Nice text on Clear Writing
Updated on Tue Jan 23 16:25:51 2001
Article: 44925 of sci.electronics
From: csmall@sna.com
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: FAQ: How to become a technical writer (1 of 3)
Date: Thu, 16 Nov 95 22:21:35 PST
Organization: Sacramento Network Access
Writing Articles For Trade Magazines (Pt 1 of 3)
How To Become An Author
Everywhere you go, you will find engineers stuck with non-engineering tasks.
I think engineers get stuck with non-engineering work because once engineers
understand any job -- engineering or otherwise
they usually buckle down and do a thorough job of it. Certainly I have found
that once engineers understand a technical magazine’s rules and goals, they
begin turning out readable, concise magazine articles, Ideas for Design, and
application notes.
You Can Write
But, a technical article in a magazine is profoundly different from the other
material that engineers write. Scientific evidence shows that the
organization and sentence structure engineers normally use are absolutely the
worst possible forms of English. That is, using "Technical Manual English" is
the least intelligible way to convey ideas and information in English.
Consequently, good technical editors spend a lot of time not so much editing
or rewriting, as recasting the material engineers produce. The content
engineers produce is good; the forms they use to express this content is bad.
High Context
Beyond hard-to-digest Technical Manual English, another fundamental problem
with engineers’ writing stems from engineers’ "high-context" natures. For a
low-context person, nothing is explicit and everything is understood.
With high-context people, everything is spelled out and nothing is
understood. engineers, I believe, occupy the very highest end of the
high-context scale. Therefore, I have seen many manuscripts from engineers
that preload the front end of the story with boilerplate background material
easily found in standard reference works. Then the stories will often list,
in exacting detail, every design choice not made and why. In fact, many
stories will have every detail possible -- except the one fact you need to
successfully follow the author’s chain of reasoning.
You must pare your article’s content down to the bare minimum necessary to
inform your target audience.
So What? Why?
Explaining something means more than just listing what exists. Or relating
what is connected to what. Or mentioning which phenomenon affects which other
phenomenon. You haven’t really explained something until you answer these two
questions for each and every statement you make:
So what?
Why?
Facts do not speak for themselves; you have to speak for them. Do not worry
about insulting your readers’ intelligence by stating facts -- obvious or
otherwise.
BEING CLEAR IS NEVER AN ERROR
No Ego
One thing you have to do to write well is to stow your own ego away and put
yourself in the place of your reader. Engineers get thousands of pages of
printed material each month. An engineer’s time is very valuable. So if an
engineer spends time reading your story, your story must meet these two
absolute requirements:
1. Use as little of the engineer’s valuable time as possible.
2. Give the engineer something valuable in return for his valuable time.
Authors, understandably, feel that the size and impressiveness of their
article should be proportional to the amount of work they have put into it.
Not so! Sometimes expressing very important ideas that are the result of a
lot of work by a genius can be very succinct:
F = m A
2
E = m c
Instead, your article or Idea for Design must be absolutely no longer and no
more impressive than needed to convey your ideas. That’s it.
Keep Your Design Goals To Yourself
No one cares about your design goals, hopes, and good intentions. So keep
them to yourself. Avoid constructions such as, "Model XYZ is designed to ..."
Be concrete. Say what things really do, not what you hoped they would do.
Avoid even the appearance of weasel wording. Engineers hate weasel wording.
Engineers like clear, factual statements you are prepared to stand behind.
Pick a level and stick to it
Before you even so much as sketch out an outline, you must decide who your
prospective audience is and at what level you are going to pitch your
article. Then when writing, you must keep your article at an even level. If
you float up into generalities or commonly known material, you will bore your
audience. If you sink down too far into details, you will trip up your
audience and lose them. Just one "stopper" can prevent readers from getting
through your article.
If you think that some fraction of your audience may need some material but
others may not, put that supplementary material in a box, or "sidebar,"
allowing readers to jump to the material or not, as they desire.
Consider Your audience; Forget Yourself
Remember that English is not the first language of a significant portion of
your audience. English is the lingua franca of Engineering. Therefore, avoid
idiomatic expressions, the more obscure tenses, and the subjunctive mood.
Keep your language simple and your logic clear. Use simple, declarative
sentences. Stick to commonly understood, simple words. Avoid jargon unless no
other simple, commonly understood term exists.
An example of acceptable jargon is using "increment" as a verb. Among
engineers, "increment" means to increase a count by one until reaching the
counter’s built-in limit. Then the count either goes to zero or to the most
negative number the counter can hold.
An example of unacceptable jargon is using "platform" for other than podiums
or other similar pedestrian objects. "Platform" as jargon comes from military
systems where the term refers to a tank chassis, helicopter, or any other
device upon which various weapons systems can be mounted. By extension,
"platform" gets used refer to just about anything: computers, operating
systems, frameworks, etc. In all cases, an existing, simpler term is clearer
and more specific. Namely, "computer," "helicopter," "frigate," "operating
system," etc.
No Fancy Stuff
Do not try to add shades of meaning with typographical tricks such as italic
or bold-faced fonts. Avoid jargon and trade names wherever possible. Use
generic names for things. Avoid poetic, picturesque, or clever writing. Be
straightforward. Don’t be cute. Don’t worry about the cadence of your story.
Do not worry about varying your sentence structure. A technical article is
not an epic poem or a novel. Your only goal is to be clear.
Never commit irony in public; some people have no sense of humor.
No jokes.
Here Is A Very Important, But Little Known, Point:
ENGINEERS ARE VISUAL THINKERS
A proven scientific fact from the field of cognitive psychology (see
References) is that high visual intelligence correlates strongly with
mild-to-severe dyslexia. Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, and Michael Faraday
are examples of outstanding visual thinkers who had trouble reading and
writing. Therefore, you cannot count on words alone to convey your thoughts
to engineers. You absolutely must have a strong visual metaphor for every
point you make in your article.
At the minimum, sketch out your illustrations as you prepare your outline. In
many cases, the best way to write an article is prepare the illustrations,
charts, and other such material first. Prepare a checklist of any complex
series of instructions. Prepare an outline for any complex explanation.
Prepare a glossary of terms. The structure of these charts, diagrams,
checklists, lists, and outlines that organize your material will often
provide a good structure for the article as well.
Take pains to make sure that the text and the figures agree. Engineers are
surprisingly sloppy about inconsistencies such as saying "register 1" in
their text and then using "REG1" as a label in the corresponding diagram.
Similarly, software entities in the text must be rendered exactly as they
appear in the listing. Don’t hand a reader who is trying to puzzle out the
text another puzzle to solve in the figures.
Be Honest With Readers -- No Meretricious Promises
A reader should know exactly what your story is about after reading the
headline, "deck" head, and lead sentence of your story. No messing around. In
contrast, engineers typically want to lay down some background for a story
before getting into the main part.
In fact, I often just jump right to the end of a story and move the paragraph
labeled "conclusion" right up to the front for an a trade magazine-style
lead. This style is the "inverted pyramid" style and is common to magazines.
