At different times, I’ve mentored people who are interested in technical writing. I have over ten years of experience as a professional technical writer and some definite ideas about how to get started in the field. A friend of mine asked me for some suggested reading on getting started in technical writing. I collected a set of links as a starting point (see below) and realized other people might be interested in the links too.
- My bookmarks on Delicious for tech writing
- The motherload of all TW mailing lists: TechW-L. Great articles, resources, and mailing list archives. The membership includes several thousand tech writers world wide.
- Online text book for tech writing
- Fundamentals of Document Design by BA Stoky Design
- Monster.com’s Guide to careers in tech writing
- DocSymmetry’s info on being a tech writer
- Myths about tech writing
- Webster Tech Writing (see the field guide to tech writing)
- User Guide Tutorial from Klariti
To get ideas for manual layout and structure, take a look at some of the available free templates for Open Office Writer and Microsoft Word. For Word, check out Microsoft’s Office template pages. The exact URL will differ depending upon the version of Office you have installed.
