Moving to Word 2007: Easing the Transition

A Webinar with Wayne Kliman

We’ve all heard that Word 2007 is considerably different from Word 2003, the workhorse most of us have been using for lo these many years (well, at least the past four or five). Some of us have already made the leap, while others are waiting to take the plunge.

Wayne Kliman is a technical writer and instructor who will make your transition to Word 2007 as painless as possible by using keyboard shortcuts and the Quick Access Toolbar to make commands readily accessible, rather than threading through the multi-tabbed Ribbon. Wayne will also cover some of Word’s new features and capabilities that we, as technical communicators, can put to good use to enable us to work more efficiently.

So, shorten the Word 2007 learning curve-all from the comfort of your own home.

About our speaker:

Wayne Kliman teaches Microsoft Word as an Adjunct Instructor for Santa Barbara Community College (SBCC). He’s worked as a technical writer and editor since 1995 and is past president of the Santa Barbara STC chapter.

Wayne presented his "Moving to Word 2007: Easing the Transition" Webinar to the STC Technical Editing SIG in the fall of 2008. The SIG’s enthusiastic response led us to ask Wayne to reprise his webinar for the benefit of SWO members. Soft copies of Wayne’s handouts will be available after the webinar.

Logistics:   

Date and time: Wednesday, February 18, 2009, 8pm ET

It’s a WEBINAR, which means you participate online from the comfort of your home! Because our speaker is on the West Coast, the program will be starting a little later than usual.

Registration Deadline:

Monday, February 16, by 12 noon ET.
To register, send an email to program@stc-swo.org.
Please include your name, email address, membership status (member, nonmember, or student).

Cost:
Members: $12
Non-Members: $15
Students: $12

Everyone must pay in advance via PayPal.
Here’s the procedure:
1. Go to www.PayPal.com.
2. Log in to your account and select the Send Money tab.
3. Complete the Send Money page. Make sure you enter treasurer@stc-swo.org as the recipient’s email.
4. Click the Continue button when complete.
5. Review the information on the confirmation page.
6. Click Send Money to complete your transaction.

We must have your reservations and payment by Monday, Feb. 16 by noon because we will send all registered participants a URL with Web site login information and a phone number to call to participate in the Webinar.

Please note that more than one person can participate in the Webinar at one site via speakerphone-but only one reservation and payment is required per site. So, a group can get together to attend this Webinar and share the cost.

Report from the Self-Employment Trenches

The US Census Bureau reported up to 18.6 million self-employed workers at the end of 2003. A large and growing number of technical communicators have joined their ranks.  Our January meeting featured three such entrepreneurs:  Adrienne Charak, Karen Harrington, and Thea Teich – SWO members who represent a total of more than 23 years of self-employment. (Emergency illness prevented the scheduled fourth panel member Mindy Hoffbauer from participating.)

Adrienne Charak (Charak TechComm, LLC)

• Core business: Technical writing and instructional design, including courseware training, Web content, software documentation, and editing
• Client industries: Telecommunications, medical, life insurance, information technology, and training
• Self-employment pros:  Working remotely with a variety of clients, meeting their needs and deadlines while managing my own business, my own projects and my own time/schedule
• Self-employment cons: Keeping a steady stream of project work and not becoming too isolated
• Self-employment wisdom gleaned from experience:
  Maintain a staff of support personnel, most importantly an accountant, an IT consultant, and a graphic designer.

Karen Harrington (The Write Thing)

• Core business: Technical writing and editing, including print and online software user assistance, new business proposals, and white papers
• Client industries: Software companies (commercial and government contractors)
• Self-employment pros:  Being able to adjust your personal work schedule to fit your life, having a beautiful quiet office conducive to concentration, not having to get permission to purchase tools and equipment
• Self-employment cons: Managing others’ perceptions, lacking IT support, the potential for non-payment
• Self-employment wisdom gleaned from experience:
  Establish a manageable plan that sets personal and professional limits.