No Promotionalism
Purge your story of any promotionalism. Engineers react very negatively to a
technical article contaminated with promotionalism or marketingese. Engineers
do not believe promotional stories, even if the stories are actually true.
Truth is no defense. Be even handed. Be factual. Be professional. Mention the
limitations of your product or design.
Let your Logical Structure Show
Ensure that the logical structure of your material is explicit and plainly
visible. The logical elements of your story should hang from a discernible
logical armature. Label premises clearly labeled as premises and conclusions
as conclusions. If you have done something clever, the text should make the
cleverness explicit. If something happens in chronological order in real
life, the same chronological order should appear explicitly called out in
your story.
I often see, for example, a sentence that starts out with "if" but which has
no "then" in it. The reader is left to puzzle out where the "if" part of the
logical construct leaves off and the "then" portion begins. Similarly, a
sentence will have an "or" in the middle of it but no preceding "either" to
mark the beginning of the or’d construction. The same goes for a "both"
serving as an warning of an approaching "and."
Engineers are supposed to be logical. So why not use the explicit logical
operators English provides when saying something logical?
Put Your Hurdles To The Side
If you have any background, "nice-to-know," or ancillary material, pull it
out of the main text and put it in a box by itself. If you must put a
digression or "nice-to-know" snippet of information into your main text, make
sure you explicitly tell the reader he is temporarily leaving the main thread
of the story. And let him know explicitly when he is back on the track. Not
being explicit about digressions can really confuse readers who do no know
the material as well as you do.
FACTS DO NOT SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES;
YOU HAVE TO SPEAK FOR THEM
Forward and Backward References
If your text is full of forward and backward references such as:
"As was explained earlier."
or
"As will be discussed in a later section."
Then your organization probably needs work.
But don't assume that your reader has been memorizing and assimilating your
text as he reads it. If the reader must put something in the current passage
together with something mentioned elsewhere (and you cannot reorganize to
eliminate the jump), do two things:
1. Mention explicitly where the information necessary to complete your
thought is.
2. Do not ever refer to something vital not yet covered.
The Curse Of The Passive Voice
The active voice is always better than the passive voice. Never use the
passive voice.
That is, always prefer:
John hit the ball.
to:
The ball was hit by John.
or much, much worse (and the norm for engineeringese):
The ball was hit.
Engineers write almost entirely in the passive voice. They will go out of
their way, using such artificial devices as the Patent-Office-ese "by means
of," to turn a perfectly good active-voice sentence around into a
passive-voice sentence. I suspect this style is a holdover from the days
before World War II when engineers had to learn Technical German. Using the
passive voice is a disastrous habit.
"The LED is lit by means of a switch."
should always be
"A switch lights the LED."
Similarly,
"The circuit is shown by Fig 3."
should always be
"Fig 3 shows the circuit."
Technical Manual English is famous for circumlocutions such as:
The Model XYZ is designed for the purpose of facilitating the report
printing process functionality by means of formatted output.
instead of simply:
The Model XYZ prints reports.
Breaking the passive-voice habit is pure torture at first. But trust me,
breaking the passive-voice habit is worth the effort. Soon you will find all
your writing becoming terse, clear, logical, and full of punch. Others will
be able to read your writing and understand what your are trying to say right
away.
Engineers Want To Communicate In The Worst Possible Way
Scientific studies reveal that the passive voice is the worst possible form
in which to cast a sentence if your goal is to communicate. Unfortunately,
for years, composition teachers have been disguising a goal as a fact when
they pronounce that "The passive voice focuses attention on the object of the
sentence." Don’t believe them. Research into readability reveals that this
pronouncement is 100% false.
People remember things in the form of short, active-voice sentences.
The active voice puts events in a logical cause-and-effect order; the passive
voice is not logical. The passive voice reverses cause-and-effect.
Science proves that every time you use a passive-voice sentence, you force
your readers to process your information twice: once to read it and once to
remember it.
Readability correlates directly with the average length of sentences and
average length of words. The passive voice inflates a piece of text, on
average, by 30% compared to the active voice. (We are stuck with long words.)
In fact, when writing, you should follow Hemingway’s rule: "Any sentence over
20 words is too long and should be cut."
Every sentence you write should have an "actor," a subject. How can you
possibly explain something clearly unless you spell out who is doing what to
whom and with which? Engineeringese passive-voice sentences typically leave
out all these elements except the "what."
One Thought, One Sentence
Engineers tend to write long, tortuous, sentences which contain several
thoughts -- probably in an effort to bolster their main thought with lots of
"context." Long sentences are dead wrong. All that "context" camouflages the
main point. Sentences with more than one thought in them are dead wrong.
Write short, declarative, active-voice sentences, each one containing only a
single thought.
Abandoning the passive voice is painful at first. Being required to supply an
agent for every action is really, really annoying too. The simple,
declarative, active-voice sentence provides no cover for sloppy thinking.
Think this over: Bureaucrats express themselves solely in the passive voice.
Now why do they do that? Are your goals in writing the same as a
bureaucrat’s?
Talk To The Reader
Address the reader directly as "you" rather than speaking about some
anonymous "designer" or -- worse yet -- "user." "User" is not a nice word.
Think about it. Writers who use "user" are often unwittingly confusing too.
Often I see "user" used to refer to two classes of people in the same
article: both the design engineer, who is "using" something, and the end user
of the engineer’s product.
Just What Is Wrong With "It"?
Some common English constructions build in indeterminacy and bothersome
little puzzles. For example, take the common pronoun, "it." I try to purge
the word "it" altogether.
Every time you use the word "it," you present the reader with a little
decoding puzzle. He must ask himself, examining the context of your "it" for
clues, "Is this ‘it’ a backwards reference, a forward reference, or a
(useless) indefinite ‘it’?"
Forward references are always indefensible: "Although it fills the bill, the
FPGA costs too much." Should be: "Although the FPGA fills the bill, it costs
too much."
Backwards references are tricky and best avoided: "Although the FPGA and the
PAL fill the bill, it costs too much." Great! Just what does the "it" refer
back to? If you start checking "its" as you read others’ copy, you will be
surprised how often the backwards-reference "it" is unclear.
Actual example: "If simulation permits visibility of the most basic, frequent
operations of a design, it could be considered subjectively to cover half of
the design." What is "it"? Operations? Simulation? Design? ARRGH! See what I
mean?
Indefinite "it." Except for colloquial expressions such as "it is raining,"
never use indefinite "its." You can always reorder the sentence to eliminate
an indefinite "it." "But as coverage increases, each successive increment of
coverage costs more and more effort and simulation time, and the point is
reached where it is most economical to leave the last few percent of coverage
to actual operational test and diagnostic software." Should be: "... where
leaving the last few percent of coverage to actual operational test and
diagnostic software is most economical."
Similarly, avoid constructions such as "former...latter." Using "former" or
"latter" assumes that your reader is memorizing your text as he goes along.
In actuality, using any form of backward or forward reference, or "dummy
argument," forces your reader to back up and reread your text. The idea here
is to make reading your text as much of a one-pass operation as possible.
