It’s the end of November, and my technical writing digest is right here to help you learn something new!
Technical Writing Communities
If you need to ask something about technical writing, stay relevant or find friends form your field, here is a list of communities for tech writers by Ann Green.
11 Most Common Mistakes in Technical Writing
Top common technical writing mistakes:
? Poor Design/Layout
? Lack of Mobile Device Support
? Ignoring People With Disabilities
? Poor Maintenance
? Inconsistency
If you want to learn more, read the article called ‘11 Most Common Mistakes in Technical Writing’.
Docs as Comics
Technical writing is not only about boring text. Some technical writers manage to create a user manual in the comics form. You can learn some examples here: Comics as Documentation.
Recently, I found the following comics by Julia Evans that clearly describe overlay filesystems.
Podcast
Robby speaks with Ana Nelson, a software developer, writer, improv performer, and creator of Dexy — an open-source tool for writing any kind of technical document that incorporates code. In this podcast, Ana talks about writing maintainable code documentation with automated tools and transclusion.
An ultimate list of resources for technical documentation
It’s a list of resources to help you get started on your next documentation project. DocToolHub features a growing directory of over 600 selected knowledge articles and tools of the trade. They’ve amassed a trove of useful links so you spend less time researching and more time planning and authoring.
DocOps: Intelligent Content for the Application Economy
Do you deposit checks with mobile banking? Automatically regulate the temperature of your house remotely via a Nest thermostat? Stream your favorite shows through Netflix? To succeed in this new world, companies must deliver superior experiences that engage their customers — experiences with software applications. Ideally, those applications are supported by intelligent content.
This article walks you through these main points:
- Why content velocity is critical
- How the legacy approach fails to meet customer needs
- What DocOps means
- How DocOps supports intelligent content
- How our team created DocOps
- How we put DocOps into practice
