It's hard to be anonymous on an anonymous survey at work when you're the only member of your "team".
"What project are you most proud of contributing to in 2025."
Uh, all the stuff that the whole company associates with me because I develop, maintain, and deploy it solo? #techWriterLife
VS Code on WSL2 with GitHub extension. After the 1.109 updates my environment is very wobbly. Reinstalls & restarts resolve things so far, but I've yet to go a day without an "oh shit" moment from fundamental tools. #techWriterLife #vscode #getYourShitTogetherMicrosoft
All-hands release preview meeting. Feedback: "Why are you wasting our time with all these minor features & fixes?"
*aggressively filters items*
Feedback from latest meeting: "This list is too short. Where are all the minor features & fixes?"
*sigh*
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting
This is important. "The writers you let go were the supply chain for the intelligence you're now betting on."
"…documentation […] is not a byproduct of development: it's the glue that ties the product together."
#technicalWriting #techWriterLife #writeTheDocs
passo.uno/reconsider/
Canceled vs. cancelled. It is small. Murder hornets are small. I write in a domain where "cancel" is a common verb & object state. Our code, APIs, & UIs are full of "cancel". Those murder hornets are constantly popping up. #technicalWriting #techWriterLife #writeTheDocs
Them: We want something light & cheap & collaborative. Let's use Google Docs!
Me: Uh, OK, as long as we keep expectations realis...
Them: Hey, we need numbered headings! And the TOC doesn't update automatically! What about our fonts?
Me: *sigh*
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting #writeTheDocs
Adventures in technical writing: I just caught this typo in a draft:
"Shite+Win+S (Windows)"
Freudian slip?
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting #writeTheDocs
🔥🔥Buying a Piece of Shit🔥🔥
Best chapter title ever. I must find a way to work this into my user-facing docs. #techWriterLife #technicalWriting #writeTheDocs
We're using AI to integrate w/ 3rd-party systems. Our devs must feed the AI complete API reference & thorough, well formatted business docs for any chance of success.
AI requires excellent documentation & devs can do it when the user is a machine. Ironic. #techWriterLife #writeTheDocs
Working with one of my favorite developers to build an API to automate publishing our release comms to multiple channels. Is this what doc tools development feels like? Because it feels damned good. #technicalWriting #techWriterLife #writeTheDocs
Fun with LLMs: the feature is called "Manual Pricer". The LLM decides that "Manual Pricier" is better and uses that throughout.
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting #writeTheDocs
Added a "Release Notes" field to Jira to automate release comms. Devs & QA folks are using it a lot. This unpromoted field is seeing better adoption than anything else we've rolled out ever. Now to rename to "User Release Notes" to scare folks away & add "Engineering Release Notes". #techWriterLife
I spent 3 hours "fixing" a feature that hadn't been documented sufficiently… in my own scripts. It is very well documented now.
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting #writeTheDocs
I experimented with Android emulators last week to doc a mobile app. After a short vacation I return to find that my work deactivated Linux on Windows. Looks like I just needed to re-enable WSL 2 and Hyper-V, but damn that was a painful few minutes. #techWriterLife
"[Techimabob-thingy] is powered by AI, so mistakes are possible. Review output carefully before use." Right. In decades of tech writing my experience proves folks are super careful & thorough when reviewing anything, esp. their "own" work.
#sarcasm #ai #technicalWriting #techWriterLife
CTO: "Hey Phil, where are we with that giant doc migration that you've been working on?"
Me: "It's done."
CTO: "Let's meet with all the principals to make our users happy & our competition irrelevant."
Me: "Cool."
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting #writeTheDocs
Donning clown makeup meme illustrating the steps to becoming a complete clown: 1. I'll remember what this code does (sponging white makeup on face 2. after all, I wrote it myself (adding eye, cheek, and mouth details) 3. and it's unlikely anyone else will work on it (face complete, donning frizzy rainbow wig) 4. I don't need to leave comments (clown makeup complete with red clown nose)
Happy Friday! Sometimes Past Phil is a legend. All too often, Past Phil is a bastard.
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting #computerHumor
Experimenting with LLMs to generate release notes from requirements, email threads, support tickets, & QA reports.
Gemini helpfully "inferred" a config property. It was nice enough to highlight the hallucination in a 2nd round of analysis, but still… so icky.
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting #ai
New video just dropped: Why Technical Writers Hate Surprises
Surprise feature drops? Surprise releases? Surprise feature cancellations after you already wrote the docs?
Yeah, I’ve got stories — and I bet you do too.
📺 youtu.be/AMBzMnR1BOk
#techcomm #technicalwriting #techwriterlife
New interview on Technical Writing Uncensored!
🎙️ I chatted with Croatian tech writer Ivana Devcic about her path from translator to cybersecurity tech writer.
🎥 www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRWT...
#TechComm #TechWriterLife #APIDocumentation #TWUncensored
Writing policies and procedures for clients is a pleasure, apart from one thing... #TechWriterLife #ReviewCycle #SME
I'm wrapping up a project, strategic & self-paced. It's been rewarding, but the finish-line push is killing me. I need to submit it. I can take it only so far on my own. Still, it's so big that I'm always finding something to fix. Dang it, today is the day.
#technicalWriting #techWriterLife
"the right information in the right place at the right time" I want a tattoo of this somewhere prominent.
writing.rocks/jump-start-p...
#techWriterLife #technicalWriting