Band-Aids For Sloppy Writing And Thinking
"In/With reference to," and "in terms of" are two of the Band-Aids careless
writers use to splice a sloppily expressed thought together. "In terms of"
has to go unless you are using it in its original mathematical sense: Express
X in terms of A and B. Take this actual example:
"The village was small in terms of population."
Clearly, the author got halfway through writing down his thought and realized
that a small village could either occupy a small area or have just a few
inhabitants. So instead of backing up and rewriting
"The village had few inhabitants."
he spliced his slipshod sentence with the virtually meaningless logical
operator "in terms of."
Or how often do you hear locutions such as, "We want to maximize the amount
of money we make in terms of profit."? Not only is this thought poorly
expressed, note that it does not deliver "terms" (plural); only one "term"
follows the introductory "in terms of."
Avoid "in terms of." Don’t be sloppy; Be precise.
If you absolutlely must use hackneyed, shopworn introductions to your
thoughts, at least mix them up. Here are some suggestions:
There is functionality.
In terms of functionality ...
Speaking of functionality, ...
On the subject of functionality, ...
With respect to functionality ...
In regard to functionality ...
On the other hand, functionality ...
Meanwhile, functionality ...
And now for something completely different: Functionality.
Unmask Those Adjectives And Adverbs
Breaking up the logjam of nouns masquerading as adjectives and adverbs in
front of the subject of a sentence can enhance readability and is a major
operation during any good technical edit. Such logjams are one of the worst
hallmarks of Technical Manual English. Just because you have concatenated a
bunch of nouns does not mean you have shown the logical relationships (if
any) that exist among them.
MERE JUXTAPOSITION IS A POOR WAY
TO SHOW LOGICAL RELATIONSHIPS
Instead of just plonking things down next to each other, answer the eternal
"So what?" after stating each fact. Put an effect right after each cause.
"We selected Type XYZ LEDs. Type XYZ LEDs are the brightest LEDs
available."
should be ("Why?")
"We selected Type XYZ LEDs because they are the brightest LEDs
available."
or
"Diode D1 conducts when the voltage exceeds 5.1V."
should be ("So what?")
"Diode D1 conducts when the voltage exceeds 5.1V, clamping the
voltage on C1 to a safe level."
Hooking an effect to a cause with a comma, as in the second example above, is
an effective technique that famous technical writers such as Jim Williams use
constantly. Simple English logical operators such as "because," "only,"
"both," a comma, etc, allow you to have a fact/so-what? or cause/effect
structure in every sentence you write.
Stating facts without answering the eternal "So what?" and mentioning causes
without linking them explicitly to their effect are two of the major flaws of
most technical manuscripts.
Platoons Of Nouns Really Needed?
Next, be sure you really need all those nouns.. Remember that the average
person can store only five to seven things in his short-term memory. If you
have preloaded the subject of a sentence with five qualifiers, the reader
will not have any short-term memory left in which to store the subject, verb,
and object of your sentence.
If you need so many qualifiers, you have probably not properly prepared the
reader. The chances are that you should go back and set the stage for the
sentence properly so that you do not have to overload the subject with so
many restrictive qualifiers.
*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*oOO*-*-*(V)*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
| "It's alive!" "It's alive!" |
| ____ Minds-Online ____ |
| -| |- -| |- |
| |()()| Charles H Small |()()| |
| ( `' ) 801 "D" St, Apt #28 ( `' ) |
| `HHHH' Davis, CA 95616-2288 `HHHH' |
| \__/ \__/ |
*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*oOO*-*-*--*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
Article: 44924 of sci.electronics
From: csmall@sna.com
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: FAQ: How to become a technical author (2 of 3)
Date: Thu, 16 Nov 95 22:23:47 PST
How to Write Technical Articles for Trade Magazine (2 0f 3)
Parts Of Speech
Use parts of speech. That is, use parts of speech other than nouns whenever
possible. For example, instead of using nouns as adjectives:
"The optimum procedure will have minimum impact."
Why not use the adjective form of words?
"The optimal procedure will have minimal impact."
Adverbs (words that end, for the most part, in "ly") are nice too. If you are
modifying a verb, using the adverb form gives the reader an unambiguous
indication of just what the modifier is modifying.
"Make the transducer precise."
does not mean the same thing as
"Make the transducer precisely."
Despite adverbs’ handy property of modifying verbs and adjectives, you just
don’t see many adverbs in Technical Manual English. But then, you don’t see
many verbs in Technical Manual English either.
You can also turn the first noun or adjective in a string of modifiers into
an adverb and help clarify the logical relationships within the string.
"A full charge battery is best."
becomes
"A fully charged battery is the best."
Possessives
Remember your English teacher telling you to use "’s" or "s’" for
possessives? Technical Manual English never uses any possessives. I really
don’t understand why. Possessives are quite handy. Generally the only
apostrophes I see in Technical Manual English are the ones getting "it’s"
wrong. ("It’s" is a contraction of "it is"; the possessive form of "it" is
"its -- exactly the reverse of every other word in English.)
Hyphens, possessives, and the romance parts of English can break up your log
jam of nouns, making sentences read less like German and making the logical
relationship of the elements of the sentence clearer.
Close examination of those all-too-frequent logjams often reveals that many
of the nouns are not really needed. Cut them.
A combination of possessivers and thoroughgoing hyphenating can really break
up those strings of nouns.
"The transistor emitter base junction temperature dependent offset
rises."
becomes
"The transistor's emitter-base-junction temperature-dependent offset
rises."
If you really do need all those qualifiers, then you probably need to back up
and rewrite the preceding sentences to do a better job of introducing your
thoughts.
MERE JUXTAPOSITION IS A POOR WAY
TO SHOW LOGICAL RELATIONSHIPS
No Invisible Forward Passes
Never use the words "this" or "that" alone as the subject of a sentence. Only
use them as adjectives: this book, that car. Otherwise, you are creating a
backwards-reference for your reader. Your reader deserves better treatment:
"Periodic floods cause seepage
into the rocks. This leads to upheavals." Just what does "this" refer to?
Floods? Seepage? Rocks? How about: "Periodic floods cause seepage into the
rocks. When the water that has seeped into the rocks freezes during the
winter, upheavals occur."
BEING CLEAR IS NEVER AN ERROR
This And That
After finishing a story, search for all instances of "This" and "That." For
each instance, ask yourself "this what?" If you cannot easily answer the
question, how do you expect the reader to? Checking all your "this" and
"that" usage is tedious but will have a marvelous effect on your copy’s
ability to lead the reader from point to point.
Use Verbs
Technical Manual English goes to great length to verbize nouns. The
motivation for stamping out verbs escapes me but the practice is obvious once
you become sensitive to it. Re-verbize those nouns back into verb form. You
copy will become much less turgid and acquire lots of zip. Following the
immortal Professor Strunk’s dictum to
shun "tion" words (as well as "ure" and "ment" words), reveals the hidden
verbs in sentences such as:
"During the completion of the project, the abandonment of the PT boats
facilitated the closure of the military bases."
This might better be
"While completing the project, we found that abandoning the PT boats
allowed us to close the military bases."
Overworked, And Therefore Meaningless, Constructions
Nowadays people are throwing in forms of the word "basic" for basically no
reason at all ... basically. Kill all uses of "basic" except for the computer
language BASIC.
