TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
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.
Subject:Re: Learning Visual Basic -- A Good Idea? From:Elna Tymes <etymes -at- LTS -dot- COM> Date:Fri, 5 Mar 1999 13:50:24 -0800
Layna Andersen wrote:
> A programmer,
> about to depart for a new job, suggested that I should learn
> Visual Basic -- said I could pick it up easily if I can use Visio
> (which I can), could in fact learn it from a book in 21 days. Is
> this realistic? Would it increase my value and marketability as
> a tech writer in good proportion to the effort expended learning
> it?
Visual Basic is rapidly becoming the language of preference for writing macros
and scripts for various dtp packages. Once you know Visual Basic, you can do
more complicated things with the current standard packages, and that ability
sometimes translates into making you more desirable. Were I in your shoes, I'd
learn it.
And the 21-day approach expects you to devote only a small amount of time to it
each day; you can actually learn it much faster than that.
