There's More Than One Way To Wire That: When Assembly Workers Are Technically Writers    

While technical writing is becoming a more obvious part of undergraduate education, it is not uncommon for an engineer to face the task of writing documentation without much training in the craft of communication. Other members of production teams may have received even less training, and yet have an equal or greater need to have a say in how documentation is produced and what it contains. In this paper, we will examine a situation in which an assembly worker, or system integrator, demanded the opportunity to document the appropriate ways to assemble complex Test and Measurement systems (for evaluating the electronic components of products such as PC’s, cars, and cellular phones), and the effects her change in roles has had on the production processes for both systems and their documentation.

Hall, Susan P. and Lili Fox Vélez. ACM SIGDOC (1999). Presentations>Documentation>Workplace

Web Design Issues When Searching for Information in a Small Screen Display  

In this paper, we report preliminary findings from an experimental study in which twenty-eight users answered questions by performing strategic information searches on web pages. Pages, which varied in length from 100 to 850 words, were displayed on either a standard, desktop monitor (full-sized) or a palm handheld interface (small-screen). Overall, users took more time to perform the tasks on the small screen interface, with the break in efficacy appearing between 225 and 350 word-lengths. Finally, contrary to our hypothesis, participants were similarly accurate across conditions.

Kim, Loel and Michael J. Albers. ACM SIGDOC (2001). Presentations>Web Design>Wireless Web>PDA

"Yes, But Does it Scale?": Practical Considerations for Database-Driven Information Systems    

This paper explores the process of designing and implementing a database-driven system of online documentation, and putting it live on the web for customers to use. Using real-life examples, it discusses practical considerations for balancing performance, scalability, and reliability.

Russell, John. ACM SIGDOC (2001). Presentations>Information Design>Documentation

Technical Communication Degrees for the 21st Century    

The practice of technical communication, especially for professionals just entering the workplace, is rapidly changing. Companies have higher expectations for degrees in technical communication, a strong foundation in technology, and the ability to function on cross-disciplinary teams alongside technical experts in the design and development process. As the practice of technical communication shifts its focus, academics have the responsibility to be certain that technical communication degree programs have a strong component of such topics as engineering design, programming, human factors, usability, instructional design, and project management, in addition to traditional communication skills. Academic programs have lagged behind practice, largely due to the location of degree programs, departmental reward systems, faculty deficiencies in technology, little depth in fields beyond rhetoric, and lack of exposure to best industry practices. This paper addresses these issues and makes some practical recommendations for catching academe up to practice.

David, Marjorie T. ACM SIGDOC (2000). Articles>Education>TC

Content Management and the Production of Genres    

In this paper, I suggest that granularized content management introduces as-yet-unexplored issues to genres of technical communication. I argue that content management, while it can, as advertised, free content and make it easy to reuse that content in multiple genres, that flexibility can create new problems for genres and genre systems, leading to problematic reuse, inflexible genre systems, rigid and proprietary genres, and uncritical internationalization.

Clark, Dave. ACM SIGDOC (2007). Articles>Content Management>Genre>Localization

Pragmatic DITA on a Budget  

A small documentation team working on a tight budget can now use the tool ecosystem enabled by the DITA standard to create the sophisticated content that previously required long and expensive projects. The author spent just nine person-weeks over three years to replace a custom XML system with a DITA system based on a combination of off-the-shelf software, authoring conventions, and custom scripts.

Baptista, Joaquim. ACM SIGDOC (2008). Articles>Documentation>DITA>Case Studies

Agile Documentation with uScrum  

uScrum (uncertainty Scrum) is an agile process developed by a small team at Altitude Software to manage the process of writing user documentation. uScrum manages uncertainty and the unknown, allowing writers to quickly react to changing conditions. uScrum uses orders of ignorance to understand the difficulty of tasks, allowing the team to effectively prioritize regular work together with difficult creative work.

Baptista, Joaquim. ACM SIGDOC (2008). Articles>Documentation>Agile>Scrum