People are appending a superfluous "process" to activities that are
inherently processes to begin with: editing process, design process, healing
process, learning process, etc. People feel better being in the process of
doing something as opposed to just doing something. Even worse, verbs get
nounized and then have a "process" appended to turn them back into verbs.
design process --> designing
specification process --> specifying
healing process --> healing
learning process --> learning
verification process --> verifying
decision-making process --> deciding
etc
Stop the madness!
With
"With" is the most overworked logical operator in Technical Manual English.
After writing something, go back over your copy, searching for each and every
instance of "with." You can replace "with" about 80% of the time with some
other more appropriate, specific, and logical preposition, Use your word
processor to search for each instance of "with" in your next piece. Ask
yourself, "Precisely what is the logical relationship between the 'with-ed'
entities?"
For example, "with" performs two different logical operations in "a hamburger
with fries" and "a hamburger with ketchup."
See if you can find a more precise way to express the logical relationships
than splicing things with "with."
Consider using one of the prepositions from the following list in place of
"with." I find that 80% of the time, one of the prepositions or other
connective from this list will be a better logical operator than "with" for
joining two thoughts:
accept having a to
accommodate of under
containing on using
develop possessing when
for produce which has
has that have
Fiddling with all your "its" and "withs" is even more tedious than fixing up
targets for "this" and "that" to aim at. But such fiddling is worth the
effort. Trust me.
There Is Little Power In "There Is"
Some people think that the introductions to a thought, "there is" or "there
are," have a simple majesty and considerable power. I think that they are the
weakest possible way to introduce a thought. If you use "there is" or "there
are" to introduce something, you are saying no more than that they exist.
Big deal!
You can always find another, more interesting, more powerful, more logical,
and no more verbose way to introduce a thought than these shopworn phrases.
Consider this ending to a thought-provoking article on dinosaurs which went
something like this:
"Dinosaurs never died out.
They live among us still.
We call them ‘birds.’"
Now let’s try this passage with "there is" and "there are."
"There are still dinosaurs alive.
In fact, there are dinosaurs among us.
They are called ‘birds.’"
Not very impressive, eh?
English Is Not Algebra
The next point is very subtle. You may have to mull it over and spend some
time looking for good and bad examples in text you read before you see the
sense of it:
ENGLISH IS NOT ALGEBRA
If the bulk of the sentences in your story are of the form
is/are
then your writing is probably very dull. You are, in effect, writing a series
of equations:
= .
Recasting your thoughts into something more interesting than textual
equations requires more thought, effort, and creativity than any other
editing I suggest in this paper. If you have the stomache for such
painstaking work, do it.
Prolix
Technical Manual English asks, "Why use one word when two -- or more -- will
do?"
For example, which is better "advanced planning" or "preplanning?" Who are we
to judge? The thoroughly cautious engage, therefore, in "advanced
preplanning."
Now I figure that "planning" must perforce be done ahead of time, so I
shorten both to "planning." Similarly, "preprogrammed" becomes "programmed,"
"interconnected" becomes "connected," "internetworked [sic!]" becomes
"networked," and "joined together" tightens up to simply "joined." "Utilize"
becomes "use." "Has the capability to" becomes "can." Et cetera, et cetera,
et cetera.
I also reduce placeholders such as "is used to" to simply "to." You can
almost always kill "is used to" with no loss in clarity (same for "is used
for the purpose of..." and "is designed to...").
Technical Manual English is peppered with pointless placeholders. Why? I
don’t know. But you can take them out with no loss of meaning. Other examples
are replacing "a large number of" with "many" or "in order to" with "to."
Anyway, the goal here is to shrink the number of words used, thereby
increasing readability. Such picky editing goes under the name of
"tightening" and, if done properly, will mysteriously enhance the
readability, flow, and "punch" of your story...yet leave you unable to put
your finger on just what has been changed.
Abbreviations, Initialisms, and Acronyms
Technical articles are full of abbreviations, initialisms, and acronyms
(strictly speaking, an initialism is not an acrynym unless you can procounce
it). If you are not careful with abbreviations, initialisms, and acronyms
(AIAs), you can puzzle and infuriate your readers.
The standard copy-editing rule is that you spell out each AIA (abbreviation
initialism acronym) upon your first use and then use the short form freely
from then on. This rule has three problems:
1. The rule is well-known only among copy editors, not readers in
general.
2. The rule assumes that readers can figure out what something is solely
from its spelled-out form.
3. The rule assumes that readers can memorize and assimilate any number
of AIAs after being exponsed to the spelled-out version of each AIA only
once.
I suspect that the rule exists for the convenience of copy editors, not
readers.
Instead of following the copy-editing rule blindly, I suggest you think over
each AIA you use. Consider that some AIAs are self explanatory once you spell
them out:
SCUBA -- Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus.
And some are not:
CMOS -- Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor.
A person who does not know what "CMOS" is will be little illuminated by
having it merely spelled out for him.
In fact, if you must spell an AIA out, you have as much admitted you should
not have used it in the first place (Kerridge’s Rule).
So feel free to insert an in-line gloss for any term whose spelled-out AIA is
not self explanatory. And feel free to redefine an AIA (or any form of
jargon) if the current use is some distance from its original definition in
the text. Copy editors will consider you redundant but readers will like you.
Use No Exclamation Points
Exclamation points signify exclamations and commands. Using exclamation
points as amazement points or look-at-this points is OK for circus posters
but is not appropriate for a sober technical article. If your story is not
interesting and exciting, peppering it with exclamation points will not help.
Professional editors assume that anyone who uses a lot of exclamation points
is semiliterate.
Related to Technical Manual English, but worse, is Marketing English.
MARKETING ENGLISH TREATS ENGINEERS AS OBJECTS
Sharing many of the faults of Technical Manual English, Marketing English is
even less desirable. One dead giveaway of Marketing English is referring to
engineers as objects: "markets." Now no one thinks of himself as a market.
Using Marketing English means you have automatically abandoned an
engineer-to-engineer approach.
So even if you are in marketing, if you are writing for engineers, avoid
sounding like a marketeer at all costs. Many engineers find Marketing English
distasteful -- a real turnoff.
Curiously, in Marketing English, products that do not ship in 50-gallon drums
in liquid form are called "solutions." Though many engineers have observed
these so-called "solutions" for long periods of time, no one has ever seen a
single "solution" solve anything all by itself.
ENGINEERS
-- NOT PRODUCTS OR COMPANIES --
SOLVE PROBLEMS
Hence, "2-chip solution" becomes "2-chip set."
Don’t Pin Me Down
For obvious reasons, marketers don’t like to make any definite promises that
you might actually hold them to. Consequently, they prefer insubstantial
adjectives to quantified nouns.
"Functionality" is a favorite Marketing English word that has spilled over to
Technical Manual English. It sprang out of nowhere (like "interoperability")
and isn’t in most dictionaries.
