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Subheadings: Perhaps the Most Useful Technique in Technical Writing 23 Aug 2013 | 07:57 pm
My recent poll on why users can’t find answers in help material surfaced an interesting paradox. Consider these two reasons: The answer is buried in a long page, but the user only spends 2 minutes ma...
Examples Are a Primary Way That Complicated Concepts Become Clear 21 Aug 2013 | 09:37 am
In my recent poll about why users can’t find the answer to help, one of the top answers (so far) is the lack of examples: The help doesn’t provide concrete examples that make the concepts understanda...
Interactive Poll: Why Can’t Users Find Answers to Their Questions in Help? 15 Aug 2013 | 08:07 pm
I’m preparing for an upcoming presentation at a local STC chapter in the SF Bay area. I’m hoping to get some feedback before I finalize this presentation, so if you have some ideas, I’d love to hear f...
Why I Test Nearly Everything 9 Aug 2013 | 09:40 am
One of the forms of writing I like most is the essay, which is a form that has strong origins with 16th-century Michel de Montaigne. Montaigne saw essays as a kind of attempt or test of an idea and hi...
When Organizing Big Data Content, It’s Okay To Be Messy 7 Aug 2013 | 12:12 pm
I recently listened to an O’Reilly programming videocast interview with Travis Lowerdermilk about his new book, User-Centered Design: A Developer’s Guide to Building User-Friendly Applications. During...
7 Ways to Learn Difficult Subjects in Order to Write Useful Content 2 Aug 2013 | 09:35 am
Since I switched jobs about 6 months ago, I decided that I wanted to move toward writing developer documentation. Not only is the job market for this skill extremely hot, it’s also a challenging and i...
Turning Around the Disdain for Help by Focusing on Content 19 Jul 2013 | 09:11 am
For a long time I pursued findability as a solution to fixing the documentation problem. But lately I’ve been less persuaded that findability will solve documentation’s ills. Instead, I’m become convi...
Messages from Sponsors — July 2013 17 Jul 2013 | 09:25 am
Etteplan | Tedopres Etteplan | Tedopres releases HyperSTE 5.0 with support for ASDSTE100 Issue 6 and new authoring applications HyperSTE 5.0 is a major update introducing support for new authoring ap...
Finding a Starting Point: Answering Questions or Addressing Purpose? 10 Jul 2013 | 12:06 pm
Since I wrote my post about how help needs to be more engaging/appealing to users, I’ve been mulling over a better approach to help. I’m convinced that one key to creating good help is producing the r...
Sample Chapter from Word Up! How to Write Powerful Sentences and Paragraphs, by Marcia Riefer Johnston 10 Jul 2013 | 11:13 am
Marcia Riefer Johnston recently published Word Up! How to Write Powerful Sentences and Paragraphs (And Everything You Build from Them). I had a chance to read an early draft and provide feedback. I re...
