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Category Archives: Technical Writing
I Wonder That You Will Still Be Writing; Nobody Reads You
Agile got (at least) one thing right: stop writing documents no one’s ever going to read. If you want to honestly assess what will or won’t be read – and therefore what should or shouldn’t be written – you should … Continue reading
Don’t Let HR Block Your Next Technical Writer
First let me clarify – I’ve nothing against HR and their involvement in the hiring process. What I object to very specifically are two habits: letting HR choose who gets interviewed, and letting HR do the first interview and veto … Continue reading
Do not Hire This Person: Technical Writers Edition
Three things some technical writers say that should serve as a warning sign that you may not want to hire them: “I only need to understand it at the UI level”. If you don’t understand how and why things happen, … Continue reading
QA: Need Help Finding UX Faults? Ask the Technical Writers
Technical writers have a very clear goal: explain the interface. That means they notice, instantly, when it’s inexplicable. If your interface is a confusing mess with overly-complicated procedures, buttons that make no sense, important options hidden in sub-menus and related … Continue reading
Make Yourself a Better Writer: Treat Every Document Like a Writing Sample
The only way to improve, the internet keeps telling us, is to push yourself past your comfort zone so that you’re always learning new things. Writing day in and day out, however, can mean you start to churn out documents on … Continue reading
Posted in Articles, Technical Writing
Tagged Quick writing tips, Writing for writers
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Quick Writing Tip: Don’t Add Images Until the Text is Done
Here’s a quick writing tip for user manuals: don’t add your images to the manual until you’re done writing your text. This has two advantages. The first is that when you add images one at a time over the long … Continue reading
Stump Documents: on Failures to Write Transferable Information
There is a general problem in software, more pronounced in minimalist Agile efforts, of documents that look good at the time of writing, but do a poor job of transferring information. I call these “stump” documents because readers are stumped … Continue reading
Posted in Articles, Technical Writing
Tagged Writing for non-writers, Writing for writers
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Lessons I Learned as a Tester, 4: Testers Should Write the First Draft and Approve the Last Draft of Release Notes
You might say I learned this lesson as a technical writer, too.
Five Questions for Technical Writing Interviews
These questions are for experienced candidates, not aspiring writers, and are meant to reveal general attitudes and methods. You want to see how people think, and how they act and react to other writers.
Punctuation in UI: the Oxford Comma
The Oxford comma, or serial comma, is the comma that sometimes appears in a list before the last “and”, “or” and so on. It has somehow become a battleground of punctuation, because some people always use it while others never … Continue reading
