I write about software development, tools, and people.
And how marketing makes it all better.
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Last week I told you about my exciting new job title, Developer Advocate. This week, let me tell you about my exciting new employer! On Monday I started a job with LaunchDarkly, a startup that does feature flags as a…
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Why on earth would developers WANT to write documentation?
This week I was at DevOpsDays Minneapolis, which was an amazing, warm, and inclusive event. There were at least three open spaces on documentation, communication, and related problems, and I didn’t propose any of them! The question the devops world…
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New job title: Developer Advocate
I’ve had a lot of job titles in my career: Technical Writing Intern Queen of Documentation (It was 2000, OK?) Technical Writer I, II, III Technical Communicator Senior Technical Writer Technical Writing Consultant Documentation Architect Documentation Mercenary You might notice…
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Consulting retropsective
I’ve been doing Agile for too many years to feel like I’ve learned something unless I identify it with a proper retrospective. I’m about to start an FTE job, and my consulting will obviously drop way off (but not entirely).…
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Crosspost from Opensource.com: How Do We Fix the State of Technical Documentation?
If we all agree that open source as a whole has a documentation problem, what can we do to work on addressing and fixing it? How Do We Fix the State of Technical Documentation? We have to talk about why…
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Software and pink collars
Yesterday, I said this: The real reasons we don't have docs/ux/pm bootcamps/code schools/hack days: 1) They're coded as feminine2) They pay less Code patriarchy. — Heidi, Sticker Thoughtleader (@wiredferret) July 4, 2017 And I want to come back and address…
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Why are there no documentation bootcamps or schools?
Sarah Mei and Sarah Fox and some other people and I were talking on Twitter about code school graduates, and how they frequently do really well at mid-level positions because they have communication skills from their previous careers. Yeah, that…
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Open Source Citizenship Award
I was at Open Source Bridge this week, with my kiddo Baz. We were both giving talks, and I was giving a workshop on interviewing with Carol Smith. Also I got to MC the slideshow karaoke part of the after-party,…
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Creative destruction
I was making a joke about the fact that I accidentally have two profiles for Open Source Bridge – one is with pink hair, and one with brown hair. Obviously, one of them is the mirror universe me. Probably the…
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The art of deleting
I have a talk where I encourage everyone to be clear on the data they collect and keep. I encourage people to automate deletion so they don’t have to do anything extra. In the original incarnation of the talk, I…