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On Mon, Dec 1, 2008 at 6:32 PM, Janet Swisher <jmswisher -at- gmail -dot- com> wrote:
> On Mon, Dec 1, 2008 at 9:30 AM, T S <tens00 -at- gmail -dot- com> wrote:
> >>
> >> Is this what everyone does, write for open source software?
>
> Heh. As far as I can tell, the idea of working on open source projects
> is only beginning to get traction in the techcomm world. I know of
> only a handful of tech writers who are actually doing it (see
>http://www.janetswisher.com/?itemid=152).
>
> I was pleased to see it come up as the first couple of suggestions on
> this thread. In the past, more common advice would have been to "make
> something up" for a product you're familiar with. *If* you're going to
> go to the trouble to create something from scratch, then doing it for
> an open source project makes a lot more sense to me than
> re-documenting another company's product, or an imaginary one. It's a
> "real" software product with actual users, who can benefit from your
> efforts. You have to plan your efforts and interact with developers to
> get information. That is more impressive to me than writing a doc for
> something where you either already know the technical details, or just
> make them up.
>
> >> Is there
> >> anything else you do with your existing information? I would love to
> >> leverage what I have
>
> Gene's suggestion for presenting redacted documents is one way to go
> about it. Another is to post what you can as-is, and put a note on
> your website that "Additional writing samples are available, but may
> only be viewed during an in-person interview, due to their proprietary
> content." That lets prospective employers know that you *have* done
> more than what's on your website.
>
> >> as (and I'm hesitant to say this) my life is already
> >> extremely busy with work and family and I just do not see being able to
> >> commit to a project outside of my existing job.
>
> No need to feel guilty for having a life :-) It seems that
> programmers who want to program in their spare time work on open
> source, and tech writers who want to write in their spare time write
> fiction :-)
I wish more tech writers would document open source software, because the
documentation that is there reads like it was written by developers. Do you
have experience with the open source community - are the developers willing
to spend time explaining things to the writers so the writer can write about
it?
-Wendy
>
>
>
>
> --
> Visit my blog at: http://www.janetswisher.com
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