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For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
"dumbest driver" instead of "dumpster driver". Unfortunately, that one
made it to print. Some kind soul called up and requested the dumbest
driver. The person on the other end of the line went into orbit, took it
to his management, it went to our management, and went down the chain to
our group. The writer (and no, it wasn't me) hit the wrong key on
spell-check and did global replace instead of ignore. We use this
example as a reason why proofreading is a very good idea.
"SEX CLUSTER" instead of "SET CLUSTER". This one made it into print
too. I don't know who did it. No one is claiming it, understandably enough.
"off-gas flower" instead of "off-gas blower". We caught this one in
time. What made it so funny was that victim was one of the group's best
tech writers. We were working on a manual at the time, so we all got
together and wrote a manual "section" on the off-gas flower (including
illos of a dandelion) and had an off-gas flower party for the writer.
The one I'd like to kick myself for:
Chasing down the library copy of my master's thesis, opening it up, and
noticing that I'd misspelled on of the main character's names.
Nancy Hayes (nancyh -at- pmafire -dot- inel -dot- gov)
