We expect a book with the title The Writing System to be about a systematic approach to technical writing, a step-by-step method of producing good writing. Indeed, the emphasis of this book is on the strategy of writing, but it is both broader and narrower in scope than the title suggests. How can it be both broader and narrower?

The cover letter you send with a resume to a prospective employer should be grammatically and typographically perfect. The principles to follow when composing the cover letter are the same as for any technical communication: Use simple, precise language; be concise; use the active voice. Tips on how to handle the mechanical aspects of the cover letter — selecting paper, using proper margins, and writing short paragraphs — are also presented.

Like a two-legged stool, language and content in technical writing do not stand alone. The finished product must meet requirements and satisfy constraints — the moral of this tale.

Design and development engineers have a responsibility to communicate and cooperate fully with technical writers if successful publications are to emerge from an organization. It is the writer's obligation to obtain the respect and confidence of the engineers so that information is rendered accurately and for mutual benefit. Such information may take the form of explanatory documents, manuals, brochures, reports, specifications, and publications for employee training. Illustrations are part of an international technical writing language. Their purpose is to convey a message with little or no text and they must be carefully crafted not to hand the reader a puzzle.

To understand a scientific or technical article written in English by Japanese specialists, readers should understand in what areas of English grammar the Japanese tend to make mistakes. Most common are mistakes in the use of articles, subjunctive mood, prepositions, and auxiliary verbs. Also a problem is the use of unsuitable words, often due to the use of bilingual dictionaries. A further complication arises from the absence of the perfect tenses in Japanese.

Students in engineering courses can learn technical writing skills without having to spend large amounts of valuable class time. Given design-project handouts that contain a problem statement and a list of design specifications, students are asked to solve the problem and they are expected to write a report that includes a title page, abstract, table of contents, introduction, body, conclusion, and reference list. Handouts, which are provided at the beginning of the project, are models of the technical reports the students are expected to prepare.

Three hundred sixty-seven engineering graduates responded to a survey by ranking 30 communication tasks according to their job importance and frequency of performance. The statistical result was that speaking tasks were rated slightly higher than writing tasks for all engineering fields surveyed, independent of whether the respondent spent more time in engineering or in management. Also, more than 50 percent had job-related spoken communication with technical personnel at least daily and with nontechnical personnel at least weekly.

The author discusses the rather highly specialized role of the technical communicator in promoting the process of technology transfer, i.e., industrial application of technologies that originally had been developed in Government research and development (R&D) programs.

You can make yourself easily understood on complex ideas by organizing and signaling the meaning of your thoughts in a clear way. Thoughts should be grouped in the order situation, problem, resolution, information — the SPRI system. Even an already written but confusing article can be improved by coding each sentence or passage with an S, P, R, or I and then reordering the text.

This paper differs from many how-to-do-it guidelines for authors because it proposes that technical writers need to acquire various skills. One valuable skill is that of analyzing how a document will be used. Creating easy-to-read texts also requires the twin skills of language control and judicious selection among graphic and typographic options. Evaluating the cost-benefits of alternative presentations requires a fourth skill, sophisticated interpretation of the available research findings (laboratory findings are not suitable for rote application). A fifth set of skills that are useful to the technical writer concerns the management of the production process, where administrative and interpersonal factors must be deftly handled. Whether these diverse skills can be found within one person seems an open question which has important implications for the training of technical authors and the operation of technical writing departments.

The premise upon which readability formulas operate is that short words and short sentences are the measure of readable writing. This premise has (and was acknowledgedly designed with) limitations that are too often overlooked in enthusiastic attempts to reduce all writing to simple, quantitative analysis. Among these limitations two are particularly germane to any discussion of using readability formulas for evaluating technical communication.

These recommendations combine time-tested advice to writers with the Editor's preferences. Used with our Information for Authors (published in each issue of the Transactions) and the reference material in the June 1977 issue (PC-20/1), this miniguide to technical writing should help any author whisk his paper through the editorial process-provided, of course, that its technical content survives the refereeing process.

