FW: Techwriter Aptitude Test (A Daydream)

["Keith, Robin" <Robin -dot- Keith -at- MIRAGE -dot- BROOKS -dot- AF -dot- MIL>]

>Whether people read the documentation or not depends a great deal on their
>learning style.  It's a fact that certain people learn better by a hands on
>approach, some learn by reading, some learn by visual pictogram type of
>method, some by hearing instructions...this is a researched and proven
>educational fact.
>
>Technical writers are not excluded from the rest of the community in this
>matter, but we tend to learn in several different styles, rather than only
>one.  This helps us as writers, especially since we have varied audiences.
>We may read documentation on certain items or look for instruction in other
>forms just as our customers would.  (Especially if we are pressed for time on
>our own learning curve.)  Being technical writers doesn't make us any less
>human.
>
>As technical writers, our job is to learn and communicate the instructions
>for a given routine or software.  Alas, we are not however, omniscient or
>omnipotent.  Therefore, we must learn who our audience is and do our best to
>meet their learning style; it may be best addressed through online help,
>printed manuals, flip charts, cue cards, audio/visual presentations... the
>list goes on.  That's what makes it so great to be a tech writer.  We get to
>be creative as well as technical.  Not many can accomplish that feat.
>
>We may skip reading documentation -- on occasion -- but since many of us also
>test software, as well as write about it, this helps us attack it as a user
>would and "break it in", so to speak.  And on those occasions when we have to
>learn new tools, we are often given little time to get up to speed -- in this
>case, hands on can be much faster.
>
>Sorry your illusions of tech writers as "manual-reading gods" was crushed.
>I'm sure there's a support group somewhere for that sort of thing.  Please
>get well soon.
>
>Robin
>Robin M. Keith
>Technical Writer
>GTE -- Brooks AFB
>(210)-536-2990
>Robin -dot- Keith -at- brooks -dot- af -dot- mil
>
>----------
>From:  M. Dannenberg[SMTP:midannen -at- SI -dot- BOSCH -dot- DE]
>Sent:  Wednesday, November 12, 1997 2:48 AM
>Subject:       Re: Techwriter Aptitude Test (A Daydream)
>
>Eric J. Ray schrieb:
>
>> I'll bite.
>
>Ouch!
>
>> Answer:  Nope. You may have found a successful user, but
>> in my experience, you'll be better off with people who can
>> puzzle out how to make it work, and then explain it
>> to everyone else in the group. Or, with people who start
>> interrogating you--the SME for lack of anyone else--about
>> where the docs are and how the darn thing works.
>
>Well well. Another of my pathetic little illusions cruelly shattered. So
>
>far I always thought techwriters were the only people who ever read
>documentation and that's why they usually know more that other people
>and can tell them how to do it. Now I realise I'm utterly utterly alone
>and no one but me ever reads any documentation at all. Booohooohooo!
>
>OK. Serious. Reading the docs is usually the first thing I do, and I
>think it has always helped me understand things faster than by just
>playing around. Even if the documentation is lousy, it usually provides
>at least some kind of useful information that would be very hard or even
>
>impossible to find out otherwise. Dear me, here I am justifying the
>value of reading documentation on the bloody techwriter list! Well,
>anyway folks, why not give it a try sometime, you might be surprised.
>
>Mike
>
>--
>Mike Dannenberg
>ETAS GmbH & Co.KG
>midannen -at- si -dot- bosch -dot- de
>
>
>
>
>


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