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Re:Undervalued Engineering Skills: Writing Well by technofiend on Friday May 31, 2019 @04:18PM (#20064572)
>I don’t think the key to effective writing is following a bunch of standards.

Well it is if you're being judged on compliance to the standard. Have you never worked in government? But hey if you don't like the standard then just make your own: the great thing about standards is there are so many to choose from!

Re:Undervalued Engineering Skills: Writing Well by mannykannot on Friday May 31, 2019 @04:56PM (#20064891)
That is how you get compliant language; whether it is effective language depends on what it says.
Re:Undervalued Engineering Skills: Writing Well by briandear on Friday May 31, 2019 @05:02PM (#20064938)
It depends on what you are writing. Also, there is a question of readability. A document written in legalese is certainly “accurate,” but that doesn’t make it comprehensible. Writing with clarity isn’t about following a standard, it’s about using language in such a way that the consumer of that language understands the message. If documents were written following like the RFC, they’d be incredibly tedious to read. English isn’t a computer language, there is a such thing as context, tone, and diction. Of course if you are actually writing a legal document or standards document, certainly use that idiom.