Category: Uncategorized

Danielle M. Villegas‘s insight:

This is an interesting take on "outside" skills that can be seen as professional assets. I’ll have to look into a few of these myself at some point. 

–techcommgeekmom

Danielle M. Villegas‘s insight:

A friend of mine posted this on Facebook. I got an 11/14–not too shabby. Localization and translation are a big deal in content strategy and technical writing, and even Ray Gallon has recommended that technical communicators should have at least 2 other languages other than their native language in their skill sets. Read this article, and take the quiz! 

–techcommgeekmom

Danielle M. Villegas‘s insight:

I found this on LinkedIn, and of course mentions Princeton University, which is just up the road from me. 

 

I found this article rather intriguing, as the student looked at both traditional and alternative methods of learning, and found that in some cases, alternative methods yielded the same or better results than traditional methods. As a former online grad student, I can tell you that it was a little difficult, even as recently as two years ago, to convince people that my MSPTC from a brick-and-mortar school taken entirely online was as stringent and comprehensive as if I went to classes in person.  I still see alternative education as a viable method, but as this student points out, since many alternative methods don’t issue a "degree", some sort of standard needs to be agreed upon by those supplying the alternative methods of learning to be able to provide a credential or "legitimize" the coursework taken.

–techcommgeekmom 

Danielle M. Villegas‘s insight:

This is an important article, which I found on LinkedIn. I agree that iPads are the future of Apple. It’s no secret that I love iPads, as I find them to be highly flexible and intuitive for the most part. The article does address some of the issues that I share in regards to what doesn’t work with iPads right now. My husband uses my old iPad2 without any issues to this day, to coroborate the retention factor mentioned in the article.  However, we’re not quite there yet with iPads replacing laptops, but we’re starting to get closer to that. There are still plenty of "power" functions that aren’t attainable with an iPad or other mobile device. For example, I was recently advised that I’d need to bring my laptop for a workshop I’ll be attending during the STC Summit. I hadn’t intended on doing so, as my laptop is a 17-inch behemoth, and I usually bring only my iPad. When I asked if I could use my iPad for the workshop exercises, the instructor advised that it might be possible, but difficult.  I could potentially use my laptop long-distance, by accessing it via my Splashtop sharing app, but that might be more complicated as well, so the laptop is coming along too.  

We’re not quite there yet, but for most people’s needs, iPads and other tablets are starting to make headway as the computing device of choice. Keep watching these! And read this article! Great insight. 

–techcommgeekmom

Danielle M. Villegas‘s insight:

Technology can be so cool, even when it’s semi-retro. This is a neat article that about storing a LOT of data on a cassette tape. I still have some laying around my house, so perhaps I will be able to save all of my iTunes downloads on one cassette! 🙂 Before I got my current job, I always associated the company where I’m consulting, BASF, with cassette tapes. Perhaps this will be a re-emergence of cassettes! Time will tell. We just have to make sure they don’t break so easily and I don’t have to splice them like I did when I was a kid. 

–techcommgeekmom