Acrolinx In Technical Communication Plus

The FrameMaker 10 & RoboHelp 9 ACE exams are now available to take.

You can register @  www.pearsonvue.com/adobe/exams/ .

Please scan your certificate and send it to me (taldous@adobe.com) along with registering with our Adobe Partner program. I would like to talk with anyone how has passed the exams and would like to work closely with our Business Development Team.

I would like to understand your strengths and goals.

Tom Aldous
Director – TechCom Business Development and Evangelism
taldous@adobe.com

http://twitter.com/@tmaldous

http://www.linkedin.com/in/tmaldous (Let’s Connect)

 

Here is post #5 in the series of posts we are doing to provide accurate and relevant information on FrameMaker. Today’s post was done by our guest blogger, Scott Prentice. Enjoy the post and please help us spread the word…

http://blogs.adobe.com/techcomm/2012/01/post-5-framemaker-edd-template-rules-what-is-all-this-and-how-does-it-benefit-me.html

 

If we are not already connected on LinkedIn, let’s do it.

http://www.linkedin.com/in/tmaldous

Early Registration Ends This Wednesday January 18 * Save $300

A Chance to Win an iPod, Kindle, or Roku

Registration is now open for the 2012 conference in Memphis, Tennessee. Hotel packages are available. Register today!

Immerse Yourself in the Many Buzz-worthy Topics

Adobe • Android • Authoring Tools • Captivate • Comics • CSS • DITA • eBooks • eLearning • Embedded UA • FedEx • Glossaries • Help • HTML5 • Hyperlinks • iPhone/iPad • Localization • MadCap • Management • Mac Lion • Metrics • Multimedia • Needs Analysis • Oracle • PDF • Performance Support • Sage • Screen Captures • Simulations • Single Source • SMEs • Social Media • Topic Types • Touch • UI Text • Usability • Video • Visual Communication • Windows 8

Benefit from the Cutting-Edge Focus

The conference topics all relate to user assistance and cover a broad range of key tools, processes, technologies, and techniques:

DITA and XML • UA for Mobile Devices • Writing Techniques • HTML5 and CSS3 • Help • Case Studies

View Real-world Projects in the Peer Showcase

Blue ribbon user assistance solutions presented to you in an informal setting by the developers themselves.

Earn Professional Recognition through Certificate Programs

Certificate programs for the experienced practitioner (ProBooster) and the newcomers to UA (UA101).

View the Latest Products and Meet with Vendors

The Conference Exhibition is a great way to get the most up-to-date user assistance product information.

Free Internet Access for All Attendees

Stay connected with your mobile devices throughout the conference in all meeting rooms. 

Network with the Conference Community

Meet speakers, exhibitors, & attendees before, during, and after the event through the online Community.

About WritersUA

WritersUA specializes in providing quality training and publications for the community of user assistance professionals. The world of user assistance comprises a variety of techniques and technologies to make working with software a better experience. Our customers represent a diverse group of technical writers, software developers, contractors, and consultants.

WritersUA and the WritersUA Logo are registered trademarks of WritersUA. 
To unsubscribe contact: Shannon Mattila · Web site: www.writersua.com · Phone: 206-405-0923  
· Linkedin: Software User Assistance Group · Twitter: writersua

 

It is my pleasure to announce Adobe Technical Communication Group’s latest hire, Maxwell Hoffmann who came on board Monday January 16^th to assume my former role as Product Evangelist for Adobe Tech Comm Business. Max will be reporting directly to myself, but will be working very closely with all parts of the business. When I was Product Evangelist for the TechComm Business, I believed I reported not just to my hiring manager, but to Engineering, Sales and Marketing while representing the interests of our customers and partners. I know Max feels the same.

Max is no stranger to working with Adobe or our products. He was FrameMaker Product Marketing Manager and later Director of Worldwide Sales Training for Frame Technology. He has done over a dozen webinars, seminars or conference presentations with Adobe since we acquired FrameMaker. He has authored several key White Papers for Adobe as well. Max also authored the FrameMaker 9 Reviewer’s Guide, including embedded Captivate demonstrations.

For the past 15 years, Max has worked with popular Adobe products in heavy, high volume production in the translation industry. He recently completed 3 major RoboHelp projects. Having been exposed to literally thousands of customer source files, he has documented nearly every possible “worst practice” and its solution. Max has continued regular webinars and demonstrations within his industry, nearly always featuring FrameMaker and associated products. He has also managed dozens of projects data migration projects that converted unstructured data from Word and other formats into unstructured or structured FrameMaker. Several of his key projects involved extensive and advanced customization of DITA and structured application files for FrameMaker. He worked with FrameMaker+SGML and has worked with structured FrameMaker in its current form since V7.0.

