Mediating Group Dynamics through Tabletop Interface Design  

Our tabletop research efforts at Stanford University have focused on how tabletop user interfaces (UIs) might respond to and even influence a user group's social dynamics.

Morris, M.R., Piper, A.M., Cassanego, A., Huang, A., Paepcke, A., and Winograd, T. Stanford University (2006). Articles>Collaboration>User Interface

Merging XML Files: A New Approach Providing Intelligent Merge of XML Data Sets  

As XML becomes ubiquitous so the need for powerful tools to manipulate XML data becomes more pressing. Merging XML is particularly tricky, but often necessary to consolidate data feeds from heterogeneous systems, or to synchronize submissions of XML fragments which make up a larger document. An automated mechanism for defining and controlling such merges has been developed and is demonstrated to provide a consistent, adaptable and resilient solution to this problem. Integration into an information pipeline allows limitless customization.

La Fontaine, Robin. DeltaXML.com (2001). Articles>Information Design>XML>Collaboration

The Methodology of Participatory Design    

Technical communicators have lately become interested in participatory design as a way to structure and guide their research and development efforts, particularly in online media. But attempts to use participatory design - in technical communication and elsewhere - have been hampered because participatory design has typically been seen as an orientation or field rather than a methodology with its own methods, techniques, and acceptable range of research designs. In this article, I work with a range of participatory design sources to describe it as a methodology useful for technical communicators. After providing the historical and methodological grounding for understanding participatory design as a methodology, I describe its research designs, methods, criteria, and limitations. Finally, I provide guidance for applying it to technical communication research.

Spinuzzi, Clay. Technical Communication Online (2005). Articles>Collaboration>Methods

Monitoring Communication in Partnering Projects

This report is a summary of a two year research project carried out by the IT byg group at BYG. DTU for the Danish government agencies Erhvervsfremmestyrelsen and By- og Bolig-ministeriet. The objectives were to collect data on the use of IT by the PPB housing consortia, a development project to test out various innovations, to map communications between the partners, and compare IT usage with their original proposals. Data was collected on communications in housing projects in the period June 1999- Aug 2000. The original PPB proposals were made in 1994/5 but there have been breaks in the flow of projects, and information technology has gone through much change since then. Use of Email has taken over from post and fax, and Project Webs have been developed in most consortia. Consortium members' policies have dominated the choice of management and logistics software, restricted compatibility in the consortia, and limited willingness to share data. Greater involvement by the client, and more sharing of equity, would have encouraged adoption of common IT systems and created more trust for data sharing between partners. PPB projects have allowed consortium members to test out new technologies but, in general, the IT systems used have been similar to those which the larger firms use elsewhere. Vertical integration has been limited by lack of experience and technology in smaller firms. In future, access to Project Webs from mobile devices should help use by all partners from any location. In all the projects studied, and in spite of the introduction of Email and Project Webs, the ratio of non-IT communications to IT varied from 0.8 to 4.6. When problems need to be solved rapidly there appears to be a tendency to revert to traditional means of communication - meetings, telephone and fax.

Howard, Rob and Ernst Petersen. ITcon (2001). Articles>Collaboration>Community Building>Government

The Most Non-Boring Article About The UPA Board Ever

A quick overview of the Usability Professionals Association Board--what functions it performs, how it's structured, and who's currently performing what role.

Sherman, Paul J. Usability Professionals Association (2006). Articles>Usability>Collaboration

Moving Between Academe and Industry: Lessons Learned  

The author discusses her transition from academic professor to corporate worker and back to academic professor. She compares and contrasts some fundamental differences between these environments on the dimensions of teaching, research, collaboration, problem solving, and ethics. She describes some of the lessons she learned as she moved back and forth across these environments. She concludes by suggesting that, however large these transitions seem, they are transitions we routinely expect our students to make when they migrate from school to work.

Levine, Barbara J. STC Proceedings (2003). Articles>Collaboration>Industry and Academy

Moving to Single Sourcing: Managing the Effects of Organizational Changes    

Argues that the move to single sourcing often requires changes within teams as new skills are introduced and members' roles shift. Points out that while some changes may threaten the stability of the team, managers can anticipate and prevent problems.

