Assessing Visualizations in Public Science Presentations  

Natural resource agencies and other technical and scientific organizations face an immense challenge of when communicating complex technical information to diverse publics. The laptop computer, presentation software, and projection unit have emerged as one of the primary presentation tools in many technical and scientific fields. Advances in software functions enable presenters to capitalize on a wide range of multimedia functions thought to make presentations more appealing, interesting, and effective. Our presentation reports on a specific research project and then provides guidance for enhancing their presentations.

Zimmerman, Donald E., Carol A. Akerelrea, Jane Kapler Smith and Garrett O'Keefe. STC Proceedings (2003). Articles>Presentations>Visual Rhetoric

Assessing Web Page Usability  

Assessing Web site usability can be complex, because the medium can be both a document and a 'software product.' Documentation usability testing asks how headings, page elements, and index entries help users find the content they need, and whether that content is useful. Software usability testing asks how well the user inteface supports users’ job-task activity, indicates functionality, provides navigation signposts and program status, and prevents errors. A Web site must meet a combination of these goals—links should lead to the content that users seek, through pathways that users can easily follow without reaching a dead-end or getting lost.

Hinderer, Deborah and Laurie Kantner. STC Proceedings (1998). Presentations>Usability>Web Design

Assistive Listening Systems: Crucial For Skilled Listeners With a Hearing Loss  

Technical communicators are skilled listeners. Whether interviewing subject matter experts or working on teams, good communication is essential. But if you have a hearing loss, assistive listening systems (ALSs) can help.

Vinegar, Judy A. STC Proceedings (2003). Articles>TC>Accessibility>Audio

Assumptions About Technical Communication Programs  

Survey data indicate that current academic programs in technical communication exhibit more differences than similarities in requirements, student support, faculty, schedule, and student support. Moreover, current programs are vigorous, continue to increase, and exhibit three primary needs: increased budgets, more new faculty, and increased involvement with industry.

Rainey, Kenneth T. STC Proceedings (1995). Articles>Education>TC

Audience Analysis and Information Design: Creating a Needs Assessment Documentation Strategy  

A user needs assessment developed from extensive audience analysis can be used to develop a documentation strategy that effectively meets user needs. This paper provides an overview of the steps required to identify and analyze the various audiences critical to enterprise software documentation and create a needsassessment- based strategy.

Yeats, Dave and Paula Kozlowski. STC Proceedings (2003). Articles>User Centered Design>Audience Analysis

Audience Analysis: Can You Get There From Here?  

As writers we face many pitfalls. One of the most challenging is trying to meet multiple audience needs -- once we identify the audience. Rarely do we have the luxury of knowing the members of our audience personally and, even if we did, bringing them to consensus would consume all our time. As writers we often decide what the readers in our audience need before the readers have ever seen our material. The analogy of map readers can help us focus on our clients' needs.

Blagg, Lynn and Carolyn K. Johnson. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>Rhetoric>Audience Analysis

Audience Analysis: Looking Beyond the Superficial  

In performing an audience analysis, it’s easy to focus on simple, obvious issues such as the differences between men and women. In fact, men and women have more similarities than differences when it comes to most of the things that technical communicators document. A discussion of some seemingly obvious differences between men and women illustrates how to look beyond superficial issues to find the truly important differences.

Hart, Geoffrey J.S. STC Proceedings (2001). Articles>Usability>Audience Analysis

Austin's Technical Documentation Focus Group: An Industry/Academic Partnership In Action  

Austin's Technical Documentation Focus Group represents an innovative collaboration between major area publications departments and academia. Designed to provide a networking forum on current publications, the group is managed by its one not-for-profit member, Austin Community College's Department of Technical Communication.

Dunlap, Johnny L., Deborah J. Rosenquist and Katherine E. Staples. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>Collaboration>TC

Authoring and Viewing Hybrid CD-ROMs  

Hybrid CD technology, which allows publishing documents on CD-ROM and placing updates on a Web/FTP server, is the solution of choice for the delivery of time-critical, large technical documents requiring frequent updates.