Naturally, translation vendors cannot pick and choose the tools their customers work with, so Max has also worked with many competitive products. Max is an Adobe Community Professional in FrameMaker, and has beta-tested every version of FrameMaker since V1.75, and has frequently worked in an advisory capacity with many of our key stakeholders in India.

In his previous job with Globalization Partners International, Max also managed GPI’s social media program, scheduling blogs, monitoring user comments, maintaining Twitter feeds and authoring a great deal of SEO-optimized web content and periodic White Papers. By necessity, he has become prolific and compelling writer. At both Frame Technology and several translation companies, Max has authored both sales and customer product training, and has trained over 1,200 people in hands-on software training. By his estimate, he has created at least 75-100 scripted demos throughout his career.

Interesting side note – Max was my first and only FrameMaker teacher, so many years ago.

Read 2 excellent blog posts here from Adobe on this topic.

http://blogs.adobe.com/tcs/2011/12/community_help/search-tips-for-adobe-community-help-client-chc.html

http://blogs.adobe.com/techcomm/2012/01/tcs-framemaker-and-robohelp-documentation.html

Wishing you a very happy new year! Hope you had a great holiday break with your family and friends.

Celebrating the new year, we are very excited to announce the release of the whitepaper “Key Trends in Software User Assistance”. This is the first of a two-part series discussing the current and future trends associated with software user assistance. Joe Welinske of WritersUA (who needs no further introduction) has authored this insightful whitepaper that covers a lot of ground in six pages.

• Whitepaper download link: https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/entitlement/index.cfm?e=robohelp%5Fwhitepaper

Also, Joe is going to present the findings of his research for this whitepaper in a webinar, 16th Jan at 10.00 AM PST.

• Webinar registration link: http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/event/index.cfm?event=detail&id=1942964&loc=en_us

The table of contents for the whitepaper is available below:
• What is User Assistance (UA)?
• Most Valued User Assistance Skills
• Most Valued User Assistance Technologies
• Platform Support

The whitepaper has some highly thought-provoking insights, several of them based on WritersUA surveys. For example, did you know:
• “Interviewing” and “Project Planning” are among the Top 5 most valued user assistance skills
• Technical communication professionals are branching out to new areas, some even into writing scripts for “YouTube-style videos”
• 30% of respondents are involved with wikis whereas in 2008 wikis didn’t even figure in the survey categories
• Even with the pervasive presence of mobile devices, only 24% respondents are using it right now – implies tremendous potential for growth

Download the PDF version (approx. 2MB) – Happy reading!

And once the whitepaper has piqued your interest, do not forget to:
• Register yourself for a webinar on the same topic: January 16th 2012, 10AM PST – Join Tom Aldous, Adobe Technical Communication Evangelist and Joe Welinske, President of WritersUA for an interactive webinar as they discuss the findings of an independent research conducted by Joe for the User Assistance professionals of today and tomorrow.
• Watch this space for Part 2 of this whitepaper: Part Two of this series will focus on the emerging paradigms in information technology and UA. This includes support for mobile devices, integration with Agile methods, convergence with training, the emergence of HTML 5, instructional video, and SEO.

Best Wishes,
Team TechComm @ Adobe

Here is an excellent post “Coming home to Adobe RoboHelp after a fling with MadCap Flare” by John Daigle: http://blogs.adobe.com/techcomm/2012/01/coming-home-to-adobe-robohelp-after-a-fling-with-madcap-flare.html.

A very happy new year to you all and wish you all the best in your projects and endeavours this year! We certainly are back in the groove of things here at Adobe and excited about the prospects this year!

Today, I have posted the third post in the series we are doing to provide accurate and complete information to our user base, so that they get all the facts on FrameMaker! Today’s post talks about how to publish your FrameMaker content to other formats (and for multiple devices) and not just PDFs. Enjoy the post and please help us spread the information.

Link: http://blogs.adobe.com/techcomm/2012/01/post-3-framemaker-going-beyond-pdf.html

Posts made in the series so far
Dec 9, 2011: Post #1: FrameMaker: a real XML authoring and publishing solution. Read the post here
Dec 16, 2011: Found a very interesting blog post from Scott Prentice on the same topic as what Tom posted on last week. Here is the link. I am sure you will find it an interesting read
Dec 16, 2011: Post # 2: Making FrameMaker your “own” – How to customize the User Interface? Read the blog post hereJan 5, 2012: Post # 3: FrameMaker – going beyond PDF! Read the blog post here

Here is a great picture of Ashish Cherian, Sales Manager Technical Communication Suite and E-Learning (left) and the boyz taken at Adobe’s 2011 World Wide Sales Conference in Las Vegas.

Watch out Carrot Top!