English 421Y: Technical Writing Online

The readings this week focused on editing and revising your documents so they achieve everything you as an author set out to achieve. The readings form TCT gave a very detailed break down of the editing process and steps involved. I think one of the most helpful parts of this reading though was the tables with some of the most common grammatical mistakes or the list of words that are commonly misused. While writing our instructions for the project making sure they are free of grammatical and usage errors goes a long way to making the instructions look much more professional and finished.

Of the four usability tests that were introduced in the readings, I feel that a document markup will be the most effective for my project (along with feedback to a few survey questions). In case you don’t know, my instructions will include the steps necessary for creating a histogram using Microsoft Excel 2007. As with most instructions for software programs, the best way to determine the effectiveness of those instructions is to have members of your audience use them to achieve the task at hand.

The reading in the TCT this week makes me feel nostalgic. All the editing marks and proper editing procedures truly reminded me of elementary school when I first learned them. I had no idea that they would be staying with me this long and apply to so many things in life. Also, the reading from this weeks Instructor blog surprised me when it said “how long it took to break into the corporate mainstream.” It’s hard to imagine a better way to improve your product than to actually make it more usable. Nowadays making products more usable is a big industry itself (like tech support, for instance).

This week’s readings, chapter 12 from TCT as well as instructor’s blog 6, focus on the actual revision and editing process involved in the production of a professional technical document. This relates directly to our current project, in which we would like to create useful instructions based on a user-centered approach. From TCT, the editing process is broken down into several distinctive levels, namely revision, substantive editing, copyediting, and proofreading. Each of these levels takes into regard a different aspect of the technical document.

One part of the reading that caught my attention was the simple usability question of "Is it safe?" This seems pretty simple, which is why I never gave it any thought until I actually read it. Since my instructions are about installing a shelf, various tools are used that have the potential to be dangerous. I am familiar with handling these tools on a daily basis, so it didn't occur to me that it could be unsafe for some users. While my expert readers shouldn't run as high of a risk, I think I will still use a few precautionary statements for liability purposes.

While reading Chapter 12, I thought that it was a great topic to cover before putting our instruction manuals together. I am enrolled in a class (IE-577 Human Factors in Engineering) that’s whole purpose is for the usability of products. The types of editing and usability testing were all explained in detail in the class and are actually very useful. I think that when I make a usability test for my manual I am going to use the document markup method. For reference, my instruction manual is constructing a set of cornhole boxes or bean bag boxes.

My graphics are in the thumbnail documents. There are two: for novices and for experts.

Included are pdfs containing:

• My novice thumnail
• A rough outline for the HTML frame structure for the novice thumbnail
• My advanced thumbnail
• My sample graphics

Thumbnails blue for headers/steps and black for the text within the headers/steps. The headers/steps are "Univers" font and the body/figure text uses "Consolas". Dimensions of the novice instructions are 11 in H x 5.25 in W for the beginner to best align with the graphics and be able to free up monitor space so you can reference the instructions while performing the action on the same monitor. The expert instructions are 11 in H x 6.25 in W for less need of graphics and because it is not meant to be referenced back and forth from the process as much.