TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
To asnwer Kristen Zerbini's question, I definitely agree with Bruce Byfield.
GIMP is excellent. I have both GIMP and PhotoShop (5.5) at home, since I am
running Linux, along (in spite of) a Windows partition because of rather
regular game usage.
I find GIMP's export possibilities great. It can handle properly a *lot* of
the traditional bitmap formats. Some of the tools are great too. I have been
using both GIMP and PhotoShop for a while now, and my preference goes to
GIMP (but then, I don't have PhotoShop 6 or 7). Also, GIMP's capture feature
is pretty neat.
I have bought the reference manual for GIMP (900-odd pages) and it's great.
I highly recommend it, even for people who start in graphic design. The
progression is OK, and I am eagerly looking at what I can do when I'll get
to use Script-Fu.
As a general rule, when I need a specific tool, I go to SourceForge. It's a
repository of most OpenSource projects. I do a search by keywords, and see
what comes up, according to the platform I'm running on at the time. I have
recently been looking for a terminology database tool for work (NT, verging
on XP...), and it looks I have found a first-class one. And free, even if
there's a commercial version coming up.
If there are students or unemployed people lurking on the list, go there,
most projects are run by developers and NEED help to write the documentation
(whether they advertise for it, or not). It is extremely useful experience,
that can be put on one's CV, that can justify any dead time in one's career.
I consider it a great opportunity to improve one's skills on one technology
or tool. A fair amount of the OpenSource projects are pretty good-class
projects. You'll be working for quality things. So, do your search, find
what fits you, and set to work.
Oh, and some projects need localisers, too. And QA. And... name it. For
those who are considering a career change (discussion thread pretty recent),
this is an opportunity to roll up your sleeves and find out what this job
you have been thinking about really is. And if you're going to enjoy it, and
be good at it.
Hope this helps
Solena Le Moigne
Rédactrice Technique
Thales Communications - Cholet
solena -dot- lemoigne -at- fr -dot- thalesgroup -dot- com
I'm on DIGEST, reply directly.
RoboHelp Studio maximizes your Help authoring power by combining
RoboHelp Office and RoboDemo, so you can easily create professional
Help systems that feature interactive tutorials and demos.
---
You are currently subscribed to techwr-l as:
archive -at- raycomm -dot- com
To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-techwr-l-obscured -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
Send administrative questions to ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com -dot- Visit http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ for more resources and info.
