The following is a guest post by Michelle Tompkins. Earlier this year she asked me to post a survey about technical communication and blogging. I posted it here, and then asked if she would follow up to share her findings. This guest post shares her findings. Earlier in December, Tom Johnson was nice enough to help me with my graduate research on how blogs are … more »

Students and others trying to break into technical writing are always wondering what tools they should use. The latest tools survey from WritersUA seems helpful in answering this question. The survey concludes that some of the most popular tools for technical writers are Adobe Acrobat, Camtasia Studio, Adobe Captivate, Dreamweaver, Madcap Flare, Framemaker, Photoshop, Robohelp, Snagit, and Visio. Of these tools, Flare scores highest as … more »

Last year I wrote a series of posts about moving from the sidelines to center stage. In the series I described how I transitioned from a low-key, hardly-speaking project member to a key player on the project team, someone with a voice that mattered in project decisions. But recently, with some projects, I’ve come full circle, moving back to that initial position of a fly … more »

In a previous post, I started to explain my approach to help authoring. I’m trying to flesh this out into a more developed and detailed — but not too long — statement about how I do help. This information would be useful both to project managers as well as other writers I work with. I would appreciate any feedback. Help Strategies Because users have different … more »

[Audio clip: view full post to listen] Download MP3 Length: 27 min. In this monologue podcast, I answer a student’s questions about the field of technical writing, including how I fell into it, what kinds of projects I work on, and other details. Her questions are as follows: What did you study in college and where did you attend? What degrees/certificates do you have? Did … more »

[Audio clip: view full post to listen] Download MP3 Length: 30 min. This is a special podcast for Carly Finseth at Clemson University who is thinking about entering the field of technical writing and wanted to ask me a few questions. After I recorded the podcast, she was kind enough to transcribe it. I polished up the transcription a bit so that it would be … more »

If you’re a college student looking to become a technical writer after you graduate, you face a formidable challenge: you can’t get a job without experience, and you can’t get experience without a job. Especially in a competitive job market, getting a job as a technical writer directly after you graduate — without a foundation of previous jobs, experience with a handful of tools, and … more »

[Audio clip: view full post to listen] Download MP3 (to download, right-click and select Save Target As) Length: 43 min. In this podcast, I talk with Ricardo Amigo, a translator and podcaster in Mexico City and Costa Rica, about the field of technical writing. This podcast is more of a reverse interview. Instead of me asking the questions, Ricardo interviews me. The general topic is … more »

WritersUA – The WritersUA Tools Survey – Tools.

[Audio clip: view full post to listen] Download MP3 (to download, right-click and select Save Target As) Length: 30 min. In this podcast, I talk with Mike Hughes, second vice president of the STC, about his latest UXMatters article, “Straight Talk: Surviving Tough Times as a User Assistance Writer.” We talk about how to make help more valuable, more worthwhile and user-focused, so you don’t … more »

Tech Comm Toolbox is a brilliant website by Char James Tanny that provides a directory of tools, consultants, and conferences. The site offers several ways to find what you’re looking for: by category, by alphabetical name, or by search. Char used WordPress to create the site, relying heavily upon categories to organize the information. Users can submit entries to be added, and they can comment … more »

As college students contemplate careers in technical writing, they often hesitate because of negative stereotypes about the profession. As with many stereotypes, these aspects of technical writing can describe some situations for some people, but as a whole they aren’t necessarily true. I’ve listed Ten Technical Writing Stereotypes — tell me if the stereotypes hold generally true for you or not. You can take the … more »

A few weeks ago I started experimenting with surveys in my sidebar, mostly informal, and mainly to try out different WordPress plugins. Little did I know my surveys would incite so much controversy. The latest poll, “Which Authoring Tool Is Best for You?” has received nearly 600 votes from people around the world, and was discussed at length on the HATT listserv. In all this … more »

A History of Tech Comm Tools. This is a discussion thread from Techwhirler.

This is a guest post by Daniel Ng, a technical writer in Malaysia. Daniel mentioned an interesting article he’d read on the possible return of Corel Ventura, and I asked him to expand his thoughts in a guest post.