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Subject:Re: Have ye the will to use it, then? From:Sharon Burton-Hardin <sharonburton -at- EMAIL -dot- MSN -dot- COM> Date:Wed, 28 Apr 1999 08:51:11 -0700
Well, I will probably regret this but....
No. No future tense. Rarely. You hardly ever need it. Present imperative
works fine for nearly everything. And they user is You. Second person. So we
have present tense, second person. Please. There is a ton more to tech
writing than these 2 things but these 2 are elemental. The we come to
passive voice but that is another rant.
I struggle to teach students this and I am generating a career and a
business based on these 2 simple premises. Amazing but true.
You can return to what you were doing....
sharon
Sharon Burton-Hardin
President of the Inland Empire chapter of the STC
www.iestc.org
Anthrobytes Consulting
Home of RoboNEWS(tm), the unofficial RoboHELP newsletter
www.anthrobytes.com
Check out www.WinHelp.net!
See www.sharonburton.com!
-----Original Message-----
From: Kevin McLauchlan <KMcLauchlan -at- CHRYSALIS-ITS -dot- COM>
To: TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU <TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU>
Date: Wednesday, 28 April, 1999 8:40 AM
Subject: Have ye the will to use it, then?
|Suzette Seveny said:
|
| I agree with avoiding the use of they/their in singular situations
|as well.
| How about a simple reword, "the user will", or try writing in the
|second
| person (which I tend to do in my User Guides) and say "you will".
|The use of a
| pronoun might not be necessary in all situations.
|
|I can't remember the last time I used "will" in a user doc.
|Why mix tenses?
|Do this. This happens.
|If you do this, this happens.
|If that happens, do this.
|The options are....
|The reasons for picking one over the other are... this does
|this, and that does that.
|
|Do most of you refer to events in the future when writing
|for users? Why? Why not?
|
|Thank you.
|
|
|Kevin McLauchlan
|kmclauchlan -at- chrysalis-its -dot- com (aka kevinmcl -at- netrover -dot- com)
|Techy writer, duffer skydiver, full-time unrepentant chocoholic
|
|
|From ??? -at- ??? Sun Jan 00 00:00:00 0000==
|
|
