Technical Writers as Computer Scientists: The Challenges of Online Documentation

Writing online documentation requires several significant departures from the writing techniques traditionally used to create paper documents. Although there are many useful transfers from the “paper side” of writing for the computer industry, some of the commonly accepted standards for writing paper documentation must be modified to create successful online documentation. This paper covers: (1) a definition of online documentation, including its various genres; (2) an exploration of the differences between paper and online documentation and their impact on technical writing tasks; (3) an overview of a structure for evolving a set of standards for designing and writing online documentation; and (4) an examination of the implications of the cross-disciplinary knowledge required for successful online documenters. It proposes that the technical writer who creates online documentation must become a special kind of computer scientist, with skills drawn from many fields.