inexpensive, allow new authors to get integrated quickly, facilitate collaborative authoring and allow for third-party groups to log in and make minor edits.”
Read more

A Halloween Diversion – For Next Year

Posted on October 27, 2011
Filed Under The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

Put this aside for Halloween – next year’s Halloween. Because if you’re going to observe Halloween as Shawn Thorsson does in Petaluma, CA, it takes a full year to get ready.

This post is a bit of a spooked diversion, true. But we’re indebted to MAKE magazine for introducing us to Shawn, who evidently goes BIG into whatever interests him. As MAKE puts it, “This guy doesn’t make costumes and props, he creates something of a reality distortion field around him and his creations.”
Read more

A Mac (and a Lisa) Helped Build TMI’s Safety Culture

Posted on October 9, 2011
Filed Under Communication, Technology, The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

Along with all the tributes to Steve Jobs, and a virtually inexpressible sadness at his passing, comes a memory of the first Macintosh I encountered, and quickly came to love. At the time I worked at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Station, where I was the post-accident communication manager. That was not long after Apple Computer introduced the Mac early in 1984.

We were preparing to defuel the damaged reactor core and to restart the undamaged companion reactor. Permeating all the activity at TMI in those days was a renewed commitment to quality, to absorbing the lessons of the Unit 2 accident and building a strong safety culture. Employee communication was important to that end, and helping to improve communication was the Mac’s role.
Read more

Technical Writers As Pencil-Pushing Listeners

Posted on September 13, 2011
Filed Under Technology, The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

It’s great when a technical writer can produce a pristine new procedure from his or her first-time observation of a new piece of equipment and capture what it takes to operate it safely. But it doesn’t always work that way, especially in settings where large numbers of veteran workers are retiring.

The “vets” have a great deal of stored knowledge from their many rounds at the plant, and they’ll be taking it all with them unless technical writers serving as reporters can capture it before they leave. (“Valve 1AS-65 is a pain. When you open it, never open it all the way, because the valve stem leaks.”)
Read more

Writing Engaging Employee Handbooks

Posted on September 1, 2011
Filed Under Business, Technology, The Writing Life | Leave a Comment

Ever been asked to write an employee handbook? That’s a special challenge because you’re writing on behalf of an organization for the people whose enthusiasm, support and creativity are vital to its success. They don’t cotton to legalese or strictures. An effective handbook needs to be more than simply a recitation of rules.  We’re talking, in effect, about technical writing with a human face.

In this context, we’ve come across a website – klariti.com – with a page on “How to Make Employee Handbooks More Human.” It’s selling an employee handbook template, but it’s modestly priced ($9.99) and might be good to have on hand. Beyond that, though, Ivan Walsh, the writer, has some pertinent tips for putting an engaging handbook together.
Read more

« go back — keep looking »
Email Subscribe

Recently


Categories


Archives


Blogroll