subjects the reader to such gems as these."To repeat, the sins in the world at large-at least, of the sort I'm talking aboutoften don't matter much.And sometimes, too, they don't matter in technical writing": and "-as I need hardly reiterate to this audience-."Moreover, the essay says nothing that other essays in the collection do not say with motivating verve.Mr. Harty assures us that these essays "have survived the most rigorous kind of scrutiny-that of my students ... at

of writing: the use of abbreviations, the division of compound words, some rules for spelling properly, among other things.This comprehensive book is aimed at students of technical writing and of English in two-year colleges.It is devised as a typical textbook: The margins are wide enough for notes, the terms likely to be new to students are printed in expanded boldface type and their meaning in light italics.Also printed in light italics are points the author thinks worth emphasizng.The book is easy to read: physically because the print is on non-glare paper, conceptually because it is well written and well organized, and that, after all, is the acid test of the quality of a book on composition.Superficially, nothing about the book suggests that it is a book on technical writing.One sees no charts, no graphs, no exploded views, no instructions on how to write an abstract.And yet this book is ideally suited for learning about or teach ing technical writing because technical writing, to attain its objective, must reflect the precision and discipline of thought basic to science and technology.That is the topic of this book.The manners and conventions of presentation, namely, that in technical writing one would use a table to compare or contrast pieces of apparatus of different make or vintage, that one would use a step-action chart or a flowchart to describe a process-all this, though important for the efficient transfer of information, is nevertheless somewhat peripheral to the meaning of technical writing.Students who learn about composition from

subjects the reader to such gems as these."To repeat, the sins in the world at large-at least, of the sort I'm talking aboutoften don't matter much.And sometimes, too, they don't matter in technical writing": and "-as I need hardly reiterate to this audience-."Moreover,

Word power is often nullified by a writer's attempt to be literary. In technical writing the basic approach should be to suit the language to the purpose and audience of the message; be simple, direct, and concise. Rules for doing so indicate shorter is better — short words, sentences, paragraphs, and articles rather than long ones. Choose direct statements over indirect and active mood over passive; choose Anglo-Saxon words over Latin derivatives. Such rules do not guarantee “rightness” or ideal communication but are likely to make the writer right more often than wrong. Knowing such rules, one can break them wisely.

A wealth of examples and assignment suggestions alone makes Joanna Freeman's Basic Technical and Business Writing invaluable to teachers and students of technical communication. Chapter 3, “Headings, Tables, and Figures,” includes 41 illustrations, most of them courtesy of business organizations. So impressive and useful is this array that one tends to overlook the misplaced apostrophe in one of the charts. Dr. Freeman complements even her discussion of formal reports with three full-length examples, each demonstrating a different communication problem and solution: a statistical study from the Journal of Marketing Research, a persuasive argument from the 25th International Technical Communication Conference Proceedings, and a student paper classifying and summarizing the results of research.

The movement toward improved written technical communication has generated little parallel pressure for improved oral communication. Yet the cost of noncommunicative technical talks is large. Attention by speakers to several simple details will result in significant improvements in technical talks. The most important of these details is to present conclusions as close to the beginning of the talk as possible. This simple action will help change a talk from a mystery story to an understandable scientific presentation.

While bad technical writing has specific characteristics, one important cause of bad technical writing is abuse of natural English word order. Since about 1400, English has relied solely on word order to convey meaning, particularly active voice (agent-verb-object). Infusions of large numbers of foreign words from 1100 to 1600 further affected the development of English sentence patterns and their use in modern applied writing. To develop clear sentences, (1) use active voice as frequently as possible; (2) build sentences with clauses rather than phrases; (3) make the agent of the action the subject of the clause; (4) build clauses by concentrating meaning in the subject-verb pairs; (5) choose concrete rather than abstract nouns as subject-agents; (6) use action verbs rather than “be” verbs whenever possible; (7) use passive voice only when its use will not cloud meaning; (8) choose voice carefully when planning sentences; (9) remember that technical writing should inform, and that historically elegant sentence patterns and words are not suitable to express technical information.

Seven mathematical expressions are presented, with comments, for the guidance of technical writing by engineers and scientists. They determine when to write an interim report, when to write the final report, when to inform the higher echelons, how many extra readers could result from one more revision, what grade to give a revised version, how much reading time increases with increasing article length, and how various factors affect the science-world communication gap. The formulas stem from analogies between communication problems and solved problems in science and are intended to stimulate bread-boarding in technical writing.

It should be clear to graduate students and fledgling writers in all branches of science that they oeed to write about their work and to publish their results.The present book addresses this need and has some unique qualities-it is far more readable than most books of its kind and is liberally sprinkled, with humorous but pithy observations.Books on technical writing frequently are devoted to longwinded exposition on the virtues of

Technical writing requires creativity but not Lewis Carrolllike creative writing. Self-control and self-criticism are needed to achieve simplicity and clarity of expression. Generally, the core of the paper should be written first because the act of writing often furthers or changes the development of the subject and therefore affects both the introduction and the conclusion of the text. The introduction should provide context and perspective for the results and conclusions. A common fault is covering too much material in too wordy a fashion. It is often better to rewrite with a sharper outlook than simply to cross out words. Vague or defensive statements and generalized descriptions are good candidates for elimination. Mathematics may often be moved to an appendix and charts or graphs used to clarify the numerical work. Good judgment rather than haste should prevail in technical writing.

