Technical Writing Blog

Technical documentation is not just any text. It is a whole new world with its rules and patterns to follow. This article will explain how technical writers can avoid the most common mistakes when writing a user manual. Abbreviations Abbreviations are great. They save us time and effort. We can transmit information faster using abbreviations,…

What do we want from any user manual? Clarity and consistency. And, good looks. How can we achieve this? Well, as far as looks are concerned, you can start off by reading this article on user documentation design. And, there’s a long list of things that can be done to improve a user manual’s consistency…

If you are a native English speaker then the choice between Active Voice and Passive Voice is likely to be obvious to you. But, if you are writing user guides in English or working in an English speaking team while it is not your mother tongue – you should study the vital difference between these…

Any technical writer should know their grammar. Actually, they should know a lot of other things and possess many other skills. But grammar comes first. In case you are wondering about the ‘other things’ a tech writer should be able to do, take a look at this article on 11 skills of a good technical…

It seems capitalization is becoming sort of a problem. If you take a look at multiple websites, you’ll see the same word capitalized in different ways. I mean, is it Microsoft or MicroSoft? Or do we just write microsoft and call it a day? Some user guides capitalize each word within a title, some leave…

It’s time to accept the facts: you can’t do it all by yourself. As skilled and task-oriented as you may be, juggling multiple projects at once can take a toll on you. You need to let others help you and take some of the pressure off your shoulders. However, delegating tasks isn’t as simple as…

What is user documentation for a company? We know what it is for end users – a place where they can get acquainted with product functionality, get their questions answered and generally find out more about the product. But what is the value of a user manual for a company? Here are some things documentation…

Technical writers are specialists who can explain technically sophisticated things in simple terms, understandable for a specific audience. They know how to write and at the same time understand the engineering and technologies. Technical writers often face software errors which were missed by the testers for some reason. That’s why the ability to create a…

PDF and Word are on the list of the most used text formats. The dominance of Microsoft Word files is explainable – Microsoft Office is the king of desktop text editors for Windows users. But, why is PDF so popular? According to this 2014 research by Duff Johnson, PDF is very strong on the web….

We all take pictures of our screen from time to time because it is often the fastest way to show and explain something. And, this is one thing. But, when making screenshots is part of your working process – this is a totally different thing. Screenshots are essential for almost any documentation as they can…