Applying Common Sense to Technical Writing    

How can budding writers achieve a middle path in their approach to documentation? This no-model approach is an attempt at busting the myth that only a model-based approach works.

Chitkara, Promila. International Journal for Technical Communication (2007). Articles>TC>Writing>Technical Writing

Applying Minimalist Principles, Strategies, and Techniques  

People use documentation differently from what we might expect. They don’t like to read; instead they jump to a task with prior knowledge, and sometimes don’t realize they’ve made an error. Understanding how users learn and applying John Carroll’s minimalist principles will help provide solutions to this problem. Documentation that has been successfully planned and designed for minimalism may take longer to create than other manuals, but reaps the benefits of making users more productive and happy, while reducing support calls, maintenance, translation, and publishing costs. The key factors to a successful minimalist approach (or any good documentation design) are a keen understanding of your users, prototypes designed to match tasks relevant to users, and iterative testing to improve each draft.

Lester, Susan M.J. STC Proceedings (2000). Articles>TC>Writing>Minimalism

Beyond the Mechanical: Technical Writing Revisited  

Optimism about the future of technical writing can be sustained only if we persist in setting for technical writing the same standards we apply to other sophisticated modes of writing and require refinement in style as well as accuracy in content. The importance of content in technical writing, of the information presented, may seduce us into seeing technical writing as purely a form of language engineering and into teaching our students to perform mechanical writing tasks, churning out dull reports to fit mindlessly into the institutional norms of industry and government.

Iyasere, Marla Mudar. JAC (1988). Articles>Writing>TC>Technical Writing

The Composing Process of Technical Writers: A Preliminary Study  

Janet Emig's 1971 study, The Composing Process of Twelfth Graders, spurred an interest in the writing process: how writers compose rather than simply what they compose. However, a survey of current literature indicates that little has been published on the composing processes of technical writers. Perhaps we have assumed that technical writers compose as other writers do. In order to test this assumption, we conducted the research on which we base this study.

Roundy, Nancy and David Mair. JAC (1983). Articles>Writing>TC

Confessions of a Technical Author: What Can Technical Communicators Learn from David Ogilvy?

David Ogilvy was an advertising genius who distilled his successful concepts and techniques into a bestselling book I've just finished reading, called "Confessions of an Advertising Man". I wanted to read his book, because I often find it useful to look at other professions and ask whether their ideas could be applied to the world of technical authoring.

Pratt, Ellis. Cherryleaf (2008). Articles>TC>Writing>Technical Writing

Delivering Clear Messages in a Technical Environment  

Argues that effective titles and slogans can help members of a documentation team keep their focus while working on a project.

Kocak, Paul J. Intercom (2001). Articles>Writing>TC

Establishing Yourself in a Writerless World  

Establishing a presence in a department that hasn’t had the benefit of technical writers can pose many challenges. As a writer newly assigned to such a department, I worked closely with my manager to develop the technical writer’s role, presented the role to key staff and teams, and created initial procedures to support writers within the department. By performing these tasks and thinking creatively about handling projects with a limited amount of writers, we’ve been able to work constructively with teams in our department and produce effective documentation.

Caliendo, Corin J. STC Proceedings (1998). Articles>Writing>TC

How Important is the Writing Part of Technical Writing?

Writing documentation isn't merely the act of pounding out dry prose. There is some creativity involved which comes from how you present the information, both textually and visually. The writing, though, needs to be easy to read, complete, concise, and to the point.

DMN Communications (2007). Articles>TC>Writing>Technical Writing

Illustration and Language in Technical Communication    

Many technical documents present information both graphically and verbally. While much is known about the verbal tools of technical professionals, technical graphics have been less fully examined. Here the drawings of a United States patent are examined revealing a system for organizing and presenting visual information that is analogous to commonly-used models for organizing and presenting verbal information.

Donnell, Jeffrey. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2005). Articles>TC>Technical Writing>Technical Illustration

Issues in Technical Writing

Now it is very important to recognize the vital role of a technical writer and services expected to provide to justify the requirements of this profession. Since technical writer is a sub category of technical communication, that involves other categories involved in documentation, like content writer, software configuration manager, technical editor, information designer and many more.

Albing, Bill. KeyContent.org (2005). Articles>TC>Communication>Technical Writing

It's Not the Tool, It's the Writer

This blog post ponders whether or not technical communicators are sometimes too enamoured with the tools, and because of that lose sight of what's best for the reader.

DMN Communications (2008). Articles>TC>Technical Writing>Technology

Learn to Read Technical Writing!

Why is my daughter not being taught to read technical literature? Practical things like reading a VCR manual or a pamphlet on health.

Kamath, Gurudutt R. IT People (2003). Articles>TC>Writing>Technical Writing

Mystery Fiction and the Technical Communicator: Emotion Separates Fiction from Fact   

Although technical documents and mysteries share certain characteristics, emotion separates the two types of writing. Mystery fiction may be popular among technical communicators because it engages both the analytical and the emotive parts of the readers' personality. This panel presentation describes techniques that mystery authors use to trigger readers' emotions. An awareness of these techniques can help technical communicators understand their affection for mysteries and stay clear about the purpose of their own work.