Writing, a technical paper and delivering it orally are complementary acts. This bibliography cites 178 resources for technical communicators interested in improving their speaking skills. These resources include organizations and publications concerned with speech; institutes, seminars, and courses on oral communication of technical information; and standard works and selected articles on informational speech. This bibliography is not complete but it is a start for technical communicators in business, industry, and government who are intent on improving their oral presentation of technical information.

Linguistic sexism is being confronted with increasing awareness by people who recognize its political and social implications. There are viable alternative words and phrases that can be substituted for those that tend to misrepresent or stereotype either sex. This article points out where changes need to be initiated and offers reasonable substitute wording that does not become clumsy or ridiculous. Such usage is especially important in scientific and technical writing where objectivity, accuracy, and attention to detail are critical. References are included along with a supplementary reading list and an appendix that describes a genderist rating scheme for written and oral communication.

Several kinds of written invention disclosure are described and a checklist of their contents (e.g., date of conception, functional description, drawing) is developed. The patentability search disclosure is discussed in particular. In general, disclosures should provide a concise description of the invention, identifying its field of technology, describing its major parts, and telling how it works; state what the inventor believes to be the novel feature and why it is an improvement; clearly label significant parts in an uncluttered drawing; and provide patent or other references to similar or related inventions. Disclosures should not ignore principles or good technical writing; encompass more than one invention or include extraneous material.

Three principal facets of the engineer's role in communicating technical information are to maintain a constant awareness of the inherent importance of technical communication; acquire and practice the basic skills needed to communicate effectively in various media; and foster the continued improvement of communication at all levels, including active participation in a professional society. Fulfillment of this role would allow engineers to realize better day-to-day communication, enhance their opportunities for advancement, and achive greater professional recognition.

American scientists and engineers are lucky. If their reports are unreadable, they can study technical writing at the nearest university, community college, hotel seminar, or in-house course. Their British counterparts are less fortunate. According to a British friend of mine who just earned his Ph.D. degree in engineering, the British are not taught to write past primary school. Those who study engineering at a polytechnic, an advanced college of technology, or at a university must write the best they can. Too often their best writing does not read well.

A survey of college and university members of the American Society for Engineering Education indicated that about 25 percent are offering technical writing instruction in some type of continuing education program. Formats vary widely and include videotape presentations, classroom instruction, and correspondence. Half of the courses are taught at the undergraduate level; about half of the instructors are in-house or visiting faculty. Major programs are at Clemson Univ., Colorado State Univ., George Washington Univ., Rensselaer Polytechnic Inst., Univ. of California (Los Angeles), Univ. of Michigan, and Univ. of Wisconsin (Madison). An industrial communication certification program is being planned at California State Univ. (Fullerton).

Reading of a substantial number of recent technical publications discloses excessive violations of certain stylistic and grammatical proprieties. These violations suggest failure of editors and teachers to get their message across and of writers to approach writing with fitting concern. The most frequent and significant violations are selected and explained. Speculation on causes and suggestions for elimination of the violations accompany the explanations.

LAST year we devoted most of our pages to articles on technical writing and publishing. This year we will tip the balance toward audio and visual aspects of technical communication. In this issue, for example, we include some thoughts on lecturing. Though the four articles reprinted here range in time of origin from the first half of the 19th century to the second half of the 20th, they are remarkably consistent and provide some succinct guides toward the development of effective oral presentations.

The busy technical writer can find whatever he needs stylistically in the Handbook of Technical Writing, and he can find it fast. Prepared as a college textbook, the Handbook can serve just as well as a desk reference for the employed writer.

To be used as a tool of professional writing, paragraphing must involve style organization, and a recognizable flow of thought. These characteristics are reviewed with examples, and emphasis is put on the use of a summarizing topic sentence.

Knowing how to express oneself properly is a necessity in today's technical world. The technical writer must use correct grammar and exact language in his descriptions of precise, technical subjects. He must learn how to adapt his personal style to the impact he wants to make. In addition, he must learn how to communicate to various levels of audiences. Also, he should learn to use graphic aids in the presentation of an article.

`Rules-of-thumb' are developed for guidance in the handling of technical names so that readers can benefit-rather than suffer-from italization, and other stylistic conventions in technical writing. The discussion also promotes the elimination of jargon, special meanings and ad hoc abbreviations.

A technical writer must keep the needs of his readers in mind. His primary purpose is to explain technical material, and a key to accomplishing this is simplicity. Factors to be concerned with are abstract words and meanings, generalization, passive description, capitalization, and hyphenation.

