Archive for March 2010
The Lessons I Learned from SPAM Writers
© 2010 Ugur Akinci I receive a lot of SPAM. 99.9% is caught by my fantastic spam filter (Akismet). Before I delete SPAM messages, I read some of them and find the exercise very educational. I have no idea why these parties keep sending me tens of thousands of SPAM messages a year. But every…
Read MoreTechnical Writing – Anticipate Resistance. Eliminate it in Advance.
© 2010 Ugur Akinci Technical writing shares one very important structural feature with copy writing: anticipation of resistance. To write a good technical manual, you have to anticipate why the reader might doubt the veracity of your instructions; why they might resist it. Then, like a skilled bomb-removal expert, you have to defuse and remove…
Read MoreCCCC Outstanding Dissertation Award in Technical Communication
The CCCC Committee on Technical Communication presents the Outstanding Dissertation Award in Technical Communication annually during the Awards Session at the CCCC Convention. Dissertations are evaluated according to the following five criteria: originality of research, contribution the research makes to the field, methodological soundness of the approach used, awareness of the existing research in the…
Read MoreTexas Tech Offers Exemplary Program in Technical Communication
The number of colleges offering a technical communication degree or technical writing certificate is steadily increasing. Most of them are offered through the English departments. That’s also the case at Texas Tech but the depth of TT program is really admirable. Consider these facts: 1. Texas Tech offers not only a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree…
Read MoreA Basic RoboHelp 8 HTML Tutorial
© Ugur Akinci A. Introduction This Adobe RoboHelp HTML 8 tutorial shows the basic steps required to create a RoboHelp project. (Robohelp comes in two flavors: Robohelp for Word, and Robohelp HTML). In this tutorial, we will use RoboHelp 8 HTML and generate a help file, starting from a “Blank Project”. NOTE: Robohelp is a…
Read MoreHow to Incorporate Performance Goals into Your Technical Documents
© 2010 Ugur Akinci Usually the first chapter of a technical document is titled “Introduction” where the technical communicator provides a bird’s eye view of the rest of the document. In that chapter, the “performance goal” of the document is spelled out clearly, as well as the “audience” it is intended for. You can make…
Read MoreHow to Write a Fender-Bender Traffic Accident Report Form
© Ugur Akinci Here is a form-design project for a definitely not-so-fun occasion — traffic accidents. When an accident happens, the parties are angry, scared, flustered. Adrenaline is running freely. The mind shuts down. It’s hard to remember what information to collect for investigation and insurance purposes. If you have a “Fender-Bender Form” in your…
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How to Select U.S. and European (Metric) Standard Paper Sizes
Standard Paper Sizes If you end up printing your technical documents please be aware that there are no “standard” paper sizes across the globe. For example, the ISO 216 standard defines the paper sizes for U.S. and European (metric) standards. These are also called A series paper sizes. It is important to know that the…
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How to Write a Printer Spec Sheet
Introduction Most technical publications these days end up posted online or shared in PDF format through email or a product CD. However, there are still documents sent to the printer for good old-fashioned hard-copy printing. Or someone in your organization can decide to print a document that has been distributed only online in the past.…
Read MoreTechnical Writing – Collective Nouns, Singular Verbs, Singular Pronouns
© 2010 Ugur Akinci There are those nouns that depict collectivities, groups. For example: a team. A horde. A couple. A series. A collection… Minority. The Olympics. United Nations. We call such words collective nouns (or collective noun phrases). Although all collective words denote a collection of individuals, they should be treated as SINGULAR words…
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