This is the first collection of narratives by practicing technical communicators telling their own personal stories about the workplace and their lives on the job. The authors portray a wide range of jobs: writers, editors, interface designers, marketing writers, and trainers working in 9 different technical fields, including software, R&D, engineering, medicine, transportation, and telecommunications. The stories vividly demonstrate the unique power of narrative as a teaching and learning tool. Unlike fabricated cases, these real-life narratives show new and veteran technical writers at work on the job, dealing with tasks, clients, and co-workers, and revealing their insights, values, and attitudes about their work. The stories also show the skills required in the profession and the ethical and other issues raised in the course of the workday. For anyone interested in technical communication and professional writing.

The complete core language for existing programmers. Dead Simple Python is a thorough introduction to every feature of the Python language for programmers who are impatient to write production code. Instead of revisiting elementary computer science topics, you’ll dive deep into idiomatic Python patterns so you can write professional Python programs in no time. After speeding through Python’s basic syntax and setting up a complete programming environment, you’ll learn to work with Python’s dynamic data typing, its support for both functional and object-oriented programming techniques, special features like generator expressions, and advanced topics like concurrency. You’ll also learn how to package, distribute, debug, and test your Python project. Master how to: Make Python's dynamic typing work for you to produce cleaner, more adaptive code. Harness advanced iteration techniques to structure and process your data. Design classes and functions that work without unwanted surprises or arbitrary constraints. Use multiple inheritance and introspection to write classes that work intuitively. Improve your code's responsiveness and performance with asynchrony, concurrency, and parallelism. Structure your Python project for production-grade testing and distribution The most pedantically pythonic primer ever printed, Dead Simple Python will take you from working with the absolute basics to coding applications worthy of publication.

Don’t let the daily grind drain your creative energy! You can work full time and still have a productive writing life. Many writers waste time waiting for the day they can finally quit their day jobs and live the so-called writing dream. Don’t wait. You can do both â€" and your writing will be the better for it. Balancing a full-time job and a productive writing life is no easy feat! This book offers writers advice, skill-building techniques, prompts, and exercises in every chapter, and strategies on how to get and keep writing while also working the 9 to 5 grind. Readers will discover tips and exercises for: • Setting and protecting personal writing goals • Creating a schedule that complements their stamina • Getting creative before and after work - and on their lunch hour • Finding inspiration in the most unlikely of spots and at the most impromptu of times • Writing proficiently in multiple forms (long and short) so that they don't get bogged down writing one long project • Becoming an active participant in writing communities so they have a solid support system at the ready • Figuring out how (if at all) to share their writing life with co-workers, friends, and family members You’ll also get quick, practical tutorials to help you master scenes, point of view, characters, settings, dialogue, and more. Writer With a Day Job gives you the strategies and motivation you need to work 40 hours a week (or more!) and achieve writing success.

Flexible and customizable, this revolutionary system can be modified to fit any writer's approach and style.

Learn how to take your work to the next level with this informative guide on the craft, business, and lifestyle of writing With warmth and humor, Paulette Perhach welcomes you into the writer’s life as someone who has once been on the outside looking in. Like a freshman orientation for writers, this book includes an in-depth exploration of all the elements of being a writer—from your writing practice to your reading practice, from your writing craft to the all-important and often-overlooked business of writing. In Welcome to the Writer’s Life, you will learn how to tap into the powers of crowdsourcing and social media to grow your writing career. Perhach also unpacks the latest research on success, gamification, and lifestyle design, demonstrating how you can use these findings to further improve your writing projects. Complete with exercises, tools, checklists, infographics, and behind-the-scenes tips from working writers of all types, this book offers everything you need to jump-start a successful writing life.

Advises would-be autobiographers about researching family history, organizing a biography, recalling details of the past, and picking an interesting writing approach