Re: Mayvbe O/T? - Text development vs tech writing

Subject: Re: Mayvbe O/T? - Text development vs tech writing
From: Bruce Byfield <bbyfield -at- axionet -dot- com>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Thu, 07 Jun 2001 19:29:52 -0700

edunn -at- transport -dot- bombardier -dot- com wrote:
>
> On a list that often sees complaints of lack of respect for techwriters, I have
> to flag that response. If your company is large enough to employ dedicated
> illustrators, production specialists, and template designers or typesetters,
> then it behooves to you as a professional techwriter to give them the respect
> they are due. If they are there in that capacity it is because they <<ARE>>
> better than you at that task. In the same manner you are a better writer than
> the engineers (or the production specialist).

Good point.

However, a coder's knowledge is still valuable to a writer, even though
he and she can't write. In the same way, a writer's input is still
valuable to a designer. For one thing, the designer may need to know
what should be emphasized in the design.

Moreover, typography - the type of design work needed between the covers
of a manual, or with large blocks of text - is a specialized form of
design. A large number of designers who are very capable when handling
graphics are mediocre when handling text. Typography is probably the
most functional of design work, and many designers simply aren't attuned
to the practicality of it. So, a writer might intervene for readability
issues, for example - most writers don't know anything about typography,
either, but they may have more of an untaught sense of its concerns than
a designer.

Of course, there are many designers who excel at typography. But there
are almost as many untrained people calling themselves designers as
there are calling themselves tech-writers.

--
Bruce Byfield 604.421.7177 bbyfield -at- axionet -dot- com

"Any view of things that is not strange is false."
-Neil Gaiman, "Soft Places"

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