Thea Teich (Teich Technical and Marketing Communications)

• Core business: Marketing and technical communication and indexing, including Web content, writing, editing, marketing consulting
• Client industries: Software companies, marketing research, technical publishing, finance companies, manufacturing
• Self-employment pros:  Doing a variety of work and projects, plus working with clients who are project oriented
• Self-employment cons: Dealing with inconsistent, peak-and-valley workloads, potential for isolation
• Self-employment wisdom gleaned from experience:
  Avoid false economy and buy what you need (good chair, good lighting, health/disability and umbrella insurance), but buy only what you need when you need it; avoid spending on nice-to-haves.

Help needed for Tech Fest!

by Louise Tincher

STC SWO will again have a booth at Tech Fest, Feb. 13 and 14 in Dayton. Tech Fest is a program dedicated to introducing kids to science, technology, engineering, medicine and math (STEM).

The program includes hands-on, interactive exhibits staffed with volunteer professionals from societies, companies, museums, universities and other technology organizations. It will be held at the Sinclair Community College.In 2008, 2600 youths were registered during the two-day program. This program is free to all with free parking under the Ponitz Center at Sinclair.

The SWO Booth: Kids, Winners, and OREOs!

In our booth, we will display the winning entries from the STC International Publications and Online Competition. If you were at the Cedarville Conference in November, you got a chance to see the entries there, too. We will also have an activity for the kids – write up how to eat an Oreo. We will have actual Oreos on hand (along with paper and pens), and some candy to give the kids.

You Can Help…

I need two types of help:

• Volunteers to staff the booth (2 or 3 people at all times)
• A total of 5 laptops to display the winning online entries (I have two already.)

I would personally take all the laptops home between Saturday and Sunday (I would not leave them at Sinclair overnight).

Tech Fest hours are:

• Fri, Feb. 13 – set up in evening (Just one or two additional people would be nice)
• Sat, Feb. 14 – 10 a.m. – 6 p.m
• Sun, Feb. 15 – 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.

…And Have FUN!

I’ve staffed the booth before, and I loved it! If you like talking to kids, or if you’d like to talk about tech communication to them and their parents, then please come! It’s designed to be FUN, for us and for them! And this year we have Oreos! Yum, yum!

One suggestion – if you?re a grandparent/aunt/uncle/neighbor, see if you can get your grandkids/nieces/nephews/neighbors to come with their parent during your volunteer shift. I bet they will have a BLAST. When you’re done at our booth, you can then enjoy the fest with them.

So Sign Up Now

Please contact Jean Fudge if you can volunteer for ANY amount of time: 513-477-7873 (Jean’s cell phone) or jaf529@earthlink.net. Web sites for Tech Fest, and directions, are:

• http://www.ascdayton.org/TechFest2009/
• directions http://www.ascdayton.org/TechFest2009/directions.htm

by Harold Fox

Longer term readers^[1] of "Calling All Verbivores"(CAV) are certainly acquainted with Richard Lederer. He is the person who coined the word "verbivore," and he is one of my heroes, so I sometimes refer to him in CAV. He is the author of Anguished English, Crazy English, More Anguished English, and A Man of My Words, among many others. He is also the proprietor of the website, Richard Lederer’s Verbivore. On the most recent visit there, I found that his most recent book is Presidential Trivia: the Feats, Fates, Families, Foibles, and Firsts of our American Presidents, published in 2008 by Gibbs Smith. I have recommended his website in more than one preceding number of CAV. You may consider this another such recommendation.Richard Lederer’s Verbivore has an extensive listing of language sites on the Internet. I want to call a few of them to your attention. Perhaps you would find one or more of those interesting and entertaining. Their order of appearance is not intended to be a ranking.

The first one is Etymologic: The Toughest Word Game on the Web. This site presents you with the challenge of identifying the etymology of words in multiple choice format. You receive an immediate "right" or "wrong" and the correct answer if your response was wrong. Then the game confronts you with the next word. It also displays a running score of correct answers. In my first try I got half of the words right. My next effort was more successful, but I’m demanding a recount.

