Musings on Technical Writing
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Style in Technical Writing Part 3 | AI & Tone of Voice
Revising with AI: Infinite Possibilities Before taking TECM 5190: Style in Technical Writing, I had never used artificial intelligence to write or revise. In the course, I spent a few weeks experimenting with HyperWrite AI, starting with an assignment to revise content with varying tones of voice. Once I became more comfortable with the tool,…
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Style in Technical Writing Part 2 | Plain Language and Tone of Voice
Tone of Voice and an Unhappy Client While learning about different tones of voice in my Style course, I had a situation at work that demonstrated the importance of tone. I’m a lead for a team of custom resume writers. One of the writers on my team had a client who wasn’t happy with her…
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Style in Technical Writing Part 1 | Style/Voice/Tone & Content Guides
Arguments for Style Guides I was disappointed to learn from Lauren Pope that many companies either don’t have content guidelines, have content guides that aren’t appropriate for their purpose, or have guidelines but don’t actively use them. I realized that as a technical communicator, I’ll have to not just create style guides, but also convince…
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Editing Technical Documents Part 4 | Advanced Editorial Tools & Professional Editorial Standards
No one Uses Style Guides! I enjoyed the interview with Val Swisher about Acrolinx. I had no idea there was such a tool, but I can see the value in having a tool that pushes information rather than having to pull the information from outside sources. The price tag for Acrolinx is steep, but for…
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Editing Technical Documents Part 3 | Copyediting Tests & MS Word as Editorial Tool
Botheration Levels I was very interested in Boettger’s study of copyediting tests, where he looked at the frequency of error types and at professionals’ perception of error types. Since I may want to pursue a career in copyediting, it was helpful to learn about the kinds of items most likely to be tested. But I…
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Editing Technical Documents Part 2 | Editorial Comments, Copyediting, and Style Guides/Sheets
Editorial Comments: Adding “please” isn’t enough I’ve filled many roles: student, teacher, tutor, writer, and editor. So I have experience writing, giving feedback on writing, and receiving feedback on writing. My experiences receiving feedback have informed my practice of giving feedback. Like most writers, I prefer editors whose knowledge and experience I respect. I want…
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Editing Technical Documents Part 1 | Levels of Edit & Editing as Q A
Structural Editing vs. Proofreading: “Lipstick on a pig” I’m good at finding errors—the surface-level errors, like errors in usage, grammar, and punctuation. Every fall, friends and family bring me their college admissions essays, and I’m always able to find mistakes. I gravitate to the copyediting/proofreading level of editing because that’s what comes easiest to me.…