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What you will learn in Writing for Developers: Blogs that get read

Blogs that get read

by Piotr Sarna Cynthia Dunlop

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Chapter by chapter

Concepts explained in this book

• technical articleA blog focused on explaining software engineering work, including technical features, designs, and results.
• target audienceA group of people who consume or engage with a creator's content, especially the intended readership of a particular article.
• draftA draft is a preliminary version of a written work that has not been published.
• writingThe practice of composing text to communicate ideas, information, or experiences in a way that sustains reader interest.
• benchmarks and test resultsA blog post pattern that reports comparative measurements and testing outcomes for products, systems, or implementations.
• goalThe intended purpose or outcome that a written article seeks to achieve for its readers.
• online communityA group whose members interact and share interests through online communication channels.
• postAn individual item of content published on a social media platform, including a post organized as a thread.
• we rewrote it in xThe We Rewrote It in X pattern explains or reflects on replacing an existing implementation with a different technology or language.
• passive verbPassive voice is a grammatical construction that presents the receiver of an action as the subject, often leaving the actor unstated or secondary.
• conversational aiA software system that communicates with users through conversational messages, typically in response to prompts or events.
• bug huntA blog post pattern centered on investigating and resolving a software defect.
• prepositionA preposition is a function word that introduces a noun phrase and expresses its relationship to another element in a sentence.
• to be verbA to be verb is a form of the English verb be that expresses existence or a state rather than a more specific action.
• clarity killerA clarity killer is a writing problem that makes a sentence or paragraph harder to understand.
• lard factorThe lard factor is the proportion of a draft’s original words removed during revision.
• paramedic methodThe Paramedic Method is a structured prose-revision technique that identifies and replaces constructions that obscure a sentence’s actor and action.
• lessons learnedA blog post pattern that distills generalizable insights from a completed experience or project.
• introductionThe opening section of a written work that presents its subject, perspective, purpose, and expected value to the reader.
• headingA short textual label that introduces and organizes a section of written or presented content.
• non-markety product perspectivesA blog post pattern that presents informative perspectives on product capabilities and implementation choices without relying primarily on promotional marketing claims.
• visualizationA graphical representation of information or processes intended to make structure, behavior, or relationships easier to understand.
• benchmarkThe systematic measurement and comparison of a system's performance under defined conditions.
• how we built itA blog post pattern that explains how a technical system or project was created.
• keywordA word or phrase that represents a subject users may search for and helps information-retrieval systems match content to queries.
• generative modelingArtificial intelligence that generates new content such as text, images, audio, or code from learned patterns.
• hashtagA keyword or phrase prefixed by a marker that categorizes social media content and makes it discoverable through topic searches.
• revisionThe process of reviewing, modifying, and improving a draft's content, structure, clarity, or correctness.
• staggered sharing planA staged distribution strategy that releases a piece of content across channels in a deliberate sequence.
• publisherA publisher is a person or company that prepares, produces, and distributes books or other written works for public release.
• flowThe organization and perceived progression of the parts and ideas in a written article.
• conferenceAn organized event at which people present and discuss topics with an interested professional or academic audience.
• language modelA machine-learning model trained on large text corpora to predict and generate natural-language sequences.
• migrationA database migration is the process of changing a database's organization, deployment, or stored data while preserving the application's required behavior.
• abstractA concise proposal that summarizes the subject and intended coverage of a conference presentation.
• thumbnailA thumbnail image is a small, condensed representation of visual content used to identify or preview an item.
• performancePerformance is the measured operational behavior of a system, especially its speed, throughput, or resource efficiency.
• perspectiveThe particular framing or perspective from which an article presents its subject.
• inverted pyramidA writing pattern that presents the most important information first and progressively less essential detail afterward.
• evidenceDetailed observations, measurements, artifacts, and test results used to reconstruct the causes of a software failure.
• article submissionThe procedure by which an author proposes content to a publication for consideration.
• toneA conversational tone is an informal, direct manner of communication that resembles peer-to-peer dialogue.
• tech magazineA publication that presents articles about technology, software, or related technical subjects.
• peer reviewThe evaluation of a work by one or more knowledgeable colleagues who provide feedback on its quality, completeness, or correctness.
• focusA writing technique that keeps content and reader attention centered on the article’s main goal.
• reviewerA person who evaluates a draft and provides feedback about its content, structure, or technical accuracy.
• metadataMetadata is descriptive information about content that helps software and users understand, classify, discover, access, or share it.
