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Kim Roper wrote:
>One of my tech writing instructors took great pains in stuffing this notion
into the class's heads, for which I am grateful. Consider the words "good"
and "bad":
Manager: Yes, the deadline is tomorrow, but we'll be renaming the product
this afternoon.
TW: Oh, *good*. [Rolls eyes]
Manager: Yeah, I agree. However, I managed to push this onto Marketing.
If they want the change, *they* can change the manuals.
TW: You are so *bad*! [Grins] >
Excellent! Your TW instructor was so BAD! <ggg> And I'm particularly amused
because this actually happened to *me* - the day before a release, Marketing
decided that the product name was inappropriate and should be changed in all
documentation prior to release. The product manager decided that to save the
developers' valuable time, the change should not be made in any of the code
except the comments: that this meant I had to check every change I made in
the documentation (because I had included code examples in which the old
name appeared) did not cross his mind. (To be fair, it didn't really waste
my time more than the name-changing had in the first place, because I would
have checked every change I made anyway: Search and Replace All is not your
friend...)
>The same holds true for technical terms. Anyone care to define
"decimation"?<
The original meaning was to decrease a group by 10%. It was a Roman
punishment for mutinous soldiers, where one soldier in ten (chosen by lot
from the mutinous body) would be stoned to death. (The connection to
technical writing is left as an exercise for the reader.)
> My departed grandfather, who survived the Newfoundland
Regiment in WWI, could have given a rather graphic definition: Decrease the
size of something--like an infantry unit--to 10% of its original value in
one fell swoop. I've heard others use the term to mean "decrease something
_by_ 10%">
Your departed grandfather was using the term in the meaning it has modernly
acquired, and was (etymologically) incorrect. But as the sense in which he
used "decimation" is the sense in which many people use and understand
"decimation", he was correct by language evolution.
>Neither definition holds true in digital imaging, which is where I use it.
The general idea of reduction by a particular factor still holds, .....
Looking at the root of the word "decimation", it's just plain inappropriate
in this context. We're not dealing with tens. However, the
connotation--the division factor attained by shifting a digit--is bang on.
So, we use it. <
...which is a further example of language evolving.
>The challenges for the TW are
1) to understand the term, in context
2) to use it properly, in context
3) to determine when a documented explanation is warranted and when it would
be condescending--in other words, to know when your audience understands the
term implicitly and when you need to clarify it.<
And I would add a fourth: to be aware when you are using a word correctly by
current or local or jargon usage but incorrect by dictionary definition. <g>
*Somebody* will look the word up in a dictionary... But language evolves:
there's nothing wrong with that. What I do is check jargon to ensure that I
am using it correctly for the audience for whom the manual is being written.
My check on random evolution is to try to prevent jargon that is unique to
the company I work for being used in the manuals.
Jane Carnall
The writers all stand around a cauldron chanting and occasionally tossing in
a small word. Unless stated otherwise, these opinions are mine, and mine
alone. Apologies for the long additional sig: it is added automatically and
outwith my control.
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