Technical Writing Digest — January
Conferences, podcasts, Google Season of Docs 2023, and other useful and interesting blog posts are here for you to help you grow!
The Technical Writing Poll
The ClickHelp team asked their followers on Linkedin about their tech writing New Year’s resolutions. Here are the results of the poll:
Attend more conferences — 17%
Take a tech writing course — 8%
Develop a new skill — 67%
They’ve noticed that few people want to take a tech writing course. Is there a reason for that? Maybe you don’t have enough time, or you don’t find them helpful. Please, share your opinion in the comments here!
TechComm Conferences in 2023
Fresh year — fresh start! It’s time to shape up your future and grasp a chance to communicate or collaborate with scientists, research scholars, and industry leaders from various regions. Keep in mind that some events from this list will be updated or rescheduled.
The Cost of Knowledge Graphs
There is interest and excitement building around the potential of knowledge graphs (“interlinked descriptions of entities [that] also encod[e] the semantics”) to drive content operations. Sarah O’Keefe believes that knowledge graphs and content management systems (CMSs) that sit on top of knowledge graphs have a critical part to play, but she also has some concerns.
Data Not Documents
Ever since moving to word processing, the pharmaceutical industry has relied on unstructured authoring environments such as Microsoft Word to create submission content. For decades, pharma has used a combination of MS Word and file storage (such as SharePoint) to author, manage, store, and publish content destined for regulatory agencies.
Content that emanates from MS Word, Google Docs, and other unstructured paradigms is, by definition, worked on in documents. The document is the “unit” of content. Documents, by their very nature, have certain characteristics, features, and drawbacks.
Google Season of Docs 2023
Apply to have your documentation project funded! Work with professional technical writers and help advance understanding of best practices in open source documentation!
Applications open on February 15, 2023 at 18:00 UTC. Join the announcement mailing list at season-of-docs-announce to stay informed.
Content Strategy in UX Teams (podcast)
In episode 134 of The Content Strategy Experts Podcast, Sarah O’Keefe and guest Jodi Shimp talk about the role of content strategy in UX teams.
Sitting, Standing, and Walking
Tom Johnson is starting a new series called Sitting, standing, and walking. Near the end of his last series on Journey away from smartphones, he described the growing discontent he felt by sitting in front of a screen all day. Tom longed to be outside, walking, engrossed in a panoramic view of the surrounding sky. Instead, it seemed most of my life, especially working in tech, was spent sitting. This series is all about ways to reduce sitting and avoid a sedentary life in front of the screen.
