RE: Programs for Writing

["Marie C. Paretti" <mparetti -at- swva -dot- net>]

I use a whiteboard, dry erase markers, and a digital camera. It's easy: 
write a page on the white board using all the colors at your disposal; 
photograph it with the camera; upload it to the web, and there you go. 
Instant manual.

The colored marker thing also gives you a lot more options for highlighting 
and emphasizing things, just to tie this into another thread - green for 
menu items, yellow for things people can ignore, red for warnings and 
smiley faces, blue and black underlining for words I like, and so on.

No, no . . . seriously? I'm "fluent" in Word, Frame, Dreamweaver, 
WordPerfect, ForeHelp, Wordstar on a Kaypro, and probably a few other 
things. I use a) whatever tool works best for the job, and b) whatever tool 
the client wants. Sometimes a & b coincide. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes 
I can convince the client to adopt a), but more likely I just pound on b) 
till it fits into the dang square hole.

FWI, we have this argument back and forth in academia all the time. How 
much "tool" do we teach students and how much "theory" (as in "Every *#!@& 
program out there has something like templates and styles - find and use 
them"). Me, I'm heavy on the theory side - if you can do it in Word and 
*understand* what you've done, you can do it anywhere, I always say - but 
there's also the "job ad" phenomenon and trying to prepare students for 
both what they need to do and what HR thinks they need to do. . . Balance, 
always balance. . . . where's Yoda when I need him?

Marie




Marie C. Paretti, PhD
Assistant Director of Professional Writing
Department of English, Virginia Tech
http://www.english.vt.edu/~mparetti

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