#21114
The IUSR Project: Industry USability Report
This document is an overview of the Industry USability Report (IUSR)) Project. The IUSR Project is designed to help potential purchasers of software obtain information about the usability of supplier products.
#27795
Lack of Annual Report Analysis on a Social, Political and Historical Basis
One area of rhetorical analysis of business writing that seems to be neglected is the analysis of annual reports on the social, political, and historical level. An admittedly-brief four hour review of on-line technical journals and academic articles on the subject of annual report analysis failed to produce a single article directly related to this subject. The only articles that I did find dealt with the analysis of contemporary annual reports on a financial basis. However, my research did uncover an article on the teaching of the conventions of business writing, such as annual reports, and an article on reconstructing the image and narrative in distressed organizations.
Remali, Peter. Michigan Tech University (1998). Articles>Writing>Business Communication>Reports
#29371
Lessons Learned the Hard Way in an Architectural Document Disaster 
Delivering project reports in radically different formats gave the client a bad impression of this consulting firm. Here's how the staff remedied the situation and learned from their mistake.
Kalvar, Shannon T. TechRepublic (2003). Careers>Consulting>Project Management>Reports
#19521
Looking into the Future: The Role of the Technical Communicator in On-Line Report Design 
Corporations are rapidly moving vast quantities of information onto intranets. In order for that information to be usable by corporate decision makers the format of traditional reports needs to change. Corporate reports must reflect information needs and not just provide a dump of available data. Their design must change from static dumps of information to an on-line highly adaptable format that connects relevant information into an integrated whole. Part of making the change means careful audience and task analysis to determine what reader¡¯s information needs. Technical communicators are uniquely skilled to handle this phase of on-line report design.
Albers, Michael J. STC Proceedings (1998). Articles>Writing>Reports>Online
#29452
Making Usability Recommendations Useful and Usable 
This paper evaluates the quality of recommendations for improving a user interface resulting from a usability evaluation. The study compares usability comments written by different authors, but describing similar usability issues. The usability comments were provided by 17 professional teams who independently evaluated the usability of the website for the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York. The study finds that only 14 of the 84 studied comments (17%) addressing six usability problems contained recommendations that were both useful and usable. Fourteen recommendations were not useful at all. Sixteen recommendations were not usable at all. Quality problems include recommendations that are vague or not actionable, and ones that may not improve the overall usability of the application. The paper suggests characteristics for "useful and usable recommendations," that is, recommendations for solving usability problems that lead to changes that efficiently improve the usability of a product.
Molich, Rolf, Robin Jeffries and Joseph Dumas. Journal of Usability Studies (2007). Articles>Usability>Assessment>Reports
#14596
Manager's Toolkit: How to Report the Status of a Project
As you develop the communication product, your client and the team of people working with you will be interested in the progress of your work. To inform them, regularly publish a progress report. The progress report offers many benfits. It anticipates your client’s need for information about an in-progress project, makes the team aware of changes to the original plans and situations that could cause problems before those situations become problems, and maintains the common vision for the project that you painstakingly created when you developed plans of the information design. Most likely, you will publish the the report weekly or bi-weekly. Let your client determine the exact frequency; when your client approves your information designs, ask how frequently the client would prefer a progress report.
Carliner, Saul. STC (1999). Careers>Management>Reports
#24561
Annual reports produced today increasingly include elaborate photographs and graphics in the narrative section. Financial analysts and many scholars have judged these reports on their clarity, accuracy, and honesty. Because the narrative invites interpretations, such criteria are not sufficient, and additional standards need to be constructed. A semiological analysis of the textual and visual elements allows for the discovery of the techniques used by document designers to promote their companies' values. Artistic images may encourage positive readings of annual reports, which, combined with similar messages in other media and repeated over time, invoke cultural myths. By definition, myths are broadly accepted commonplaces that conceal details of their subject, and communicators must expose the missing details and judge the myth within a specific context. This kind of analysis, acknowledging the constraints of the rhetorical situation of a single report, can identify effective criteria for judging the narrative's ethics.
