ITauthor

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What's it like doing documentation as part of an Agile software development team? Why is it a better way of working? I mull this over these and other questions with Graham Campbell. If you want to find out more about the Agile software development methodology, I'd recommend you read some of Scott Ambler's articles. For example: http://www.agilemodeling.com/essays/agileDocumentation.htm An extract from Scott Ambler's best practices for increasing the agility of documentation:

Simplification * Keep documentation just simple enough, but not too simple * Write the fewest documents with least overlap Determining What to Document * Focus on the needs of the actual customers(s) of the document * The customer determines sufficiency Determining When to Document * Iterate, iterate, iterate: * Update only when it hurts General * Treat documentation like a requirement * Require people to justify documentation requests We also also discuss our writing tips, software recommendations and podcasts we've been listening to. Software we mentioned:

fileinfo.net

writerriver.com

Keepass

Podcast recommendations

The Penny Arcade Podcast:
  RSS feed: http://www.penny-arcade.com/padlc.xml Dan Carlin's Hardcore History: RSS feed: http://www.dancarlin.com/dchh.xml

Other links

Testing documentation: http://www.onemanwrites.co.uk/2008/08/07/testingdocumentation/ The Almighty Thud by Martin Fowler: http://martinfowler.com/distributedComputing/thud.html

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The music I play at the beginning and end of the show is by Amplifico. You can hear more of their music at Podshow.

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I talk to Graham Campbell about being the only technical writer at a software company. Graham describes his experience of being a year into tech writing and having his Documentation Manager (me) disappear off to do another job, leaving him in a team of one, and then the possibly worse situation where, after a year, the same guy comes back again! We also also discuss our writing tips and software recommendations. This time round the apps we like are: Paint.NET
Texter from Lifehacker

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I'd love to know who's listening, where you are and what you think of the podcast, so contact me at:
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Or just let me know you've listened in by putting a pin in the ITauthor map at:
http://www.frappr.com/itauthor

The music I play at the beginning and end of the show is by Amplifico. You can hear more of their music by going to the Podsafe Music Network.

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       Ellis Pratt is Sales and Marketing Director for UK documentation specialists, Cherryleaf. He joined me via Skype to talk about Cherryleaf and to discuss questions such as:

• What kind of skills do you need to be a technical writer?
• What's the difference between an information designer, a technical communicator and a technical writer?
• Which is the worst of the "six biggest mistakes project managers make with documentation"?
• Is there still a demand for printed manuals, and if so, why?
• What does Cherryleaf offer as a recruitment company that other, bigger recruitment companies can't?
• What does the future hold for technical writers?

I encourage you to have a look at the Cherryleaf website. The monthly newsletter is well worth signing up for. There are a number of interesting articles and there's also a blog (for example, you might want to check out the post Ellis referred to on the secrets of effective technical authors). By the way, I claimed during the conversation that there's no degree course in technical writing. What I think I meant was that in all the many, many CVs I've read while trying to recruit a technical author, I've never come across a candidate who has been formally trained in technical writing. However, as Ellis mentions, Coventry University run several courses in Media and Communication. Also, Sheffield Hallam University offers a postgraduate distance learning course for a diploma in Technical Communication.

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I'd love to know who's listening, where you are and what you think of the podcast, so contact me at:
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Or just let me know you've listened in by putting a pin in the ITauthor map at:
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The music I play at the beginning and end of the show is by Amplifico. You can hear more of their music by going to the Podsafe Music Network.

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As an antidote to podcast #10, which dwelt a bit heavily on problems in Madcap Flare, this time round I talk about some of the things I really like about Flare.

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The music I play at the beginning and end of the show is by Amplifico. You can hear more of their music by going to the Podsafe Music Network.

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So remind me: Why do we use Flare? In this podcast I talk to fellow technical writer Graham Campbell about Madcap Flare. Graham is relatively new to Flare but has been using Flare 3 in anger recently and went on a training course run by Mike Hamilton of Madcap in London a few weeks back. He talks about his first impressions of Flare, the training course, what's good and bad about Flare, and comparisons with Adobe FrameMaker. Flare gets a little bit of a bashing, but we love it really - or at least I do. I'm not so sure Graham does though - not yet anyway.

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I'd love to know who's listening, where you are and what you think of the podcast, so contact me at:
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Or just let me know you've listened in by putting a pin in the ITauthor map at:
http://www.frappr.com/itauthor

The music I play at the beginning and end of the show is by Amplifico. You can hear more of their music by going to the Podsafe Music Network.

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