Next consider Word Spy: The Word Lover’s Guide to New Words. This site lists new words or phrases with a definition and a paragraph that describes the usage. The following is an example of one such listing:

shovel-ready
adj. Relating to a construction site or project that can be used or started right away. Also: shovel ready.
Nearly every economist who spoke here agreed that a dollar invested in, say, a new transit system or in bridge repair is spent and respent more efficiently than a dollar that comes to a household in a tax cut. A bigger percentage of the latter is saved, they said. There was concern, however, that the nation lacked enough ‘shovel ready‘ projects that could be ramped up quickly, generating jobs.
—Louis Uchitelle, " Economists Warm to Government Spending but Debate Its Form," The New York Times, January 7, 2009

Another site listed by Lederer is Ask A Linguist  (sic.) Its self-description is this:

Ask A Linguist is designed to be a place where anyone interested in language or linguistics can ask a question and get the response of a panel of professional linguists.

LINGUIST List members are professional, academic linguists with a variety of particular interests, from whose number come 33 (at the time of this writing) who volunteer to respond to the questions submitted. The names of these volunteers are displayed with the institutional identification of each. Questions or topics are displayed as links, with the name of the asker and the date of the submission. Each topic (link) is followed by a list of links to the responses from the panel, each link identified by the name of the respondent and the date of the response. For example, at this time two responses appearing sequentially are these:

"’bl’ as a root for words relating to speech?"  – Bill Wertheim (Jan-14-2009)
         and
"The role of linguistics in the world" – Alexis Nava Teodoro (Jan-08-2009)

Each of these is, at this time, followed by a list of six respondent links.

A final example, for now, is worthless word for the day   Today’s listing, at this time, is the following:

today’s wwftd is…the worthless word for the day is: cacozelia [Gk kakozelia: unhappy imitation; affectation]/kako ZEEL i a/ studied affectation in diction or style, as in a speech filled with pedantic latinisms and inkhorn terms (not to be confused with lalochezia?)

This site mixes just plain fun with opportunities for learning. Enjoy both!

Let me leave you with a teaser from one of the Lederer list of language sites, which I will not identify until I supply the answer in the next number of CAV.

The letters of the phrase CORRECT ANSWERS can be rearranged to make two words, each of which names a vegetable you might find in the produce section of a supermarket. What are they?

*If you want to know where you fit in the list of "long term readers," consider that this number of CAV happens to be #50. Thanks for your attention.

Until next time, send me your solutions (or suggestions or complaints or stumpers) at hfox@juno.com or 2005 Burroughs Drive, Dayton, Ohio 45406.

Karen Harrington

by Karen Rokich

Twenty years ago, while exploring various vocations and corresponding college courses, Karen S. Harrington, discovered the Technical Writing and Editing (TWE) program at Cincinnati State Community College (formerly Cincinnati Technical College).  She was intrigued by the curriculum which consisted of a variety of communication courses (writing, editing, document design, etc.) as well as technology courses.  As one who loved reading and writing and who was also fascinated by science and technology, the TWE program seemed like a perfect fit for her.  Under the visionary and strategic guidance of Pamela Ecker, the TWE Program Coordinator at that time, she fulfilled the program’s requirements and selected electives that would prepare her for a career suited to her natural abilities and interests.
Upon receiving her degree, she became a member of the Society for Technical Communication (STC).  The Technical Communication profession has steadily evolved to keep pace with technological trends and people’s needs for collecting, retrieving and delivering  information.  Over the years, STC has been in invaluable source of guidance and support;  she has attended and enjoyed multiple STC conferences and currently serves as the Employment Lead for the Southwestern Ohio chapter.
Professionally, she is a creative individual with solid writing, editing, and project administration skills.  She has a strong technical aptitude and an ability to easily grasp new concepts.  Her work experience includes:

• Assessing client-defined information requirements and, in conjunction with project team members, prepare objectives and specifications.
• Documenting processes and designing work products and related style guides.
• Interviewing subject matter experts and researching technical concepts and issues.
• Writing and editing software manuals, online help systems, white papers and scripting language reference guides.
• Creating document templates and style sheets.
• Performing software usability analysis and recommending functional and interface design improvements.
• Gaining familiarity with structured documentation practices, web design, HTML and XML.
• Producing simple illustrations.

