3-99 (September 1999) Mailing List Discussions by Lisa Syed France U.S.A.

The following article was printed originally in the May 1999 issue of Shenouda News, and is reprinted here with the kind permission of Judy Shenouda. The article neatly summarizes recent discussions on our listserver; it's interesting to hear another publication's point of view.

As you know, this paper version of TC-FORUM is distributed free of charge to about 2,000 subscribers in 34 countries. If you haven’t as yet discovered the online Technical Communicators’ Forum, log on at http://www.tc-forum.org to learn more about this listserver. Over 400 members worldwide subscribe from countries as diverse as Germany, France, UK, US, Denmark, India, Canada, and the Netherlands. Subscribers can offer topics and participate in the discussions. The forum offers opportunities for members to discuss topics of specialized interest that are relevant to the field of technical communication.

Here are some issues that were recently discussed:

 

A Rose by any Other Name

The question of how to define a technical communicator elicited several responses. The discussion began with this definition: "A technical communicator is a specialist who processes complex technical information into a format comprehensible to defined end-users to enable them to carry out an action or to understand a concept."

A contributor added the definition of a technical writer from the (US) 1998-1999 Occupational Outlook Handbook, noting that the newer term "technical communicator" is not listed: " A technical writer develops, writes, and edits material for reports, manuals, briefs, proposals, instruction books, catalogs, and related technical and administrative publications concerned with work methods and procedures, and installation, operation, and maintenance of machinery and other equipment."

Another contributor included a definition of a technical writer from the (US) Teacher’s Guide to the Bureau of Labor Statistics Information. "Technical writers make scientific and technical information easily understandable to a nontechnical audience. They prepare operating and maintenance manuals, catalogs, parts lists, assembly instructions, sales promotion materials, and project proposals. They also plan and edit technical reports and oversee preparation of illustrations, photographs, diagrams, and charts."

A member added these thoughts, translated from French: "A technical communicator is a communications specialist. His or her role is to permit users to use products that are of an ever-growing technical complexity. During the design phase of the product, the technical communicator acts as the user’s lawyer in his or her own company, herewith participating in the commercial success of this product.

Depending on the mission’s definition, and on the product and information support involved, the services he or she offers can vary. We identified the three following main intervention areas:

• user information policy advice
• documentation projects management
• design and creation of user-oriented information devices"

A British member took issue with exclusivity in language use to say, "Technical writers ought to be aware that to write readable text, they need to get the reader on their side. Since more than half the world’s readers are women, using language that excludes them is not likely to help to get the message across. It is simply no longer acceptable to write as though men... are the only people in the world..."

 

Controlled Language

A member has invited people from different fields of interest to provide their definitions of the terms "controlled language" and "sub-language" and will post the responses in a report at a later date.

Further discussion on controlled languages led to the historical development of how the European Association of Aerospace Industries’ (AECMA’s) Simplified English (SE) came into being. SE is now the most accepted controlled language in the aerospace industry.

Other controlled languages mentioned are:

• British American Scientific International Commercial (BASIC) English developed by Charles Kay Ogden and Ivor Armstrong Richards in the 1920s
• Caterpillar’s Fundamental English (CFE) in 1970, which led to the development of Hyster’s Easy Language Program (HELP), J.I. Case’s Clear and Simple English (CASE), E.N. White’s International Language of Service and Maintenance (ILSAM), and Perkin’s Approved Clear English (PACE)
• McDonnell Douglas’ Technical Dictionary published in 1979
• AECMA’s Simplified English, which became available in 1986; controlled versions of French, German, and Swedish are now available
• General Motors’ controlled language, CASL, which is used to write the service manual of the Chevy Metro for the model year 2000

On the home front, Shenouda employee Donna Muldoon has worked on a variety of projects using Kodak International Service Language (KISL).

 

Metrics

This discussion was related to measuring quality, readability, and accuracy in documentation. One member asked about metrics to measure documentation quality. The member cited an example of measuring errors per page, but noted that this measure is flawed because it is not easy to determine what an error really is.

One respondent listed three systems to measure quality:

• Variations of usability tests with or without video
• Document certification audits
• The degree to which generally accepted rules to technical writing have been violated

Within the discussion, Web sites are provided for further details.

Yet another member considered how the Flesch-Kincaid reading grade level scale can compare two versions of a text. The results, though measurable, have no correlation to readability. Authors can write documents compliant with the Flesch-Kincaid scale, but these are not necessarily readable. "For most technical documentation, the quality metric is the performance enhancement on the intended user group." >>>(WHO WROTE THIS?)<<<

Document quality is not measured within documents, but needs external verification from the intended audience.

"transline Deutschland - Übersetzungsdienst für technische Übersetzung"