I can't tell you how many times a company has come to me and said they have an editing job for us. The content is there, they explain, it's just a matter of editing it. Last week, a client came with this exact comment. Now, there are times when the client genuinely means this. Editing IS enough. Perhaps it is an internal document - one that will be passed around within the company. The expected audience knows the…
This is part of the Help Authoring Tips series. The difference between a good help file and an ineffective one is not really how it looks, but ultimately, what is written there. Sure, the help should look good. This increases usability and makes a positive statement towards your company's branding. But the contents of the help often determines the user's ability to successfully use the application. Following are some tips for writing right - correctly writing the help so that…
Today's technical writer needs to be so much more than he or she once was. When I first started on the path to becoming a technical writer 19 years ago, the tools were more basic and infinitely more limited. WinHelp was about as cutting edge as there was. Â The first company to hire me, Scitex, was a huge Israeli hi-tech company that broke tasks into tiny pieces and hired people to do them. My skills included: the fundamentals…
This is part of the Help Authoring Tips series. Indexing should be, in theory, one of the most important tasks you do as a technical writer. If we all agree that most people don't read a manual from cover to cover (and certainly don't read every help topic), then it follows that the index should play a critical role. The index should point a user to the most likely topic or topics that would provide the information they seek (based…