Top 4 benefits of writing a tech comm blog

Kai’s Tech Writing Blog was one year old last week! It’s been good to me, and the work it takes pays off in several benefits. If you don’t keep a blog, my benefits below may help you decide whether you want to start one. And if you do have a blog, we can compare notes! [...]

Getting ahead as a lone author, the article

“Getting ahead as a lone author”, based on my presentation in last September’s TCUK conference, appeared as a 3.5-page article in the current Winter 2010 issue of ISTC’s Communicator. I’ve covered lone authors over the last months in blog posts and in my presentation, after which Katherine Judge, commissioning editor of ISTC’s quarterly, asked me [...]

2011 megatrend in technical communications

I think this year’s megatrend for technical communicators and their managers, especially employed ones, is to position tech comm as a business in its own right – or to be redundant in the long run. This is my conclusion after thinking about three astute predictions that Sarah O’Keefe recently blogged about. – I know: I’m [...]

Instructions for everything

“If Ikea Made Instructions for Everything” is a brilliant spoof on (almost) wordless IKEA instructions by the folks over at CollegeHumor. This made the rounds a few weeks ago on social networks. If you didn’t catch it then or want to revisit it, check it out now. I especially like the “Hädrönn Cjollidder”…

Learn about DITA in a couple of hours

DITA 101, second edition, by Ann Rockley and others is one of the best tool-independent books about DITA. It’s a good primer to learn about DITA in a couple of hours. Strong context The book excels in firmly embedding DITA’s technologies and workflows in the larger contect of structured writing and topic-based authoring. I attribute [...]

TCUK10 conference videos online

Speaking of conferences, one stream of 13 presentations at the ISTC’s conference TCUK10 was recorded, and the videos are now online. Included are the two keynotes by Nokia’s David Black and by J Haynes of Haynes manuals, as well as Roger Hart on content strategy, Chris Atherton on the psychology of usability, and many more. [...]

Resolution for 2011: Attend a conference!

Attending a conference is the perfect professional new year’s resolution for us tech writers: Regardless of what other plans for improvement you (or your boss) have, tech comm conferences are the perfect platform to exchange ideas, learn about new methods and tools and generally recharge your enthusiasm! If you’re a manager: Sending your tech writer [...]