Customer comments on this selection.
 Comprehensive Style Guide for Software Documentation
This is a great book that tackles every aspect of software documentation with enough detail to get you started. Read Me First gives the push you need to begin laying down your own styles. It also reviews some basic grammatical issues that you as a Technical Writer must be aware of. I would recommend using several style guides if your company doesn't already have one. The Microsoft Style Guide is another great reference to consider. I gave this book 5 stars because of its easy to read format.
 Good book, poor binding
This book has a lot of useful information. It's a good companion for The Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publications. I like to underline and make margin notes but this book won't lie flat enough for these activities without ripping the binding. It has already fallen apart and I'm not even halfway through it. I tried to find a way to contact the publisher but searching for a few minutes found nothing.
excellent chapter about documents with links
Sun offers a style sheet for technical writers. These suggestions are used by Sun in its documents and are a very clean and internally consistent guide. Of course, it is not restricted to descriptions of Sun's products. A lot of care has gone into the guide.
Plus, the suggestions are not just for printed documents. Nowadays, a lot is expressed in languages with links, like HTML or PDF, and the advice pertains here too.
For illustrations, you are shown how to display interactable icons differently from non-interactable images. Subtleties, to be sure. But taking these into consideration makes for a clean document.
On the subject of documents with links, a chapter has cogent suggestions on the proper usage. Like avoiding overlinking, which is a common flaw amongst writers new to this. Also avoid linking with anchor text that is generic, like "click this". Instead, use more descriptive strings to help search engines classify the document that is pointed to. Assuming that both documents will be on the Web. But even if not, they might still be in your internal corporate web, and you might have an internal search engine spidering these. The strings will help the engine better classify both documents. This chapter may be the most vital of the book.
A good book gets even better in 2nd edition
The first edition of this style guide was good, especially if you wanted an alternative to the Microsoft Manual of Style, but this edition is even better. It covers a wider range of issues (for example, adding much information about writing online material), and covers them very well. In fact, the book goes a bit beyond style in an appendix on developing a publications department, but the topics covered are certainly relevant and valuable, so I'm glad they were included. I don't always agree with the style choices, but that's irrelevant; I've never seen any style guide I completely agree with. Overall, I'm so impressed with this book, I'm likely to use it as a textbook for teaching technical editors. As you can tell, I'm giving it the "highly recommended" stamp.
Super Reference Book for Creating a Company Writing Style
This is an excellent book to read if you are in the position of having to create any kind of writing style guides for the company you work for. The book's sections include one on writing style itself and why it is important, working with an editor, working wit illustrations, writing for an international audience, legal guidelines, the "mechanics of writing," creating an index, among others. The book makes some good points and provides an informative reference for writing style questions.Two small points against it. The CD is difficult at times to use and the Recommended Reading section lists some books that are out of print. Time for an update perhaps? However, it's still an excellent book to have when having to make decisions about your own company's writing style. When I had to write a Writing Style Guide as a class assignment, this book was one of the ones I used as a reference.
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