David, Carol. Journal of Business and Technical Communication (2001). Articles>Business Communication>Reports
#28846
An Outline for a Course in Report Writing for Company Executives
A case study about a continuing education course in Report Writing for company executives.
Chapdu, Robert E. Business Communication Quarterly (1969). Articles>Business Communication>Reports
#24036
Instruction covers primary and secondary research techniques, analysis and interpretation of information, audience analysis, report design, format and graphics, and oral reporting. Instruction also covers writing in its social context and the management of complex research and writing projects.
Barker, Thomas. Texas Tech University (2004). Academic>Courses>Writing>Reports
#14566
This course is designed to teach specialists in a wide variety of disciplines to write clearly and effectively on their subject for both specialist and non-specialist audiences. You will work intensively in the study and practice of the communication activities that will ordinarily be expected of you in your professional career. This will include: * composing letters, memos, proposals, and reports * reviewing and editing the writing of others * researching information in the library, interviewing subject specialists, organizing research, and preparing a formal report * giving oral presentations summarizing research
Dragga, Sam. Texas Tech University (2001). Academic>Courses>Undergraduate>Reports
#29922
To date, STC has not been very aggressive or innovative in terms of electronic delivery of educational content to our members or others in the profession. Aside from telephone seminars/Webinars and the online availability of articles from Intercom and the journal, the Society has largely ignored the methods that its members, their companies, and other professional organizations are using to deliver content to stakeholders. Because only a fraction of the membership attends the annual conference and regional/chapter conferences, and because the Society is attempting to reach out to members of the profession outside North America, it is imperative that STC pursue other means of offering educational opportunities. By truly leveraging the power of the Web and other emerging technologies, STC can address a worldwide audience and provide significant educational offerings to members and prospective members alike.
Barnum, Carol M., Saul Carliner, David Dayton, Lynn Harris, George F. Hayhoe, Bill Horton, Kathryn Northcut, Makarand Pandit, Janice C. 'Ginny' Redish and Alison Reynolds. STC (2006). Articles>Education>Reports>STC
#22017
Review: Reporting Technical Information
When I first picked up Reporting Technical Information, I thought from the title it was going to be a primer on writing technical reports. Instead, this book turned out to be a basic, though somewhat better than average, textbook on technical writing.
Coleman, Colleen. Technical Communication Online (2002). Articles>Reviews>Reports>Technical Writing
#13808
Scientific and Technical Reports: Elements, Organization, and Design
This revision brings the standard on report writing into the electronic age by including de facto document type definitions (DTDs) to describe the structure of reports so the document can be electronically processed using document imaging, OCR, compression/decompression, and optical media storage of full text. Z39.18 also provides explicit guidance on the preparation of reports in the traditional print environment. Included are directions on the bibliographic data elements that should appear on the cover and title page of a report, a description of the scope of each section of a report and instruction on the most effective communication of textual and visual information and tabular materials. Recommendations on publication formats, the use of figures and tables, the presentation of numbers and units, formulas and equations, and symbols, abbreviations and acronyms are also given. Z39.18 supersedes MIL-STD-847B and is approved for use by the Department of Defense (DoD).
National Information Standards Organization (1995). Books>Writing>Reports
#19627
Short Reports: How To Write Routine Technical Documents
This document introduces two basic principles of technical communication -- meeting the reader's needs and using the inverted pyramid. It also describes the section headings typically found in a technical report.
Jerz, Dennis G. Seton Hill University (2001). Articles>Writing>Reports
#22563
Some Advice on Writing a Technical Report
The Technical Report (TR) is a common written form through which computer scientist communicate their findings. Each TR should have a focused topic that is developed logically along some clearly identified perspective. The major components of a TR are title, author information, date, keywords, informative abstract, body, acknowledgments, references, and appendices. Typically, the body is organized into four sections: motivation, methods, results, and discussion. This document offers advice and specifications for writing TRs.
