The Daily Reviewer | A Tech Writer's World

Security breach!

Mar 11, 2010 10:25am

It's always entertaining to read about non-lethal lapses in security at a major event. Remember the debacle at the 2010 Winter Olympics? A man with false ID got within a few yards of U.S. Vice President Joe Biden before being arrested at the opening ceremony. You'd figure after spending almost...

Taxing my docs

Mar 3, 2010 10:18am

I recently attended an STC conference where one of the topics discussed was user-centred design. I met with usability experts and interaction designers whose sole job is ensuring that a product is intuitive and easy to use from a user's perspective, and not from the business's....

The Sixth Sense

Mar 3, 2010 9:37am

We all know (and love) our five senses: sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch. Apparently, these senses are not enough. Science, psychology, and the arts have been on the hunt for a sixth sense since the time people knew they had senses.Candidates for a sixth sense include:intuitionemotionintelligenceextra-sensory perception (ESP)equilibrioception -...

Gold, finally

Mar 3, 2010 9:25am

I admit I'm not a huge hockey fan. For me, the ability to insert a small, black plastic cylinder into a mesh just doesn't give me a warm fuzzy. However, even I have to admit it is remarkable that Canada won gold in both the men's and women's hockey at...

Krazy Karl Rabeder

Mar 3, 2010 9:20am

Karl Rabeder is an Austrian millionaire. But he's sad - so sad that he's giving away his entire $5 million fortune, to charity."My idea is to have nothing left. Absolutely nothing," he said. "Money is counterproductive --it prevents happiness."Karl continues: "For a long time I believed that more wealth...

A New Mantra

Mar 2, 2010 4:10pm

Apple has given technical communicators a new mantra.The Apple slogan is: There's an app for that, to market the fact they have an app for everything and then some, for their ubiquitous iPod touch and iPhones.Our new slogan should be: There's a doc for that, to market the fact...

I'm sorry

Feb 20, 2010 12:44pm

Tiger Woods has apologized for his behaviour.I'm also sorry.I'm sorry for all the trees that gave their lives so that user guides could live.I'm sorry for all the dumb questions I've asked SMEs over the years, just so our users wouldn't have to call tech support with those same...

Wall Street Journal - Free My Info!

Feb 16, 2010 2:00pm

Here is a link that will take you to an interesting Wall Street Journal article:The Microsofting of Apple?As the page indicates, if you want to read the entire article, you'll have to pay for a Wall Street Journal subscription.Now, go here, then click on the second or third link.The...

The Chilean Mother of All Typos

Feb 16, 2010 1:47pm

I would not want to be Gregorio Iniguez, the managing director of Chile's mint. Under his watch (if one could call it that) thousands of 50-peso coins were circulated with a spelling error.Now, this was not some minor obscure typo. It was not in a section of smaller, secondary text.This...

Olympian glitches

Feb 16, 2010 1:04pm

Before an Olympics occur, there is another sporting event: the mad spectacle of various cities fighting over each other for the chance to host the Olympics. It's as though five debt-ridden people are competing to acquire even greater debts. Afterwards, there is genuine surprise over the overspent millions.Of course most...

And the Oscar goes to...

Feb 7, 2010 10:20am

The Annual Distribution of Meaningless Awards to Shallow People, a.k.a., The Oscars, is fast approaching. This non-event is as useless as a Windows 1.0 user guide. The choices are completely subjective. Many great films and performances have lost out to lesser ones. One of the best examples of this...

Recalling all recalls

Feb 5, 2010 1:41pm

"Oh, what a feeling to drive Toyota!"This catchy jingle from a few years ago rings ironically in my ears. With all the current recalls from Toyota, this jingle needs a rewrite:"Oh, what a feeling - to drive Toyota - into a brick wall..."Last year, I came dangerously close to owning...

Colour my worries away...