Many people sling it around without really knowing what they mean. Doing so
is easy because the word has no agreed-upon meaning. "Functional" is the
adjective form of "function." And "functionality" is the noun form of
"functional." So, both being nouns, and the one being derived from the other,
do "functionality" and "function" mean exactly the same thing? Maybe yes and
maybe no. (Think about "person," "personal," and "personality" for a while.)
You see, "functionalism" was an industrial-design movement back in the ’30s.
"Functional" acquired a connotation beyond "merely operable." Something that
was "functional" was elegantly and sparely designed. It performed its
function flawlessly. It was the product of genius. It was streamlined and
lacked adornment and embellishment.
I have often heard claims that someone has "enhanced the functionality" of
his product. After questioning, I find that some people mean that they have
added functions. So for them, "functionality" simply refers to the set of
functions that their product has. In this case, I just as simply replace
"functionality" with some form of "function."
Others mean that the product does no more than it always did, but it does
those functions better. For them, "functionality" refers to the degree of
functionalism that their product has. In this case, I usually reword the
sentence to make this rather abstract statement concrete.
Still others mean both things at once.
Software Jargon
Software jargon abounds with peculiar usages of English words, semi-literate
extensions to English, and misused mathematical terms.
Put yourself in the place of a novice searching a word-processor manual for
directions on alphabetizing a list of names. The joke is on the novice. He
should be looking under "S" for "sort," not "A" for "alphabetize."
Programmers have extended the use of "reference" -- a noun derived from the
verb "to refer" -- as a verb. I often have trouble figuring out what is
referring to what in a software story and just what the nature of this
referring is. Not satisfied with this level of confusion, programmers
invented "dereference." If you know what "dereferencing" means, look up
"reference" in the dictionary and a couple of ordinary words that begin with
"de" (such as "delouse"). See if you can figure out how programmers got from
the verb "refer" to the verb "to dereference."
So if you are forced to use software jargon, define the jargon as best you
can and make sure that you the context you use the jargon in is clear.
If you are writing for engineers, you should assume that they -- unlike
programmers -- know the difference between a "parameter" and an "argument."
When you must deal with vague, abstract programming terms such as "C can pass
a function as a parameter," try to recast the software jargon into concrete
engineering terms. "C can pass the starting address of a function to a
subroutine."
Ephemeral Euphemisms
Because marketers want to gloss over any deficiencies in their products,
Marketing English tends to use up euphemisms at a high rate. As these
euphemisms will quickly go out of fashion, do not them in your text. Remember
that "moron" was once a polite euphemism. Or, consider the increasingly silly
series of euphemisms for products that may, or may not, actually work with
other products without first subjecting the hapless user to infuriating
troubleshooting sessions:
compatible
interoperable
plug-and-play
Do you really want to participate in foolishness like this just to be trendy?
Phony-Tough Language
Marketers relish phony-tough language. They like to think of themselves as
"gladiators battling it out in the arena." Really they a just a bunch of guys
in suits trying to sell something they don’t fully understand before
technology passes the product by.
Stick to concrete terms. Avoid military, sports, law-enforcement, and other
phony-tough allusions.
A Technical Article Is Not A Free Ad
Despite what marketing, public relations, and management might think, a good
technical article is not a free ad for your company’s products. Even if you
work for a really mean old timer in the semiconductor industry who thinks he
knows everything, a technical article whose primary function is to promote
your company’s products will not make a good impression.
A good technical article, like a good application engineer, helps other
engineers whether they buy your company’s products or not.
If you want to make a good impression with hard-bitten engineers, be
professional, don’t be promotional.
Charles H Small, csmall@sna.com
References
1. Gardner, Howard, "Frames of Mind, the Theory of Multiple
Intelligences," Basic Books, New York, NY, 1985. ISBN 0-465-02508-0.
2. West, Thomas G, "The Mind’s Eye," Prometheus Books, Buffalo, NY, 1991.
3. Petroski, Henry, "The Pencil," Alfred A. Knopf, New York, NY, 1990.
4. Ferguson, Eugene S., "Engineering and the Mind’s Eye," MIT Press,
Cambridge, MA, 1993.
5. Tufte, Edward R, "The Visual Display of Quantitative Information,"
Graphics Press, Cheshire, CT, 1983.
Appendix 1 -- Checklist
1. Review the content and style of your target magazine.
2. Decide just who your target audience is. Then pick a level for your
story.
3. Prepare figures, diagrams, charts, tables, glossary of special terms,
bibliography of reference material, and checklists.
4. Write down everything you can think of without regard to style,
content, or organization
5. Rewrite.
6. Reorganize.
7. Rewrite some more.
8. Ruthlessly cut out any superfluous material.
9. Insert logical operators.
10. Change all passive-voice sentences to active voice, providing an
explicit actor for each action.
11. Rewrite to eliminate the word "it," "this" or "that" used as nouns,
overuse of "with," "former/latter," engineeringese, marketingese,
patent-office-ese etc.
12. Break up log jams of modifiers piled up in front of subjects of
sentences.
13. Change as many nouns as possible into verbs, adjectives, or adverbs
-- as appropriate.
14. Write short "segues" that explicitly transition readers from one
section of your story to another.
15. Let your story cool off and re-read it in a couple of days.
16. Get one or more persons who are smart, but who are not familiar with
your material, to critique your story for you.
17. Rewrite some more.
Article: 44901 of sci.electronics
From: csmall@sna.com
Subject: FAQ: How to become a technical writer (3 of 3)
How to Write Articles for Technical Magazines (3 of 3)
Appendix 1 Word List
Words and constructions to avoid in technical articles:
acualize
Peculiar word. Try one of the following and you may
be more widely understood.
act out, realize, cause
are/is aimed ... at
Avoid bellicose metaphors (aiming, targeting, etc),
especially passive-voice ones.
Try: suit, suits
are/is designed ... as
If using some form of verb "design" to address
designer's goals or good intentions, reword to focus
on what product actually
does.
are/is given as
Overly formal. Just say "is" or "are" rather than
"is/are given by".
Try: is, are
are/is (not) sufficient for
Overly long way to say "can" or "cannot."
Try: cannot
are/is such that
Try eliminating "is/are such that" to tighten sentence
and express your
thought directly.
are/is suited as/for
Engineeringese. Verbose. Simplify.
Try: suits
are/is supplied as/with
Wordy.
Try: come in, comes in, come with, comes with
are/is sufficient to/for
Simplify "is/are (not) sufficient to".
Try: can, cannot
are/is/was/were used as/for/to
Needlessly passive. Cut "is/are/was/were used
as/to/for", find real verb in what follows and
promote it to main verb of whole thought.
a total of
Often redundant, or prepended to avoid starting a
sentence with a number.
Try cutting "a total of".
according to
Simplify. Use form of "say".
Try: says said to
advantage
Marketingese. Use concrete specification instead.
Readers can decide if spec is an advantage or disadvantage.
aggressive
Phony-tough marketingese. If appended to "strategy,"
cut entire passage. If appended to pricing, reword.
amperes of current
Amperes can only be current.
Try: amperes
as benefits
Avoid using this stilted introduction to a thought.
as follows
If introducing something (...is as follows), you can
probably cut "as follows".
based on
Overworked. Inexact. Imprecise. Who or what is "based"
on which?
