Re: Degree Question

[Susan Gallagher <Susan_Gallagher_at_Enfin-SD -at- RELAY -dot- PROTEON -dot- COM>]

Teresa Stubbs worries:

<snip>
> The problem is that I do NOT feel adequately prepared to enter this field.
>The head of our department insists that ETC majors take the same number
>of literature classes as the other English majors do. The only classes
>for a BA in ETC are 'Introduction to Technical Publication,''Writing in
>a Technical World,' 'Desktop Publishing,'and an Internship. We take
>three journalism courses: 'Basic News Reporting,' 'Organizational
>Writing,' and 'Copy Editing.' All other classes are basic composition
>and literature classes.

>I feel competent that I can write memos and letters and I feel competent
>in my ability to put together a newsletter or advertisement, but any
>good secretary can do that. When I read the messages on this network, I
>realize that I don't know most of what is being discussed. Online
>documentation: what is that?

          Well, Teresa.  You should at least be able to write well.
          What seems to be missing is some training in how to organize
          information effectively.  (I'm not sure we're talking about
          "organizational" writing here.)  Do some research on how
          people learn.  Learn the basic rules of teaching new
          concepts (like build on prior knowledge...).

          Online doc is lots of different things.  It's paper manuals
          thrown online without any preparation, it's a carefully
          prepared context-sensitive help file, it's everything in
          between.  If you really study online documentation
          techniques, you'll find that it's a whole different writing
          style.

          It's more concise.  You need to present as much information
          as possible within the default window size and start to feel
          inadequate whenever you make your user use the scroll bar to
          get to the rest of the info.

          It's (believe it or not) less visual.  Yes, you have the
          opportunity to use bitmaps (hopefully), but italics look
          terrible online and using more than one or two levels of
          2-space indents gets you worried that the user will have his
          help window set **really** small and end up with one word
          per line.

          If you're writing for a system that provides a viewer,  you
          probably will have some control over color.  If you're
          writing in a "native" help system, the user will control
          most of the color and you'll be afraid that what you've done
          for emphasis will blend into the background.

          And you'll never be sure that the user has the font you want
          to use!


>The two basic programs we use in most of our classes are Microsoft Word
>and Pagemaker. Are these enough? Do you even use these?

          Both are good starts.  We've had quite a few discussions
          here about which tools to use and what to do when the
          employer wants to hire a tool-user rather than a writer!

>The head of our ETC program is a woman whose experience
>and educaiton are phenomenal. She is a dynamite person and I feel that our
>program has a lot of possibilities, if we could only get the department to
>see that our degree should address more technical areas.
<snip some more>

          Whether or not you can get your department to consider more
          technical areas or not, there's lots you can do to prepare.
          Reading this list is one.  Joining student chapters of
          writers organizations (like STC) is another.  Reading
          technical documents with a critical eye is yet another.  See
          how the software/hardware manuals you use work for you and
          where they fall short and think about what you would change.

          And, don't worry.  We all started somewhere!

Sue Gallagher                                 |
Sr. Technical Writer                          |      "Updating a manual
Easel Corporation                             |     is like changing tires
Enfin Technology Lab                          |       on a moving car."
San Diego, CA                                 |        -- Edmond Weiss
Susan_Gallagher_at_Enfin-SD -at- relay -dot- proteon -dot- com |