Sherman, Alan T. UMBC (1996). Articles>Writing>Reports>Technical Writing
#21803
Some Advice on Writing a Technical Report
The Technical Report (TR) is a common written form through which computer scientist communicate their findings. Each TR should have a focused topic that is developed logically along some clearly identified perspective. The major components of a TR are title, author information, date, keywords, informative abstract, body, acknowledgments, references, and appendices. Typically, the body is organized into four sections: motivation, methods, results, and discussion. This document offers advice and specifications for writing TRs.
Sherman, Alan T. UMBC (1996). Articles>Writing>Reports>Technical Writing
#21975
Special Topics of Argument in Engineering Reports
As a discussion of writing-across-the-curriculum programs in universities, his essay focuses on disciplinary discourse within academic settings. Nonacademic discourse also occurs with particular conventions, purposes and institutions; such discourse can be subjected to similar study.
Miller, Carolyn R. and Jack Selzer. North Carolina State University (1985). Articles>Writing>Reports>Engineering
#19605
Standards Update: Usability Test Reporting
It’s a truism that even a bad usability test will help improve your software. But the findings from different usability tests are notoriously difficult to compare. This makes it difficult to track usability improvements or to see how you compare against an earlier product. An emerging international standard looks set to solve this problem.
#30434
A Structured Process for Transforming Usability Data into Usability Information
Much research has been devoted to developing usability evaluation methods that are used in evaluating interaction designs. More recently, however, research has shifted away from evaluation methods and comparisons of evaluation methods to issues of how to use the raw usability data generated by these methods. Associated with this focus is the assumption that the transformation of the raw usability data into usability information is relatively straightforward. We would argue that this assumption is incorrect, especially for novice usability practitioners. In this article, we present a structured process for transforming raw usability data into usability information that is based on a new way of thinking about usability problem data. The results of a study of this structured process indicate that it helps improve the effectiveness of novice usability practitioners.
Howarth, Jonathan, Terence S. Andre and Rex Hartson. Journal of Usability Studies (2007). Articles>Usability>Reports>Technical Writing
#24117
This outline is provided to help introduce the Technical Report and to clarify the acceptable format and level of achievement that is considered essential for successful completion of the Technical Report.
Scott, George A. TechWriter!. Reference>Style Guides>Reports>Technical Writing
#22616
Technical Report Writing Resources
Provides links to online resources such as directories, web sites, chat forums, journals, associations, and conferences. It also has 18 tips for technical writers.
Halligan, Nancy. Technical-writing-course.com (2002). Resources>Directories>Reports>Technical Writing
#20497
The assignment in this unit is to learn about technical reports, their different types, their typical audiences and situations, and then to plan one of your own. Specifically, your task in this unit is to pick a report topic, report audience and situation, report purpose, and report type.
McMurrey, David A. Illuminati Online (2001). Academic>Course Materials>Reports>Technical Writing
#29393
Technical Reports for Quick Reader Comprehension
A technique to conserve the time of scientists and engineers in report preparation, assure prompt reporting, and provide reports that meet user needs.
DITA Users (1961). Articles>Writing>Technical Writing>Reports
#13598
There's no reason why technical writing shouldn't be lively and interesting. Too often technical writing has a flat style making documents difficult and tedious to read. As in all good writing, you should put across your message in clear English and avoid complex words, acronyms, jargon and passive verbs. Visit my site and follow my guidelines to help improve your technical reports.
Halligan, Nancy. Technical-writing-course.com (2002). Resources>Writing>Reports
#15213
Ten Tips on Writing White Papers
Offers ten suggestions for technical writers wanting to improve the quality of their companies' white papers.
Barefoot, Darren K. Intercom (2002). Articles>Writing>Reports
