Writing Skills for Technical Purposes

Contents Preface. 1. Technical writing. 2. Writing process. 3. Technical reports. 4. Business correspondence. 5. Writing of white paper. 6. Easy to read writing. 7. Common page design. 8. Book design. 9. Lists. 10. Special notices. 11. Graphics and tables. 12. Highlighting and emphasis. 13. Oral technical reports. 14. Designing electronic documents. 15. Report format and final production. 16. Power revision techniques. 17. Abstracts introductions conclusions.18. Abstracts introductions conclusions. 19. Libraries documentation cross referencing. Bibliography. Index. In a world of rapid technological development people are constantly falling behind and becoming technological illiterates. Technology companies are constantly struggling to find effective ways to help customers or potential customers understand the advantages or the operation of their new products. Technical writing is a specialised structured way of writing where information is presented in a format and manner that best suits the cognitive and psychological needs of the readers so they can respond to a document as its author intended and achieve the purpose related to that document. Thus it is writing formatted and shaped to make reading as simple poignant unequivocal and enjoyable as possible. It so happens that most technical writing positions are still primarily offered to those who can write effective end user manuals system design documents web sites and the like for engineering and IT firms. This book aims to teach students the skill of technical writing. It is unique in that it gets to the point uses practical outlines throughout and actually shows students how to produce the most common technical documents step by step. It employs a laid back approach that is focused on providing real world information in a straightforward and easy to understand manner. 278 pp.