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Has anyone here made the leap from developer to technical writer? Or know someone who has? It sounds weird but I not only take pride in writing documentation f

• klibertp 6y ago
  6 hours and no replies? Damn. I'm also interested, what would be needed to start a career as a technical writer, after 15 years of programming? Is it even worth it as a career, compared to coding? I like writing and, according to a few people, the result is of good quality; I would also appreciate a change of pace (due to health issues) for a while...
• ChrisMarshallNY 6y ago
  I have not, but what I have done, is get to a place where documentation is a “first class citizen” in my work. I actually wrote an article about exactly that, fairly recently: https://medium.com/chrismarshallny/leaving-a-legacy-1c2ddb0c8014 https://medium.com/chrismarshallny/leaving-a-legacy-1c2ddb0c... It’s a fairly long read, compared to most of my articles, but I feel that it’s an important topic. My biggest issue with most modern tech writing, is that it is actually painful to read. It may be 100% correct, and impart very important information, but if I can use it as a soporific, there’s a problem. I find that writing in the vernacular, injecting personal anecdotes and [very carefully-chosen] humor and humanity into tech writing helps. I write about extremely technical stuff; often walking through significant code trails, but I have had non-technical people praise my writing, and read the entire article.