Bottitta, Jeanette, Alexia Prendergast Idoura and Lisa Pappas. Technical Communication Online (2003). Articles>Content Management>Single Sourcing>Collaboration

Multilingual Knowledge Management Empowers Global eBusiness  

With the penetration of Internet technologies into global business operations, employees at every level are collaborating across multiple geographies.

Sargent, Benjamin B. ZDNet (2001). Articles>Knowledge Management>Collaboration>Online

The Nature of the Interchange Between Editors and Authors

Editors, if allowed to interact with authors on a level above the comma, could often help authors negotiate new meaning as authors struggle to translate their ideas into writing.

Document Design (2001). Articles>Collaboration>Editing

The Need for Technical Communication in IT Departments

Although many would not believe such to be true, there is a vast amount of communication that must be done in the IT world. This is even truer when the IT organization is involved with a regulated industry (e.g., pharmaceutical). In general, procedures and practices that went into the development, installation, and use/maintenance of a system require documentation and the communication of outages to the user community are also important. Among the more specific areas are help documentation, user instructions, code comments, installation instructions, and maintenance procedures/schedules. When a problem arises, it is often necessary for the IT professional to explain exactly what happened and provide the resolution in a coherent, layman-termed method, whether it be verbal or written (or both). Unfortunately, not all IT professionals are capable of doing this.

Mardekian, Beth. MetroVoice (2004). Articles>TC>Technology>Collaboration

Networking With Our Peers  

Technical communication is a broad field—its practitioners perform many different tasks in many different industries. Technical communicators may write technical documents, design multimedia presentations, create Web pages, or illustrate mechanical designs. And they may perform these tasks in industries such as aerospace, biotech, computer software, or agribusiness. To effectively network with your peers, you need to find your communities of practice.

Grice, Roger A. Intercom (2004). Articles>Collaboration>Professionalism

NetWorks or, How to Make Professional Connections When You Live and Work in the "Sticks"

NetWorks is an association of people involved in public relations, technical/computer documentation, marketing, fund raising, planning and development, training, journalism, editing, video production and publishing. We have a common interest in sharing ideas, information and resources.

Olander, Karen Wise. Boston Broadside (1992). Articles>TC>Collaboration>STC

Newsletter Co-Registration, and other Partnerships

When someone signs up for my newsletter, I list some other newsletters they might be interested in on my site's thank-you page. People can simply check a box next to the other newsletters they want to receive, click one button, and they're done. The publishers I partner with do the same for me, listing the Excess Voice newsletter on their sign-up thank-you pages.

Usborne, Nick. Excess Voice (2006). Articles>Web Design>Collaboration

A Newsletter Competition Where Everyone Wins  

A competition where everyone wins—is it too good to be true? Not if the STC Newsletter Competition Committee (STCNCC) has anything to say about it.

Ames, Andrea L., Cheryl Disch and Helen T. Hegelheimer. STC Proceedings (1996). Articles>Collaboration>Community Building>STC

A Newsletter Competition Where Everyone Wins  

A competition where everyone wins--is it too good to be true? Not if the Society for Technical Communication (STC) Newsletter Competition Committee (STCNCC) has anything to say about it. This year we implemented the second phase of a three-year plan to increase participation and maximize constructive feedback in the annual STC Newsletter Competition. In this discussion session, the STCNCC would like to see judges and editors meet to discuss the effectiveness of the competition and the committee’s plan to improve it. Participants are invited to consider ways to improve the competition in the future.

Ames, Andrea L. and Cheryl Disch. STC Proceedings (1997). Articles>Collaboration>Community Building>Newsletters

Nipping Client Silliness in the Bud

A significant number of ALA posts talk about unreasonable requests from clients. Either they want a Sony-level website on an AOL user's look at my kitties budget, or else they want so many features added to their sites that they will become as unusuable as the original boo.com.

Miller, Robin. List Apart, A (2000). Articles>Management>Collaboration

Notes on the Documentation Development Process

Define your audience, and their needs, explicitly and carefully. The definition process may lead you to include additional material such as indexes, system requirements, and contextual notes (e.g., lists of exceptions), as well as the preplanned documentation.