The traditional preoccupation with `correctness' and `clarity' in technical writing frequently goes hand in hand with a neglect of the reader's point of view which results in publications of such poor quality that instead of admiring them one should consider them unacceptable. Robert Pirsig's `Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance' includes an exploration of this problem and a reexamination of the relationship between `objectivity' and quality.

This panel is sponsored by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Group on Professional Communications. It is intended as an open discussion; we are restricting ourselves to technical composition and especially the problem of the composition of mathematics. I am going to ask each of our panelists to make a few statements about their views of “the problem.” When these are complete, we expect and hope that you will participate in the discussion. Today's objectives are to add (possibly) one more straw to the pile, in the hope that someone, somewhere, someday will be able to set a page of mathematics for $10 “as it used to be.”

Though surrounded by fascinating and challenging subjects, too many engineers and scientists write dull reports and papers. More attention to verbs can help alleviate dullness and can promote such qualities as vividness, directness, force, and interest. Passive verb forms can be changed to active; combinations of passive verbs with other lifeless verbs can be reduced through subordination and elimination; and normalized verbs (verbs forced into noun functions) can be used as true verbs. An improved approach to technical writing is suggested.

Technical writers apparently show little concern with the measurement of readability, defined as level of reading comprehension. Some evidence and reasons for this indifference are presented. Three current methods of measuring readability are described. Two readability formulas involving word load and sentence load are the Dale-Chall, which uses a word-list, and the Fry, which uses a graph. The cloze procedure is a non-formula technique which involves the reader as well as the material being evaluated. The application of these methods is illustrated with passages of technical writing of varying difficulty. Some implications and applications of readability concepts are indicated.

The writing of scientists and engineers is severely criticized, but the critics seldom dig into the reasons for its supposed weaknesses and faults. By analyzing technical writing, however, one finds that many of the `faults' are justifiable if not carried to extremes, and if not used inappropriately when writing for nontechnical audiences.

document were highly correlated with frequencies from the remaining parts of the document, particu larly in technical writing. For this reason, the trigram frequencies were gathered from the document being analyzed even though this nearly doubled the running time of the program.

Careless use of certain pronouns in technical writing today causes communication to be a fuzzy and inept as many other writing flaws. The pronouns most commonly misused are the demonstratives, <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">this</i> and <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">that</i> with their plurals <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">these</i> and <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">those</i> ; such relatives as <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">which</i> , <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">who</i> , <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">whom</i> , and <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">that</i> , and the anticipatory expletive <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">it</i> . Eliminating the irritating and confusing aspects of these often misused pronouns is simple. More effective and efficient technical communication will result.

be described as "the way you write," rather than as "proper words in proper places" or "the dress of thoughts," then their thesis is that your style should be such that the reader will do with your report, or because of your report, what you would have him do.Their comments on style and their own easy familiar way with words combine to make Technical Writing a good example as well as a collection of precepts.details are given adequate recognition.Some of the Suggestions for Writing are comprehensive and some specific; some of the Sentences for Revision involve simple matters, others present challenges.Worthy of note is the excellent treat ment, in all Sections, of the structural and logical aspects of planning a tech

Security classification in science and technology has aroused strong feelings, but there is little objective information about its effects. This paper presents the opposing, and highly subjective, points of view; summarizes objective studies of information flow; and reports an investigation of the flow of restricted and unrestricted information in a large research-and-development laboratory. The investigation showed that security classifications had little effect on the laboratory's procedure and output; however, additional research is indicated. Altogether this paper demonstrates the feasibility of obtaining empirical data on the effects of security classification on technical communication-data that are much needed, in view of the ongoing controversy.

Holt, Rinehart and Winston have recently published two works on technical communication. Both of these are third editions of text-books which give chapter-end suggestions for writing-practice. As the two volumes cover about the same material, effort will be made here to point out dissimilarities in content, organization, and tone.

During the past 30 years the technical report has developed into an important primary medium of communication in science and technology, to the extent that it is sometimes seen as a threat to primary journal publication. At the same time the (unclassified) report has been accused of not meeting the same standards of authority, scientific rigor, and retrievability as conventional journal publication. Report publication is reviewed in the light of standards commonly accepted for journal publication, and the inherent characteristics of technical reports are assessed. It is concluded that both reports and scientific journals have distinct roles to play in the communication of scientific and technical information, and that a cost-effective system will make full use of the strengths of both.

When is a handbook not a handbook? One answer to this paraphrased riddle might be, “When it is the most complete and sophisticated technical writing guide ever published.” The Jordan-Kleinman-Shimberg Handbook of Technical Writing Practices seems very well described by these words on its dust-jacket. A joint effort of Wiley-Interscience and the Society for Technical Communication, this work is a tour de force in the most complimentary sense of the phrase.