Structured Authoring & Editing

These projects illustrate my skills at systematizing documentation and editing. With years of experience developing and editing documents, these projects offer additional insight into my ability to focus on the details in order to bring about a cohesive and coherent whole.

DITA Demonstration

This project demonstrates my technical ability to publish structured documentation with localization (e.g., translation) using authoring tools that apply open standards. In a post-secondary context, these technical skills would have application to marketing and institutional advancement activities as well as grant development. These departments frequently need to reuse content given their scope.

Skills

  • Basic coding and scripting in XML and XHTML
  • Basic localization with translation workflow application
  • Technical documentation

Tools

  • DITA Open Toolkit
  • Swordfish Translation Editor
  • Heretto CCMS
  • Gemini Pro 3.0

Style Guide

The goal for this project was to demonstrate my ability to author a style guide and immerse myself in the technical editor’s mindset. I had experience working with a style guide when I authored a textbook, so, to test my skills, I intentionally chose to develop a style guide for an organization outside of higher education: an investment company.

Skills

  • Audience analysis
  • Document analysis and design
  • Subject matter expertise: Style Guides
  • Editing

Tools

  • Google Documents

uInvest by GreySlab Style Guide

Editing Examples

The first example primarily illustrates edits I made at the sentence level to improve clarity and concision. I also noted content that diminished topical unity and made suggestions for revision.

The second example illustrates my analysis of a comprehension exercise for a college-level textbook section. In addition to evaluating the general clarity of all the content, I evaluated the consistency between the question stem, the answer identified as correct, and the answer feedback. I made notes when there seemed to be a discrepancy. This illustrates my approach to communicating errors and inconsistencies with authors.

Skills

  • Written communication
  • English mechanics and usage
  • Audience awareness
  • Document analysis
  • Relationship management

Tools

  • Google Documents