In 2008, she launched The Write Thing – an independent consulting business that provides communication services aimed at helping clients achieve their goals.
Personally, she is dedicated to continuous improvement through commitment to life-long learning and empowerment of others.  She is passionate about mentoring, training and inspiring others.

Register Free for Documentation and Training West 2009

Documentation and Training West 2009 will be held in Palm Springs, CA, from March 17-20, 2009. The conference theme is Moving From Unstructured to Structured Content; its special focus is on DITA (the Darwin Information Typing Architecture). Registration, which includes two days of conference presentations, case studies, and panel discussions, as well as access to two days of hands-on training workshops, is $1299.

However, as a member of STC-SWO, you may be able to register for FREE.

That’s zero dollars and no cents.In these economically-challenged times, you can’t beat a deal like this!

If you’re interested, contact President Louise Tincher (president@stc-swo.org) for details about eligibility and requirements.

More Content Management Conferences

If you’d like information about other content management conferences (including some that are a little closer to SWO territory, check out this list:

• Intelligent Content 2009, Jan 29-30, 2009, Palm Springs, CA
• Documentation and Training DITA, June 2-5, 2009, Indianapolis, IN
• Web Content Chicago, June 15-16, 2009, Chicago, IL
• Documentation and Training East, October 27-30, 2009, Waltham, MA

Karen Rokich Is Runner-Up in Clifton Library Writing Contest

Perhaps a patron at the Clifton Branch of the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County asked about the reindeer that cavorted atop the library and Graeter’s buildings.  "Where," this nameless person may have queried, "did they really come from?" Maybe then the library’s Powers-That-Be realized that they didn’t have a really good story of origins for the landmark reindeer.

Or maybe not. Whatever the reason, the Branch held a writing contest for the best "Origins of the Reindeer" hypothesis. Our Chapter secretary Karen Rokich won a runner-up spot in that contest.

BTL extends congratulations to her and presents her winning entry below in its entirety.

Yoga Breathing Reins Deer

by Karen Rokich

Santa decided to attend a yoga class at the studio – It’s Yoga on Ludlow Avenue in Clifton.  As he was concentrating on his rhythmic breathing pattern, his imagination started to churn. With one exhalation, one reindeer safely landed atop the Ludlow Library.  With exhalation two, reindeer number two had a soft landing next to reindeer one.  With exhalation three, the third reindeer landed in front of reindeer one, near the edge of the building. 

Exhalation four was unique.  At the end of the exhalation, Santa cried, “Ha, Ha, Ha, He, He, He, Ho, Ho, Ho.”  After a somersault, reindeer four landed adeptly, chin and eyes pointed upward but atop the Greater’s Ice Cream building.

With exhalation five, reindeer number five settled next to reindeer number three.  With exhalation six, the sixth reindeer slid next to the second reindeer.  Reindeer number seven appeared in front of reindeer number six with the blink of Santa’s eye.  Reindeer eight side-stepped next to reindeer six again with the blink of Santa’s eye.  With exhalation seven, reindeer number nine slid star-styled in front of reindeer eight.

After another exhalation, Santa sighed, “Ho, Ho, Ho, Ha, Ha, Ha, He, He, He.”  This reindeer, named Hans, peaking his nose to the street, landed adroitly.  Santa blinked twice and two more reindeers landed…..now a dozen reindeer atop the library.

The thirteen reigning deer atop the library and Graeter’s are singing – Have safe travel and head over to the Esquire Theatre to see the Curious Case of Benjamin Button.