Hart, Geoffrey J.S. Geoff-Hart.com (1996). Articles>Documentation>Collaboration

Nourishing the Bonds: Managing Information to Maximize the Skills of the Dev-Test-ID Team  

The IBM TPF group is organized into tightly-coupled teams of developers, testers, and writers. This paper explores that relationship, including our method of managing information, and how it creates an environment conducive to high-quality information products.

Mills, M. Fay and Ellen C. Smyth. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>Collaboration

Now That You've Got a Double Agent, What Do You Do With 'Em?  

Having demonstrated the importance of acquiring a double agent for writing projects, we now want to explain the best ways to successfully indoctrinate a double agent. This paper will help you prepare for, orient, train, and become a mentor for a double agent to help make him or her an effective member of your writing team.

Fisher, Judith R., Karen L. Mobley and Michelle M. Wright. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>Writing>Technical Editing>Collaboration

Observations on Entrepreneurship, Instructional Texts, and Personal Interaction    

This article explores the complexity in Rohan's observation that "although texts in progress create community, this function hasn't value; in the world of business works in progress must be free" [1, p. 130]. To do so, the article describes the history of the development of the paper sewing pattern, discusses the role personal communications with consumers played as the genre evolved, and offers observations on the kinds of instruction provided by sewing machine and pattern companies. The extent to which gender and authority are connected in communications between consumers and corporate authors is explored. The article concludes by observing that once a genre is sufficiently established to become a standard, two changes occur: industries adopt authority for only certain types of necessary information, and women's authorship becomes anonymous, corporate, and personal exchanges with consumers are curtailed to save the expense.

Durack, Katherine T. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2003). Articles>Collaboration>Instructional Design>Gender

Obtaining Reprints--The Effects of Self-Addressed Return Labels    

This article compares the response rates for obtaining journal reprints from colleagues when the requests are made using postcards with or without a self-addressed return label. Higher response rates were obtained from the cards with the self-addressed return labels, and more women responded than did men, but these differences were not statistically significant.

Hartley, James. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2002). Articles>Research>Collaboration>Gender

On Development Methodology

Give me the smallest, smartest team possible, with the right tools and infrastructure. Work like fiends for two or three months to get infrastructure and applications started right, then grow slowly to maintain and build additional applications on the core technology.

Boynton, J.R. Diamond Lane, The. Articles>Project Management>Collaboration

One-On-One Japanese Business Etiquette

If you are traveling to Japan on business it is very important to have business cards created, or as they are called in Japan, meishi. Not only are they a useful tool to identify you and your company, but they can also provide additional information for your Japanese counterparts, such as any professional memberships or associations you may be involved in.

WTB Language Group (2005). Articles>Collaboration>Regional>Japan

Online Collaboration: Distance Learning and Professional Forums Display Advantages and Disadvantages  

Online collaboration has become a major resource for students and professionals alike. Distance learning and other forms of online communication have become established norms for many schools and professional organizations. While online communication has countless benefits, several disadvantages exist and continue to emerge. This paper will explore the authors’ personal experiences as students and professionals, taking an in-depth look at online collaboration forums such as distance learning and professional collaborations as well as the advantages and disadvantages that each of these forums present.

House, Andrea L. and Holly N. Siegelman. STC Proceedings (2000). Articles>Collaboration>Online

Online Communities

A study of how a rhetorical perspective can help to improve the construction of virtual communities. By applying rhetorical theory to environments and communication, my research demonstrates that the relationship between a speaker and audience is in part determined by spatial cues. That means that the architecture of a virtual environment creates interactional expectations that guide activity within the environment. A major component of these expectations is the authority of a participant in relation to others; spatial cues help speakers determine the ethos -- or relational background -- of others. Researching this relationship across a variety of online environments has demonstrated that the structure of public and private spaces within an online community will affect congregating patterns, conversational habits, genres of discourse, community coherence, and social structure. In addition to spatial cues, representational choices also influence participants’ expectations of themselves and others. In my most recent study I have created an online environment that incorporates an @race property into the familiar litany of @gender, @description, and @research found in many educational and social environments.

Kolko, Beth E. ACM SIGCHI (1999). Articles>Collaboration>Online