Lanyi, Gabriel. STC Proceedings (1999). Design>Multimedia>CD ROM

Authoring for Electronic Delivery  

Caterpillar is dramatically changing the way technical, product support information is authored. Book paradigms have been replaced by the more granular Information Element (IE) approach. The new integrated environment utilizes Unix based, TCP/IP connected, ECALS compliant tools on multi-tasking author workstations. Research data, in-process work approved IE's and relational indices are distributed to work group servers. Application software tools include a graphics editor and an interactive, context sensitive, SGML text editor. The environment is managed by a robust file management system that provides file tracking, revision control, workflow sensitive tool launching, burden planning and management reporting capabilities.

Hudson, Dave. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Documentation>Online>Help

Authorship and Responsibility: The Problem of Special Knowledge  

The ethical questions that technical communicators face frequently present themselves obliquely, arising because the communicators depend heavily upon the special knowledge of other people who provide necessary information. The special knowledge that communicators lack and others possess may come from highly technical education, privileged access to information sources, or socially constructed access to information. Proponents of need-to-know policies may argue that limiting communicators' knowledge absolves them of responsibility for the information's veracity and effects; however, more ethically rigorous considerations of the issue consider communicators' authorial roles, their right to know, and their responsibility to their audiences.

Bryan, John G. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>TC>Ethics

Avenues to a Career in Scientific Communication  

Scientific communication (SC) covers science, medicine, and technology. Its documentation format ranges from research papers and regulatory-agency submissions to educational/ training materials and reference guides. This panel discussion addresses issues for those entering the area of scientific communication or wishing to enhance their skills in this area.

Armbruster, David L., Nancy E. Davis, Alice L Philbin and Jim J. Walsh. STC Proceedings (1994). Careers>Scientific Communication

Avoiding Client/Contractor Nightmares: Best Practices for Contractor Management  

You've secured the budget to produce some badly needed, high visibility deliverables. Part of that budget includes funding for contractors. To help manage and guide the communications between your contractors, your staff, and your management, you want to use your company's best practices. The best practices of the contractor or provider firm you employ should closely match your own company's best practices. Beginning on the "same page" will eliminate headaches and expenses during the lifecycle of the project. A quick comparison of practices and procedures enables you to proceed with the project confident that you are using competent outside resources.

Michaels, Sherry, Maggie Haenel, Ann Backhaus. STC Proceedings (2004). Careers>Project Management>Consulting

Avoiding Disasters with Better Communication  

Many of the memoranda and letters related to the Chicago flood, the Three Mile Island nuclear accident and the Challenger and Columbia shuttle disasters that warned of impending disasters went unheeded. The reason: the writers failed to properly use various rhetorical features and conventions. They failed to include necessary information, omitted unnecessary detail, placed important information in inappropriate locations, used qualifiers to reduce perceptions of the consequences of actions, and failed to follow organizational conventions related to transmission of information. Their lack of knowledge of rhetorical strategies exacerbated the problems associated with the contexts in which the various documents were written, resulting in misunderstandings.

Boiarsky, Carolyn. STC Proceedings (2004). Articles>Scientific Communication>Risk Communication

Avoiding the Content Silo Trap™, Enterprise Content Management  

Organizations frequently fall into the content silo trap, multiple authors creating similar information, in many areas of the organization. Authors rarely share their information (they work in silos) or are even aware that this information already exists elsewhere in the organization. Technical communicators have been single sourcing for years, this session looks at how to move beyond technical publications to assist your organization with enterprise content management. This session includes a case study from Eli Lilly.

Rockley, Ann and Jodee Clore. STC Proceedings (2002). Design>Content Management>Content Strategy

Avoiding the Drone Syndrome: How to Keep Your Technical Writing Job Interesting in an Age of Automated Publishing  

Information development organizations are under increasing pressure to implement single-sourcing or other automated and highly structured document development processes. Forces driving this trend include translation requirements, niche marketing, the convergence of software and documentation, and shrinking cycle times and budgets. Initially, these changes threaten to remove everything that is challenging and interesting about the technical writer’s work. However, technical writers who successfully adapt to this new environment will find more opportunity than ever to use their analysis and writing skills and to develop additional negotiation and process management capabilities.

