Re: Your opinion about help authoring tools

Subject: Re: Your opinion about help authoring tools
From: Gregory P Sweet <gps03 -at- health -dot- state -dot- ny -dot- us>
To: Gretchen Hollis <gretchen -dot- hollis -at- att -dot- net>
Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 11:39:29 -0500

> 1. What type of technical writing job do/did you have (i.e., your
> title, company, and your technical writing responsibilities) and
> where are you located (i.e., state)?

I am a Health Media Training Specialist and Certified Synchronous Learning
Expert with the New York State Department of Health. I am responsible for
user documentation, instructional design, training delivery, usability and
QA of custom web-based information exchange applications on the
Department's secure Health Commerce Network. I also provide e-mail,
telephone and synchronous technical support for the network's 75,000 users.
I am in Albany NY.

> 2. Did you take courses that taught you how to use help authoring
> tools (i.e., RoboHelp, Doc-To-Help, AuthorIT) or desktop publishing
> tools (i.e., Framemaker, Illustrator, InDesign, Quark). If no, skip to
#5.
No for authoring tools, yes for DTP -- actually PageMaker.

> 3. If so, did you take the course(s) through a university or somewhere
else?
I took a full semester on DTP with PageMaker. While the class used
PageMaker the focus was more on what constituted good page layout and
design.

> 4. Did you take the course before or during your technical writing job?
As part of my Journalism degree program -- so well before I ever even
considered technical writing as a profession.

> 5. Do you think on-the-job learning is sufficient for learning help
> authoring tools for your work?
Yes. In fact that's the job isn't it? To be the first on-the-job learner
with the product you are documenting?

> 6. Do you think technical writing programs at universities should
> teach students how to use help authoring tools?
Specific tools? No. The concepts of what makes one help better than
another, definitely. If I were looking to hire, I would be far more
interested in seeing samples of work. The tools would be a follow-up
question if I saw something nice, something I hadn't seen before or
something I didn't know how it was done. Really, the tool would be
secondary to seeing the prospect knew good design from bad.

-Greg

techwr-l-bounces+gps03=health -dot- state -dot- ny -dot- us -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com wrote on
12/02/2008 02:54:54 PM:

> Hello all,
>
> I'm a technical writing graduate student, and I'm interested in
> other technical writers' experiences with help authoring tools . I
> would appreciate your responses to the following questions.
>

>

>

>

>

>

>
>
> Thanks,
> Gretchen
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^


IMPORTANT NOTICE: This e-mail and any attachments may contain confidential or sensitive information which is, or may be, legally privileged or otherwise protected by law from further disclosure. It is intended only for the addressee. If you received this in error or from someone who was not authorized to send it to you, please do not distribute, copy or use it or any attachments. Please notify the sender immediately by reply e-mail and delete this from your system. Thank you for your cooperation.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

ComponentOne Doc-To-Help 2009 is your all-in-one authoring and publishing
solution. Author in Doc-To-Help's XML-based editor, Microsoft Word or
HTML and publish to the Web, Help systems or printed manuals.
http://www.doctohelp.com

Help & Manual 5: The complete help authoring tool for individual
authors and teams. Professional power, intuitive interface. Write
once, publish to 8 formats. Multi-user authoring and version control! http://www.helpandmanual.com/

---
You are currently subscribed to TECHWR-L as archive -at- web -dot- techwr-l -dot- com -dot-

To unsubscribe send a blank email to
techwr-l-unsubscribe -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
or visit http://lists.techwr-l.com/mailman/options/techwr-l/archive%40web.techwr-l.com


To subscribe, send a blank email to techwr-l-join -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com

Send administrative questions to admin -at- techwr-l -dot- com -dot- Visit
http://www.techwr-l.com/ for more resources and info.

Please move off-topic discussions to the Chat list, at:
http://lists.techwr-l.com/mailman/listinfo/techwr-l-chat


References:
Your opinion about help authoring tools: From: Gretchen Hollis

Previous by Author: RE: "Gage"
Next by Author: Re: best tools for editing screen shots
Previous by Thread: Re: Your opinion about help authoring tools
Next by Thread: Adobe Acrobat versions - what do I need for catalog (indexing)?


What this post helpful? Share it with friends and colleagues:


Sponsored Ads