Try: contains, depends on, depending on, having, that
has, which has, with
begins
If pricing "begins" at some price, is sleazy unless
ceiling price given too.
benefits
List specs instead of citing "benefits" or telling how
product "benefits" the reader. Readers will decide, by
themselves, if specs are beneficial or not in their
particular application.
boasts
Silly verb.
Try: has features
breakthrough
Overblown. Cut any claim that something is a "breakthrough".
busses
A no-no.
Try: buses
by ... means of
Patent-office-ese. Leads to especially convoluted, passive
construction. Get doer of action our from behind "by means
of" and make it subject of sentence.
by way of
Sleaze transition? Rewrite to eliminate.
are/is called ...
Just give product name once; no need to inform reader
that "...the company "calls" the product XYZ."
can be shown to be
Stilted, academic, verbose.
Try: is are
can be obtained with
Stilted, academic, unnecessary passive.
Try: yield yields
claimed
Correct connotation? Do you believe the person or spec
you are quoting? Or is "claim" just weasel wording?
Try: say says state states
commitment
Usually appears in self-serving blurb. Cut.
comprise
The whole "comprises" the parts; the parts "compose"
the whole. "Comprise" means "include" (with a notion of
totality). Never use "is comprised of."
Try: compose, composes, composed
cost effective
Avoid this promotional cliche. Cut and give prices for
comparison instead.
crescendo
A "crescendo" is a gradual increase in volume over
time. Hence, you cannot "reach a crescendo" and a
"rising crescendo" is redundant.
damn
Poor taste. Don't use.
designed ... for use in
Verbose. Forgo focus on designer's goals; concentrate
on concrete results.
Try: suit, suits
device
Overworked, vague, imprecise, ambiguous. Find another,
more concrete noun to use if possible.
due to
"Due to" is an adverb. Use only if a verb follows.
Otherwise, use "because of".
Try: because of, from, arising from
especially unique
Illogical.
Try: unique
exception
In software contexts, readers are more likely to
recognize "interrupt" than "exception".
Try: interrupt, interrupts
flexibility
Instead of "giving/providing the "flexibility"" to do
something, just do it. Be specific. Enumerate modes of
operation. Reword to eliminate "flexibility".
flexible
Vague relative term. Be more specific about all the
things the product can
do.
for example/instance
Be precise. If is exemplar, use "example"; if is the
first thing that came to hand, use "instance"
from the viewpoint of
Unless really "viewing" something, is usually flabby
splice between two thoughts. Rewrite to express logical
relationship precisely.
functionality
Ambiguous--means either "function(s)" or refers to how
"functional". If makes sense, replace with "function(s)";
if not, rewrite to eliminate.
Try: function, functions
furthermore
Sleaze transition?
heads up
"Heads up" is baseball; "head up" is for displays,
especially displays in aircraft and cars.
Try: head up, head-up
hell
Poor taste. Don't use.
high precision
Relative term. Be concrete. Cut. Quote accuracy spec
instead.
in
If you are abbreviating inches, it's "in." (with a
period).
Try: in.
in the form of
Overly long way to express logical relationship.
Try: as
in the way of
Sleaze transition? Rewrite to eliminate.
in order for
Stilted, wordy.
Try: for
in terms of
Often unnecessary. Can be flabby splice between two
thoughts. Can be flimsy band-aid. Go back, lay groundwork.
Supply missing thought. Break up into two sentences.
Express thought precisely.
in mind
If "designed with the user in mind", hackneyed, trite.
Cut entire passage.
Industry source [et al]
Attribute all quotes.
integrated
Except for ICs, vague--especially software. Try
cutting. Be specific about
what the "integrated" thing comprises.
is/are intended
If use of form of verb "intend" speaks to designer's
goals, good intentions, or future expectations, reword
to focus on actual achievements in the present.
intercommunicate
"Co"mmunication can only occur among "co"mmunicators.
The "inter" is redundant. Simplify. Use form of "communicate".
interoperate
Use only for networked computers. Avoid otherwise.
involve
Simplify. Try just doing whatever the sentence is
talking about instead of "involving" doing something.
it may be noted that
Stilted, academic. Reword to eliminate.
Try: note that
it is necessary that
Stilted, verbose, academic. Rewrite to eliminate.
Try: you must, you should
it
If "it" is a backwards reference, be careful reference
is clear; if "it" is a forward reference, reverse order; if
"it" is an indefinite "it", reword to eliminate.
just
Attempted trivialization? Try cutting "just". A thing
that weighs "just" three pounds and a thing that
weighs three pounds both weigh the same.
less than
Attempted sleaze? Be more exact, especially pricing.
market
Take engineer's viewpoint, not marketeer's. Engineers
design; they don't engage in marketing.
Try: is selling, are selling, sell, sells, offer,
offers
market
Take engineer's viewpoint, not marketeer's.
Try: application, applications area, field, fields
meanwhile
Sleaze transition?
media
"Media" is plural. Use plural form of verb.
mediums
"Media" is the plural of "medium". Try: media
minimum
If using "minimum" as a modifier, use adjective form
"minimal".
Try: minimal
mode
If "mode" is applied to a state, is overworked, vague,
imprecise, ambiguous. Find another way to express state.
module
Overworked, vague, imprecise, ambiguous. Find another
way to express.
myriad of
Grammatically incorrect. "Myriad" is only an
adjective, never a noun. Cut the "of".
obviate the need for
"Obviate" includes the notion of eliminating "need".
Cut "need" and associated modifiers.
one
"One" as a pronoun is stilted, overly formal. Use the
familiar "you."
Try: you
only
Promotional? Attempted trivialization? "3 lbs" and
"only 3 lbs" weigh the same. Try cutting "only".
optimum"Optimal" is the adjective form of "optimum".
Try: optimal
packaged ... as
Unnecessary passive and redundant. Are saying, in
effect, that item is packaged in a package of some sort.
Try: come in, comes in
parameter "parameter" is a term that sets the size or
form of something. Never use for argument, limit, esp "perimeter".
Try: argument, characteristic, limit, setting, spec,
specification, variable, perimeter
perfected
Promotional relative term? Try cutting.
platform
Silly marketingese. Use "computer(s)" if hardware,
"program(s)" if software.
Try: computer, computers, program, programs
positioned
Marketeers use forms of "position", both as a noun and
a verb, in a peculiar, jargonish fashion: "leadership "position"",
"..."position" the product as..." Express thought another way.
preplaned
Planning can be done only in advance. Simplify. Use
form of "plan".
Try: plan, plans, planning, planned
prepositioned
Simplify. Try form of "position" without the "pre".
Try: position, positioning, positioned
preprogramed
Programming can be done only in advance. Simplify. Use
form of "program".
Try: program, programs, programming, programmed
presently
"Presently" means soon, not "at present".
Try: soon, at present, currently, now
priced at
Unnecessarily passive.