Guthrie, Melissa L. STC Proceedings (2000). Careers>Content Management>Single Sourcing>Technical Writing

Avoiding the Pitfalls of Independent Contracting  

With the decline of employer loyalty to employees and the move to outsource peripheral functions, many technical communicators are exploring the possibility of becoming an independent contractor. Although much emphasis has been given to marketing and negotiation skills, there are pitfalls awaiting the entrepreneur who leaps before looking. Among these pitfalls for former corporate employees are structuring time and dealing with isolation. Success as an independent is measured by how well he/she deals with these intangible issues.

Smith, Gem. STC Proceedings (1997). Careers>Consulting>Contracts

Avoiding Traumatic XML/SGML Transitions: Moving to XML/SGML Without Losing Your Writers Along the Way  

When moving to single-sourcing through XML and SGML, management often spends considerable time on tools evaluation and content management, but not enough on preparing the writers for the paradigm shift to the new environment. This presentation provides some hints for a successful transition for your personnel as well as your documentation.

Gelb, Janice. STC Proceedings (2003). Articles>Writing>XML>Technical Writing

Avoiding Typeface Terrors  

Appropriately using typefaces is critical to your document’s success. The opposite is conversely true. A poorly selected or implemented typeface can equal a document disaster. When selecting a typeface, technical communicators must consider a typeface’s legibility (how distinct, clear, and recognizable its letters are), readability (how easy it is to read in a text line), and personality (what feeling it conveys). Once selected, typefaces must be carefully used to enhance the document’s message. Typefaces must enhance—not distract from—your document.

Yoshida, Kathleen Burke. STC Proceedings (2000). Design>Typography

Baby Steps Can Lead To Giant Leaps In the Way Your Organization Approaches Usability  

Until recently, Landmark Graphics’ UNIX Documentation Group had written user documentation based upon information that was gleaned from surveys, fellow workers, and personal experience. We had little contact with our users and little opportunity to see how our users worked. Last year, we expanded our efforts. We talked to User Groups, supervised a booth at the company’s trade show, and began to visit our clients on site. But we didn’t stop there... we reported the results of our study at our yearly developer’s conference, and we developed a company-wide Usability SIG (Special Interest Group). This paper focuses on our experiences.

Stark, Mary Jo and Mary Rio. STC Proceedings (2000). Articles>Usability

Balancing Paper and Online: Integrating CD-ROM into Document Libraries  

A panel of industry experts provides an overview of the CD-ROM publishing process—and its business issues, for technical communicators who are responsible for implementing CD-ROM publishing in their organizations. The panel will also discuss guidelines for integrating print and CD-ROM documents into a complete user support library, while still gaining the economies of CD-ROM publishing.

Gale, John, Stephanie L. Rosenbaum and Pamela Sansbury. STC Proceedings (1995). Articles>Documentation>CD ROM

Balancing the Elements in Job Aid Design  

Job Aids offer the Technical Communicator a unique opportunity to present acquired product knowledge in a creative format. In order to produce a successful job aid, you must select and blend elements of material, color, graphics, text, typography, and ergonomics in a manner that will be most useful to the intended user. The information for the Job Aid is culled from the larger project deliverables such as User Manuals or Procedure Guides; the creativity for the Job Aid comes from within and is driven by the needs of the user and the limitations of time, money, and environment.

Houterman, John and Kristine E. Henriksen. STC Proceedings (1997). Articles>Education>Tutorials

Basic Indexing Workshop  

Although we all agree on the importance of a good index, many technical writers find themselves in the position of having to produce an index in a short amount of time with no training or experience. If you have ever been in this situation or anticpate ever being in this situation, this workshop is for you. You’ll learn the six steps required to produce an index that is thorough and easy to use. Then you’ll practice two of those steps: selecting index entries and refining the rough draft of the index. Finally you’ll compare your individual efforts to the rest of the group to see how you did, what more you could have done, and what you can suggest to the rest of the group.

Winsberg, Freya Y. STC Proceedings (1999). Articles>Indexing

Basic International Technical Communication  

International technical communication is the profession of the present and most definitely of the future. Businesses around the world need technical communicators who are skilled in communicating with a multicultural audience and who are comfortable working as members of international teams. This workshop introduces you to some basic skills you need to master to be successful as an international technical communicator. The skills this workshop focuses on are: performing an international user analysis, identifying cultural bias, generating a glossary for translators, and designing a page with translation and the international user in mind.

Hoft, Nancy L. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>TC>International