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New Series: Organizing Content [Organizing Content 1]

Series: Findability / organizing content

by Tom Johnson on May 17, 2010
categories: findability • technical-writing

  1. 1.0 → New Series: Organizing Content [Organizing Content 1]
  2. 1.2 Introducing Project Swordfish [Organizing Content 2]
  3. 1.3 Things Fall Apart, The Centre Cannot Hold [Organizing Content 3]
  4. 1.4 Imposing Order Versus Observing Order [Organizing Content 4]
  5. 1.5 Topic-Based, Hierarchical Navigation [Organizing Content 5]
  6. 1.55 25 Facets for Navigation [Organizing Content 5]
  7. 1.6 Faceted Classification, Faceted Search [Organizing Content 6]
  8. 1.7 Implementing Faceted Classification/Search with a Help Authoring Tool [Organizing Content 7]
  9. 1.8 Second-Level Faceted Navigation [Organizing Content 8]
  10. 1.9 Browse Versus Search: Stumbling into the Unknown Unknown [Organizing Content 9]
  11. 2.0 Figuring Out Search Algorithms [Organizing Content 10]
  12. 2.1 Search Engine Optimizing Your Help Content for Google [Organizing Content 11]
  13. 2.2 From Help Authoring Tools to Web Tools, Especially Wikis [Organizing Content 12]
  14. 2.3 Using Mediawiki Templates to Organize Content [Organizing Content 13]
  15. 2.4 The Semantic Web and Content Findability: Interview with Patrick Warren [Organizing Content 14]
  16. 2.5 Faulty Assumptions About the Scope of Help Content? [Organizing Content 15]
  17. 2.6 Can Blogs Work as a Web Platform for Help? [Organizing Content 16]
  18. 2.7 Organizing Content as Story [Organizing Content #17]
  19. 2.8 Separating Basic from Advanced Topics: How Twitter Organizes Their Help [Organizing Content #18]
  20. 2.9 Emergence [Organizing Content #19]
  21. 3.0 Relying on the Wisdom of the Crowds with Help Authoring [Organizing Content #20]
  22. 3.1 Principles for Organizing Print Material [Organizing Content #21]
  23. 3.2 The Technical Writer as an Outsider: How Ambitious Are You? [Organizing Content #22]
  24. 3.3 The Interface Is Text [Organizing Content #23]
  25. 3.4 Best Practices for Writing Interface Text [Organizing Content #24]
  26. 3.5 Organizing for Learnability [Organizing Content #25]
  27. 3.6 Why Learning Software Is So Hard, and Organizing Content into Levels [Organizing Content #26]
  28. 3.7 Is Rhetoric Relevant? Considering the "Message in Context" [Organizing Content #27]
  29. 3.8 Organizing Content for Constructivist Learning [Organizing Content #28]
  30. 3.9 Eight Defining Questions that Shape Content Organization [Organizing Content #29]
  31. 4.0 Why Help Content Fails and #contentstrategy

I'm starting a new series on organizing content. I'm not sure how many parts there will be in this series. Writing essays in a serial format is an experiment I'm exploring. Basically this approach to writing follows the agile model. I write a bit, get some feedback, write some more, get feedback, and keep going. The feedback along the way shapes the direction I'm heading. Also, with each serial post, I hope to take the issue a little deeper.

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About Tom Johnson

Tom Johnson

I'm an API technical writer based in the Seattle area. On this blog, I write about topics related to technical writing and communication — such as software documentation, API documentation, AI, information architecture, content strategy, writing processes, agent skills, tech comm careers, and more. Check out my AI courses for more on the latest in AI and tech comm. If you're looking for info about documenting APIs, see my API documentation course.

If you're a technical writer and want to keep on top of the latest trends in tech comm, be sure to subscribe to email updates below. You can also learn more about me or contact me.

Finally, I want to note a couple of things. I usually write the first drafts of my posts myself and then use AI to improve accuracy, clarity, and detail in places, so my writing is a mix of human and AI. (Hopefully that's not too off-putting.) Also, the opinions I express on my blog are my own perspectives, not those of my employer.

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