Try: costs, costing
proactive
No one is sure just what this touchy-feeley word
means. Try to find another way to express your thought.
process
Redundant. Overworked. Often appended to activities
that are inherently "processes". (Editing process, writing
process, design process...) Try
cutting. Use verb form of word preceding process.
programming power
Vague marketingese. There's no unit for "programming
power".
proportion
Do not use "proportions" to refer to absolute size,
ie: "...reached epidemic "proportions"." "Proportions"
are relative, not absolute. Often
redundant or weasel wording. Try cutting.
Try: size
quantum
A "quantum" is an extremely small interval or amount.
Do not use expressions such as "quantum leap" to mean significant
advances.
readily
Promotional adverb? Try cutting.
RPMs
Just use RPM, not plural, because RPM is already
plural (R=revolution"s")
Try: RPM
schema
"Schema" is a more pretentious form of the word
"scheme".
Try: scheme, schemes
shit
Poor taste. Don't use.
since
Use "since" only to describe time. In all other cases
use "because".
Try: because
situation
Often redundant, as in "crisis "situation"" or
"emergency "situation"". Try omitting and see if sentence
still reads ok.
solution
Promotional? No product, except for a "liquid", is a
"solution". Engineers, not products, solve problems. Try cutting.
Try: device, set, module, program, unit
somewhat dependent on
Stilted, verbose, academic, unnecessarily passive.
Rewrite in active voice to eliminate.
somewhat unique
Silly and illogical. Try: unique, or better, just cut.
speed
Reserve "speed" for the velocity of physical objects.
Otherwise, use the more general "rate".
Try: rate
sports (verb)
Ugh!
Try: has, have, feature, features
starts at
If pricing "starts" at some figure, is sleazy unless
ceiling price or range given.
state of the art
Trite. Passe. Overworked. Verbose. Promotional. Logically,
"state of the art" does not mean "good" anyway
-- just the best you can do right now.
Try rewording to eliminate.
such as to
Try eliminating "such as to" to tighten up sentence
and make expression of thought more direct.
such that
"Such" is an adjective; use "so that".
Try: so that
support
Vague. Overworked. Be specific. What's it really do?
Who is really supporting whom? Is any supporting really
going on or does stuff simply coexist?
targeted ... at
Avoid bellicose metaphors.
Try: suit, suits
that
"That" what? ""That"" must modify something. It cannot
stand by itself as a noun -- as the subject of a sentence,
for example.
the ...ing of
Avoid "the ...ing of" construction; try to use simple
verb form instead.
the ...ment of
Avoid "ment" words; try to use verb form instead.
the ...tion of
Shun "tion" words; use verb form where ever possible
instead.
the ...ure of
Avoid "ure" words; try to use verb form instead.
the/a total of
Often redundant. Try cutting "the/a total of".
the use of
Engineeringese. Rewrite to eliminate.
Try: using
there is
Don't use this empty introduction to a thought. Reword
to eliminate.
there are
Don't use this empty introduction to a thought. Reword
to eliminate.
this
"This" what? ""This"" must modify something. It cannot
stand by itself as a noun--the subject of a sentence, for example.
transitioning
A bit overstated. Try something simpler.
Try: switching, changing
type
Sometimes not needed, as in "BNC "type" connectors".
typical
Be precise. Is it really "typical" of the entire
sample -- an exemplar? Or is it just one thing from among
bunch of unrelated things?
Try: often, sometimes, usually, one, example, sample
user friendly
There's no unit for "user friendliness" so cut such
unverifiable claims.
very
Unneeded intensive? Promotional? Try cutting "very".
viable
Must you? (Courtesy Chris Terry)
watts of power
Just "watts"; cut the "of power".
Try: watts
where it can be shown
Reserve "where" for indicating physical locations.
Avoid the academic use of "where" as in "where it can be shown".
whereas
Stilted legalese.
Try: where
while
Does "while" introduce your thought or describe action
properly? Reserve "while" for simultaneous occurrences.
Kill "while"; introduce contrasting thought with "but".
Try: although, but, despite, given that
with regard to
Usually flabby splice between two thoughts. Convoluted
construction. Rewrite to eliminate and express logical
relationship precisely.
with respect to
Usually flabby splice between two thoughts or empty
introduction to sentence. Rewrite to eliminate.
with
Make logical relationship clearer, preciser, or
expliciter. Replace
"with".
Try: accept, accommodate, containing, develop, for,
has, having, in, of, on, possessing, produce, that have,
to, under, using, when, which has
Words and constructions to avoid when deriving copy from
press releases and other promotional material.
advanced
Usually promotional in press-release context. No
company ever released a "retarded" product.
Try cutting.
appealing
Promotional?
Try cutting.
astounding
Really? Justified or promotional? Try cutting.
complete
Are you sure? Read ok without "complete"?
Try cutting.
comprehensive
Are you sure is "comprehensive"? Just in case vendor
left something out, cut.
dubbed
Just state product name. No need to inform reader that
"...company "dubbed" its new product ."
easier
Salesman to Blondie: "This book will cut your
housework in half." Blondie: "Fine, I'll take two."
Leave out claims about how easy something is to use
or learn.
easy
Be reluctant to pass on a vendor's claim that its
product or process is "easy" to use or understand.
Try cutting "easy".
enhanced
Vague. Be more specific about just what improvements are.
entire
Are you sure "entire" is accurate? "entire" needed?
Try cutting.
even
Gushy? Promotional?
Try cutting.
excellent
Promotional relative adjective? Try cutting.
extensive
Overblown. Vague relative adjective. Often unsupported.
Try cutting "extensive".
extreme
Promotional relative adjective? Try cutting.
first
Don't use "first"--especially in leads. "Firsts" are
usually just cooked up. Ok for time sequences or order
in series.
full
Usually promotional and unnecessary in press-release
context. Try cutting "full". A "full 16-bit bus" and
a "16-bit bus" both have 16-bits.
high
Promotional relative adjective? Try cutting.
ideal
Always very promotional in press-release context.
Cut "ideal".
innovative
Always promotional in a press-release context. Cut
"innovative".
lead, leader, leading
Avoid claims involving "leaders" or "leading"
companies or products--especially "market leaders".
low
Promotional relative adjective? Try cutting.
major
No vendor ever made a "minor" announcement. Always
promotional in a press-release context. Cut "major".
new
Promotional? Avoid "new" in press-release contexts.
If it wasn't new, you wouldn't be writing about it.
novel
Not needed, promotional. Cut "novel" in press-release
contexts.
now
Often promotional in press-release contexts. Try
rewording to eliminate "now".
popular
Gushy valentine word. So what? Who cares if product is
popular? Promotional. Cut.
powerful
Unless you can quote a spec in watts, "powerful" is
overblown, promotional. Try cutting "powerful."
prime
Except for beef and numbers, is usually PRese. Try
cutting.
simple
Promotional? Just how "simple" is it? Try cutting.
superior
Promotional relative adjective? Try cutting.
today
Don't use "today" and associated copy in press-release
contexts.
unique
Justified? Often promotional in press-release
contexts. Try cutting "unique".
unprecedented
Is this superlative justified? Overblown? Try cutting.
versatile
Justified? Usually superfluous and promotional in
press-release contexts. Try cutting.
well
Promotional? Try cutting.
wide
Promotional relative adjective? Try cutting.
taneous occurrences.
