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Subject:RE: What are "advanced" API topics? From:"Lydia Wong" <lydiaw -at- fpoint -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 30 May 2001 11:12:30 -0400
Glenn Maxey wrote:
> I realize that Walden, Lydia, et al put little stock in tools. Rightly so.
> The tech writer is still going to have to hit the trenches, still
> gonna have
> to understand the big picture, still gonna have to figure it out.
Well, just to clarify, I wouldn't say I "put little stock in tools." I've
used a few auto-documentation tools to generate material for checking our
docs, just as Glenn wrote. They can be very useful for that. I can also see
how an auto-documentation tool that generates documentation would be
extremely useful. I haven't seen one yet that fit our particular needs where
I work, though.
Actually, I'm optimistic that by taking advantage of XML tags and XML
capabilities, we will someday soon see (or create??) a tool that provides
the flexibility we need. The provision of XML-like tags in C# is a preview
of what might be possible, I believe.
I'd be very interested in tools as a topic. If I'd been at STC this year,
I'd certainly have attended Manuel Gordon's and Greg Rakauskas's
presentation. It sounded excellent (fortunately, Greg works here in the RTP
area, and gave a preview of his part of the talk to our local STC chapter).
I think a kind of "advanced API writers" mini-workshop or track where we can
mingle, discuss tools, have presentations such as Greg's and Manuel's, in
addition to one on creating examples (and the facets of that people have
discussed in the other posts), would be first rate.
I'm glad so many people have had excellent ideas on this! I hope something
comes to pass for next year's STC conference. I would definitely try to
attend.
Lydia : )
__________________
Lydia Wong
Technical Writer
FarPoint Technologies, Inc.
www.fpoint.com
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