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Subject:Re: Programmers as writers? From:cpwinter -at- rahul -dot- net To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Fri, 6 Dec 2002 21:24:25 -0800
On 3 Dec 2002, at 14:35, Andrew Brooke wrote:
>
> On 19 Nov 2002, at 19:23, Mike Stockman wrote:
> "I would expect most good programmers to also be good at writing."
> Huh - what planet do you live on?
>
> :-)
>
> Seriously, I would hate to generalize about programmers (or any other
> group) either positively or negatively about their writing ability. But I
> recently gave a talk about writing documentation for developers (which I do
> full time) and tried to make the point, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, that
> programmers are from another planet. They are concerned about (and good at)
> code, objects, modules, classes, functions, etc. As tech writers, we are
> concerned about language, content, words, documents, clarity, presentation,
> etc.
>
> The two professions are therefore very different - to expect or assume
> that programmers (even "good" ones) would be good at programming is
> nonsense. I review their raw documents (which I have to repair) almost
> daily - most of them are in pretty sad shape. That's not their fault -
> it's just that they are paid to be programmers, and not writers. That's my
> job.
>
Yes, there are differences between the profession of programming and
the profession of technical writing. But I stand by my opinion that the
essential operations -- stringing code statements together to make a
program, and stringing sentences together to make a text -- are quite
similar.
Also, the fact that the programmers you work with turn out inferior
documents, when documentation is not their primary responsibility (and
may not be a formal responsibility at all) says little about their innate
ability to write.
Chris
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