Appendix 2 Some Magazines
Byte
One Phoenix Mill Lane
Peterborough, NH 03458
Circuit Cellar Ink
4 Park St, Suite 20
Vernon, CT 06066
Communications System Design
600 Harrison St
San Francisco, CA 94107
415 905 2200
Computer Design
10 Tara Blvd, 5th Floor
Nashua, NH 03062-2801
603 891 0123
FAX 613 891 0514
Control Engineering
1350 E Touhy Ave
PO Box 5080
Des Plaines, IL 60017-5080
Defense Electronics
6151 Powers Ferry Road NW
Atlanta, GA 30339
DesignFax
29100 Arena Rd, Suite 200
Cleveland, OH
44139
Design News
275 Washington St
Newton, MA 02158
617 964 3030
Desktop Engineering
Helmers Publishing
174 Concord St
Peterborough, NH 03458-0874
Dr Dobbs Journal
411 Borel
San Mateo, CA 94402-3522
415 358 9500 xt 250
EDN (EDN stands for nothing)
Cahners Publishing
275 Washington St
Newton, MA 02158
EDN Products
301 Gibraltar Dr
Morris Plains, NJ 07950-0650
EE Product News
707 Westchester Ave
White Plains, MY 10604
EE Times
600 Community Dr
Manhasset, NY 11030
Electronic Component News
Chilton Way
Radnor, PA 19089
Electronic Design
611 Route 46 W
Hasbrouck Heights, NJ 07604
FAX 201 393 0204
Electronic Products
645 Stewart Ave
Garden City, NY 11530
Electronics Now
500-B Bi-county Blvd
Farmingdale, NY 11735
516 293 3000
Embedded Systems Programming
Miller Freeman, Inc
600 Harrison St
San Francisco, CA 94107
FAX 415 905 2499
ID Systems
Helmers Publishing
174 Concord St
PO Box 874
Peterborough, NH 03458-0874
I&CS Magazine
One Chilton Way
Radnor, PA 19089-0380
IAN
One Chilton Way
Radnor, PA 19089
Industrial Computing
ISA Services Inc
67 Alexander Dr
Research Triangle Park, NC 27709
Intec
67 Alexander Dr
Research Triangle Park, NC 27709
Electronic Products
645 Stewart Ave
Garden City, NY 11530
Instrument & Automation News
(press releases only)
Chilton Way
Radnor, PA 19089
Industrial Equipment News
(press releases only)
5 Penn Plaza, 8th Floor
New York, NY 10001
Industrial Product Bulletin
(press releases only)
301 Gibralter Dr
Box 650
Morris Plaines, NJ -7950-0650
Machine Design
1100 Superior Ave
Cleveland, OH 44114
Measurement & Control
2994 W Liberty Ave
Pittsburgh, PA 15216
Mechanical Engineering
345 E 47th St
NY, NY 10017
MicroComputer Journal
784-A Lexington Club Blvd
Del Ray Beach, FL 33446
Midnight Engineering
1700 Washington Ave
Rocky Ford, CO 81607
NASA Tech Briefs
41 E 42nd St
NY, NY 10017
Personal Engineering
& Instrumentation
25 Washington Rd
Rye, NY 03870
Product Design & Development
1 Chilton Way
Radnor, PA 19089
RF Design
6151 Powers Ferry Rd NW
Altanta, GA 30339
404 955 2500
Sensors
Helmers Publishing
174 Concord St
Peterborough, NH 03458-0874
Spectrum Magazine
345 E 47th St
New York, NY 10017-2394
Wired
520 Third St, Fourth Floor
San Francisco, CA 94107
Wireless Design & Development
(press releases only)
301 Gibralter Dr
Box 650
Morris Plaines, NJ 07950-0650
Asian Electronics Engineer
22nd Floor, Vita Tower
29 Wong Chuk Hang Road
Kong Kong
Canadian Electronics
135 Spy Ct
Markham, Ontario L3R 5H6
Composants Instrumentation
Electroniques (CIE)
Tas Publishing Ltd.
80 Highgate Road
London NW5 IPB
Design & Elektronik (D&E)
Magna Media -- Verlag Aktiengesellshaft
Hans-Pinsel-Str. 2
85540 Haar
Germany
EDN Asia
Reed Overseas Companies
19/F, Eight Commercial Tower
8 Sun Yip Street
Chaiwan
Hong Kong
Electronic Engineering
Morgan Grampion
30 Calderwood Street
London SE 18 6QH
Electronic Info
At Fachverlag GmbH
Saarlandstrasse 28
D 70734 Fellbach
Stuttgart
Germany
Electronic Product Design
IML Group
Blair House, High Street
Tonbridge, Kent, TN9 1BQ
Electronic Product News
Pan European Publishing Co
Rue Verte 216
B-1210 Brussels 21, Belgium
Electronics World & Wireless World
Quadrant House
The Quadrant
Sutton, Surrey
England
Elektronic
Franzis-Verlag
Gruber Strasse 46A
85586 Poing
Germany
Elektronik Industrie
Huthig Publishing
Dr. Alfred Huthig Verlag
Paul-Gerhardt-Allee 46
D-81245 Munchen
Germany
Elektronik Revue
(press releases only)
Elsevier Thomas Fachtverlag GmbH
Max-Hutschmidt-Strasse
Postfach 1869
D-55008 Mainz
Germany
Eletronique
CEP Group Test
26 Rue de Oradour sur Glane
75015 Paris CEDEX 15
France
Elettronica Oggi
Gruppo Editoriale Jackson
Via Gorki 69
20092 Cinisello Balsamo
Via Ferri 6
Italy
Elettronica Selezione
Gruppo Editoriale Jackson
Via Gorki 69
20092 Cinisello Balsamo
Via Ferri 6
Italy
EPN
Rue Verte 216
B-1210 Brussels 21
Belgium
EPN Asia
Rue Verte 216
B-1210 Brussels 21
Belgium
FAX (32) 2-245-7740
Journal Of The Electronics Industry
Dempa Publications Inc
1-11-15
Higashi, Gtoanda
Shinagawa-ku
Tokyo 141
Japan
New Electronics
Findley Publications Ltd
Franks Hall, Horton Kirlby
Kent, DA4 9LL
Transistor Gijitsu
CQ Publishing Co., Ltd.
1-14-2 Sugamo, Toshima-ku
Tokyo 170
Japan
Nikkei
Nikkei Business Publications
Unit 1404, East Point Centre
533 Hennessy Road
Causeway Bay
Hong Kong
NEP
Incom Company Ltd.
1-22-6 Sekiquichi
Bunkyo-kuk
Tokyo 112
Japan
Mundo Electronico
(also Mundo Productronica)
Cetisa/Boixareu Editories, S.A.
Concepcion Arenal, 5
08027 Barcelona
Spain
Eurofach
Maria Auxiliadora, 5
20840 Madrid
Spain
Rede
Ediciones Tecnicas REDE S.A.
Ecuador, 91
08029 Barcelona
Spain
What's New In Design
(press releases only)
Miller Freeman Technical Inc
30 Calderwood Street
London SE18 6QH
UK