TECHNICAL WRITING:PURPOSE, SCOPE, AND STYLE OF

WRITING SUPPLEMENTED BY FORMATTING TIPS

HP 101 – MATLABWednesday, 10/1/2013

www.clarkson.edu/class/honorsmatlab

Professor Quotes

“Look, I’m a cat!” Wick

“…it’s the cat’s pajamas to use their type of column!”

McCluskey

“But Bob, you don’t have to watch a horror movie! You can just pay close attention to my lecture on rigorous theory!”

Also McCluskeyhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTLp14MKDDU

Overview

Goal: Effective and rapid delivery of information

Three Components Content

scope and level of information Style

the way you communicate Form

format and mechanics of writing – layout, grammar, etc:

Content: Overview

Nuts and bolts of writing

Capture proper scope/audience Ex: Summary of PSE 1 for Congress vs.

coworkers

Emphasis on proper sections Significant findings/conclusions vs.

background

Content: Types of Detail

Technical Memo/Technical Brief VERY SHORT More emphasis on recommendations,

lessons learned Journal Article

More emphasis on theory & development of tool, etc.

Technical Report (HP200 Report) Most detailed of all writings Include structure of group and

responsibilities

Style: Overview

Not a story Summary of findings Not blow-by-blow recount of what and how

you did Dry, thick, concentrated

Streamline Don’t use 7 words when 3 will do

Practice – this is an art

Style: Grammar

Active 3rd Person

GOOD: As expected, results indicate a quadratic relationship between height and weight.

BAD: I found the data has a quadratic relationship between height and weigh.

Form: Formatting Tips

Figures (text boxes, captioned) Equations on one line (captioned) Justify text Works Cited/Endnotes

More advanced topics: Section Headings, Table of Contents, Table of Figures, Drop Caps

Notes About PSE1

Highlights Don’t be too brief Include a sentence about the background,

the problem, the general method, and the conclusion that was made

Problem Statement Write about what needs to be done, not

what you did Should stand apart from the Highlights and

Methodology sections

PSE1

Methodology Do not write about specific lines of code or

functions Review general concepts

Matrix multiplication was used to evaluate the salary equation for each year of interest.

Results, Recommendations Include all relevant outputs of your code Explain how all pieces of information relate

to a central conclusion