Re: What does a tech writer do?

[Larry Weber <larry_weber -at- HOTMAIL -dot- COM>]

Students,

Most technical writers produce documentation for computer hardware and
software. This is what I do, so I can't comment on writing for other
kinds of products.

Mostly, we decipher and spruce up information generated by programmers
and marketing people. Material written by programmers requires us to
insert the missing vowels into each word and then transform the material
from a "what the weeblefitzer option does" perspective into a "how the
weeblefitzer option makes life easier for you" perspective. Material
written by marketing is much easier to work with; we simply turn fiction
into non-fiction.

Other responsibilities include furtune telling (scheduling documentation
projects for products that don't yet exist and, when completed, aren't
anything like the products we wrote the schedules for in the first
place), functioning as a user advocate (a former employer insisted on
using an <Enter> button instead of <OK> on the first GUI version of
their AS/400 product), and other tasks as assigned (whatever else the
management didn't think of). Each day is a challenge and you quickly
develop a love of Dilbert merchandise.

Hope this helps!!!

Larry (fully aware of the gross generalizations and inaccuracies but I
couldn't resist)

>From techwr-l -at- listserv -dot- okstate -dot- edu Mon Sep  8 09:19:06 1997
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Mon, 8 Sep 1997 11:19:36 -0500
>Date:         Mon, 8 Sep 1997 12:07:39 -0400
>Reply-To:     Debbie Molinaro <debbiem -at- UCS -dot- NET>
>Sender:       "Technical Writers List; for all Technical Communication
issues"
>              <TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU>
>From:         Debbie Molinaro <debbiem -at- UCS -dot- NET>
>Subject:      What does a tech writer do?
>To:           TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU
>
>Hi folks!
>
>Over the Labor Day weekend, I had an interesting conversation with a
>youngster entering her freshman year of college as an English major.
>Apparently, her parents are concerned with what she can "do" with an
>English major. I suggested technical writing and she asked me what a
tech
>writer does.
>
>I told her what I do/what I've done, with the disclaimer that this was
only
>a small part of a big world, and that she should talk to other tech
>writers. Since she doesn't currently have e-mail (but is "pretty sure"
her
>school "does that"), I told her I would poke around on techwr-l for her
and
>forward the results when she got her address. <Details on long listserv
>conversation omitted.>
>
>So, what do you, as a tech writer, do?
>
>Reply to me or the list, as you deem appropriate. If there's enough of
a
>demand and responses look "summarizable" I'll summarize to the list.
>
>Thanks,
>Debbie
>
>
>Debbie Molinaro
>debbiem -at- ucs -dot- net
>
>The Paper Trail
>Technical Documentation Services
>http://members.aol.com/papertr/
>
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