How to Transform Long Paragraphs into Easy-to-Understand Tables
© 2010 Ugur Akinci
There are those cases when the best way to make a long and complicated paragraph understandable is to transform it into a table.
Here is an example.
First the paragraph:
“In those cases when there is low load on the circuit (that is, less than 10 watts), the user should turn on switches S1 and S2 while turning off switches S2, S3. When the load is medium (between 10 and 30 watts), the user must turn the switches S2 and S3 on while turning off S4 and S5. However, in those cases where the system experiences a high load (that is, over 30 watts), the operator must turn on switches S4 and S5 and turn off switches S1 and S2.”
And now, here is the same information presented in a table:
| CIRCUIT LOAD | Power Switches | |
| Turn On | Turn Off | |
| Low Load (< 10 watts) | S1, S2 | S2, S3 |
| Medium Load (Between 10 and 30 watts) | S2, S3 | S4, S5 |
| High Load (> 30 watts) | S4, S5 | S1, S2 |
Which one is easier to understand? I think the answer is obvious to see.
Thank you for posting this article illustrating how to convert information from paragraph form to a table. This is an important skill for technical communicators.
I have written a couple of articles on this topic that your readers might enjoy. The links to each are listed below.
Creating Effective Tables in Technical Documents
http://cypressmedia.net/articles/article/29/creating_effective_tables_in_technical_documents
Ten Tips for Tables in Technical Documents
http://cypressmedia.net/articles/article/31/ten_tips_for_tables_in_technical_documents
I will post a link to this posting on Twitter and Linkedin to call more attention to this topic.