Paying for This Site
I write this blog out of the kindness of my heart, but contributions would be appreciated. If you become a regular contributor, I will conjure up bonus content or other bennies to make your contributions worth your while.
Category Archives: documentation
Read the Frickin’ Manual…Carefully
When a man reaches a certain age, he is encouraged by his doctor to get an exam that requires a camera inserted in his backside to check for prostate cancer, among other things. Alas, I’ve reached that age. There are … Continue reading
Are You Really Doing “Heroic” Technical Writing?
It occurs to me as I get older that I’ve made my career doing rather boring, out-of-the-way, bureaucratic work: answering complaint letters, developing internal training programs, developing spreadsheets, writing proposals, editing engineering reports, and so forth. None of those are … Continue reading
It’s Getting Kind of Haptic: Technical Writing in the Age of Tactile Interfaces
Recently I went to the Secrets of the Empire virtual reality (VR) experience (you can read about that here). It was a game environment mixing VR and physical elements. While there was a brief script introducing this team-based, first-person-shooter game, for … Continue reading
Technical Writing in Space
Updated 7/25/19, 11:18 a.m. Following a discussion about future topics in space-related technical communication, I started to wonder about how tech comm is handled in space NOW. What followed was a fascinating discussion with a friend in the astronaut training … Continue reading
Writing Requirements: The Home Edition
A lot of technical writers get experience helping engineers or other technical subject matter experts respond to requirements through proposals, design documents, or documenting actual finished products. Requirements, of course, are a list of things that a customer wants a … Continue reading