Feb 1, 2010 8:45am

I love the simplicity of the Homeland Security colour-coded advisory system.This system, which purports to indicate the threat of a terrorist attack, and thereby tells the general public how much they need to worry, is as follows:Green - LowBlue - GuardedYellow - ElevatedOrange - HighRed - Severe(I didn't list Yellow...

Collaborative editing 101

Jan 8, 2010 1:20pm

Check out this great example of online collaborative editing using Google docs.It's a video of a group of friends editing a document.Watch it, then watch it again, pausing to see the changes.Compare the original, long-winded, version with the much simpler, and much better final version.Ain't technology grand?...

An Echo from History

Dec 31, 2009 7:49am

One of Sting's finest songs is Children's Crusade - his haunting lament on the follies of war, specifically, the First World War.Here are the relevant lyrics:Young men, and soldiers, Nineteen FourteenMarching through countries they'd never seenVirgins with rifles, a game of charadesAll for a Children's CrusadePawns in the game are...

Resolve this

Dec 22, 2009 6:51am

My new year's resolutions all involve documentation, of course.The Paper ChaseMy first resolution is to organize all the various printed guides, warranties, and other paper documents that have accumulated over the years and randomly spread themselves into various piles throughout my home.I will review each and every paper item and...

The draft from Copenhagen

Dec 21, 2009 1:31pm

Let me see if got this straight: hundreds of leaders, civil servants, and NGOs gathered from all over the world in Copenhagen to address the problem of global warming.They flew in using private jets, were driven around in gasoline-guzzling limousines, and ate gourmet food flown in from hundreds of kilometers...

Just watch me

Dec 21, 2009 1:20pm

I bought a new watch recently - digital, of course; I don't do analogue.It's a watch only a tech writer could love: the day, date and time are clearly visible with massive fonts on a over-sized display.Imagine my disappointment when after taking it home, I discovered the wrong user guide...

We're here, we're synesthesic, get used to it

Dec 18, 2009 6:32am

Synesthesia is the ultimate mashup. It's a neurological condition in which a person experiences the data of one sense with another - a sort of warped virtual reality.Examples of synesthesia are:seeing numbers and letters as colours: for example, where most people see the following text as black: ABC 123, a...

The $53 million document

Dec 17, 2009 11:41am

The final report from the five-year long public inquiry into child abuse allegations in Cornwall, Ontario has finally been released.The price tag for this document? A staggering $53 million.The report itself is 2,400 pages. That's just over $22,000 per page.Assuming 500 words per page, the cost is about $44 per...

The World, On Demand

Dec 15, 2009 11:27am

Just as a shoemaker's kids go barefoot and doctors makes the worst patients, us techy types are often the last ones to use newer technologies. How else to justify my delayed entrance into the wonderful world of podcasting and BitTorrents? My lame rationalization is that I wanted to be sure...

Nutritional Information Development

Dec 15, 2009 11:16am

For a marvellous analysis of what's wrong with Canada's nutritional information labels, view this PDF developed by the Nutrition Action Newsletter.Pay special attention to page two of this PDF, which details how the label should look. The design of this page, the suggested improvements to the label, and the way...

Complication Nation

Dec 15, 2009 10:52am

I'm getting emotional over motion. "Motionflow" TV must be one of the dumbest inventions ever. Oh, it sounds great in theory: a video display technology which reduces the blurring of rapid motion, making it flow more smoothly. The problem is it works too well. Watching a movie on a MotionFlow...

Deception: The User Guide

Dec 7, 2009 12:01pm

Imagine being asked to develop a user guide for spies instructing them on how to deceive others using techniques based on magic tricks. Sounds crazy, right? Yet that is exactly what U.S. magician John Mulholland was asked to do by the CIA in 1953. His guide was recently...

The Doc Surge

Dec 2, 2009 1:13pm

Let's talk effective project management. Imagine a particularly large and complex project. The top manager has laid out the terms. More resources are being committed. The project's objective has been stated, and, most importantly, an end date given.The leader is the U.S. President. The project is the war in Afghanistan....