Jennings, Ann S. STC Proceedings (1999). Articles>Writing>TC>Emotions

On Writing, Technical Communication, and Information Technology: The Core Competencies of Technical Communication    

This article contributes two arguments to the disciplinary conversation of technical communication with the aim of exploring leadership opportunities our field has in the field of information technology. The arguments assert that 1.) Writing is the core technology in any IT system, and all IT systems attempt to leverage the core strengths of writing to make these systems more valuable. 2.) Technical communicators have a central role to play in IT systems consonant with our core competencies: we attend to the balance of situated as opposed to generalized strategies and the balance of appeals to identity in writing about the practical use of technology, and we are well prepared to attend to these balances in other important arenas of IT discourse. Together, these two arguments are meant to begin or continue conversations—in workplace and academic contexts alike—that bring the issues of IT development and the future of technical communication closely together.

Hart-Davidson, William. Technical Communication Online (2001). Articles>TC>Writing>Technical Writing

Reflections of a GTA on the Teaching of Technical Writing

Though I have a degree in technical communication and have worked as a technical writer for four years, I still had no idea what should be taught in a technical writing classroom, or how one should go about teaching it. Before I ventured into the arena as an instructor, I wanted to find out what goes on in a technical writing classroom. Two types of practical research that I thought would provide some insight into technical writing instruction were: an observation of different technical communication classrooms; and a survey of various textbooks available for technical communication courses.

Anderson, Ginger. Michigan Tech University (1998). Articles>Education>TC>Technical Writing

Tactics and the Quotidian: Resistance and Professional Discourse  

The research I discuss in this essay addresses what I take to be an unfortunate imbalance in current research on professional writing. Research reports in journals and in edited collections describe different professional discourses, how they are formed, how they operate, how organizational structure and discourse are related, and how writers learn to participate productively in institutional discourse. With some notable exceptions, very little of the research being reported concerns the ideologically coercive effects of institutional and professional discourse—what my students and I have come to call 'the dark side of the force.' If Foucault had to argue that cultural theorists should think of power as productive rather than merely repressive, I argue that rhetoric needs to recognize that the opposite is also true of discourse. That is, research in professional and nonacademic writing should begin to investigate not only the ways in which discourse produces knowledge, but also the ways in which it extends the grid of discipline and the ways in which writers resist the mute processes to which de Certeau refers in the epigraph above.

Herndl, Carl G. JAC (1996). Articles>Writing>TC

Taking a Political Turn: The Critical Perspective and Research in Professional Communication      

This article examines the critical perspective as an alternative to our current descriptive, explanatory research focus. The critical perspective aims at empowerment and emancipation. It reinterprets the relationship between researcher and participants as one of collaboration, where participants define research questions that matter to them and where social action is the desired goal. Examples of critical research include feminist, radical educational, and participatory action research. Adopting the critical perspective would require that scholars in professional communication rethink their choices of research questions and sites, their views of the ownership of research results, and the types of funding they seek for research initiatives.

Blyler, Nancy. Technical Communication Quarterly (1998). Articles>TC>Writing>Rhetoric

Technical Communication and Programming: Using Writing Rules

This article is about better commenting practices for the purpose of—perhaps—helping some to better their programming practices. But before beginning, let me qualify the entire thing by saying that I am not a programmer—not the professional kind anyway. I have created small programs in the past for some of my employers, but that is not how I make my living. Therefore, I am not trying to teach principles of programming. I am only a writing teacher who happens to enjoy programming as a hobby. And while I cannot provide insight into better programming principles, I can offer guidance about writing those short pieces of text programmers always embed, but sometimes neglect. Helping students write better documents is, after all, my occupation; and believe it or not the principles I teach to write better papers are not that different from the principles needed to write better code.

Lanier, Clinton R. sense and usability (2008). Articles>TC>Technical Writing>Methods

To Attract or to Inform: What Are Titles For?    

This article critiques some titles in journal articles for being misleading and it argues that titles need to be informative. Examples are given of work on measuring the effectiveness of titles in two areas--sentence structure and reader comprehension--and the article concludes with brief comments on the effectiveness of book titles.

Hartley, James. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2005). Articles>TC>Writing>Metadata

Transferable and Local Writing Skills  

One indication of the state of our profession is the discriminations that we are just getting around to making: useful, even essential, 'sortings out' that, when then, are made, seem embarrassingly obvious. One such 'sorting out' or discrimination is essential for an understanding of what any composition class can do, whether advanced composition, technical writing, feature writing, or whatever. In the writer’s repertoire, there are local and transferable skills. Local skills have to do with a given genre and involve such matters as special forms (e. g., the scientific report), footnoting, vocabularies, special styles, and even the 'tones' that particular fields demand. Transferable skills are the 'basics' of writing: syntactic fluency, control of diction, sense of audience, organizational ability, 'mechanics' such as punctuation and spelling.

Winterowd, W. Ross. JAC (1980). Articles>TC>Writing>Rhetoric

Using Documentation Out of Sequence

User documentation is rarely, if ever, read like an ordinary book. Readers jump around, finding the information that they need to perform a particular task and pretty much ignore the rest. Until they need that information, of course.

DMN Communications (2008). Articles>TC>Writing

We'll Never Get This Past Legal

Looks at usable writing, and convincing the legal department to adopt the tenets of clear writing.

Jarrett, Caroline. Usability News (2003). Articles>Writing>TC

When a Production Worker is Technically a Writer: Using Craft and Rhetorical Knowledge in a Manufacturing Environment    

Although rhetoricians have studied the discourse practices of engineers, little is known about the production workers who must assemble engineering knowledge into functional products. This case study examines what happens when a production worker tried to improve manufacturing documentation, and how her success depended upon both her craft knowledge and the rhetorical skills she attributes to a Writing Across the Curriculum program she experienced in college.

Vélez, Lili Fox and Susan P. Hall. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2001). Articles>TC>Technical Writing>Engineering