• cross-compilationBuilding executable software on one system for a different target operating system or hardware architecture.
• bookA substantial written work consisting of organized pages or sections published as a single volume or digital equivalent.
• self-publishingSelf-publishing is the process by which an author independently manages the publication and distribution of a book rather than using a traditional publisher.
• blog post patternA recurring structural and rhetorical form used to organize a blog post around a particular communicative purpose.
• arguable statementA statement expressing an opinion or making a claim that a reasonable reader might doubt or disagree with.
• social mediaOnline platforms that enable people to create, share, and interact with content.
• subject matter expertDeep, specialized knowledge and skill in a particular subject or activity.
• outlineAn outline is a structured list of the points in a written work arranged in the order they will be covered.
• topicIn Google Trends, a language-agnostic subject grouping that includes related terms, misspellings, and linguistic variants.
• croppingA writing technique that removes or narrows peripheral material to emphasize the most interesting or relevant part of an article.
• transparencyThe quality of communicating intentions, scope, limitations, and expected content openly and clearly.
• livestreamThe delivery of audio or video over a network as it is recorded or broadcast, usually for immediate viewing.
• podcastA podcast is a series or episode of recorded audio or audiovisual content distributed for on-demand listening or viewing.
• presentation deckA structured collection of presentation slides used to communicate information to an audience.
• bloggingThe practice of publishing written entries on a blog to communicate information to an audience.
• code exampleA fragment or sample of source code presented to illustrate a programming technique or system behavior.
• hypertext linkA link embedded in digital content that allows a reader to navigate to another resource or location.
• topic ideaA subject selected as the focus of a blog post.
• backstoryA narrative account of the events or motivations that led to a project, decision, or subject being discussed.
• listA list is a structured sequence of related items presented as separate entries in written content.
• thoughts on trendsA thoughts on trends post presents analysis or perspective on developments in a technical field.
• blog post aggregatorA content aggregator is a service where users or publishers submit content that is collected and generally made available through the service.
• technical reviewA technical review is an examination of a technical article's subject matter, accuracy, reasoning, and supporting evidence.
• slideA slide is an individual visual page in a presentation that displays text, graphics, or other supporting content.
• writing processThe writing process is the sequence of activities involved in planning, composing, revising, and editing written text.
• tradeoffA decision situation in which gaining one benefit requires accepting a cost or limitation elsewhere.
• Google TrendsGoogle Trends is a web service that reports relative search interest for terms and topics over time, locations, and categories.
• coreA blog-post optimization group concerned with focus, logical organization, and adequate technical support.
• speaker bioA short biographical description of a proposed conference speaker's background, experience, and interests.
• user engagementEngagement is the degree of audience interaction with published content, such as reading, responding to, or sharing it.
• stage frightStage fright is anxiety or fear experienced before or during a public performance or presentation.
• speaker notesSupplementary text associated with presentation slides that guides a speaker during delivery.
• rantA rant is a forceful, highly opinionated form of expression that presents criticism or enthusiasm in an emphatic manner.
• guest bloggingA guest blog is a blog article contributed by an author to another publication or blog.
• article reviewArticle review is the systematic examination of a written article by one or more reviewers to improve its quality before publication.
• technical communicationWriting that explains technical information, processes, systems, or decisions to a defined audience.
• digital imageA two-dimensional visual representation presented to communicate information in digital or physical form.
• direct addressA writing technique that speaks to the reader explicitly, commonly by using second-person forms such as “you.”
• reader languageLanguage adapted to a reader's knowledge, context, expectations, and communicative needs.
• cross-postingCross-publishing is republishing substantially the same written content on more than one publication or website.
• review criterionA stated standard used to assess the suitability or quality of a conference submission.
• backup slideAn additional presentation slide held in reserve for extending a talk or answering questions.
• section slideA presentation slide that marks a transition between major sections of a talk.
• slide titleThe short textual heading that identifies and focuses an individual presentation slide.
• search interestSearch interest is a normalized measure of the relative popularity of a search term or topic over a specified time and location.
• debuggingDebugging is the systematic process of locating, diagnosing, and correcting defects in software.
• high-level requestA high-level request is a review request that states the overall scope and kinds of feedback sought for a document.
• writing skillThe ability to communicate ideas clearly, accurately, and effectively in written form.
• GrammarlyGrammarly is a digital writing assistant that detects and suggests corrections for grammar, spelling, punctuation, style, and related usage issues.
• root causeThe underlying defect or condition that produces an observed software failure.
• scannabilityScannability is the ease with which readers can visually survey written content to understand its structure and locate information.
• chatting with a humanA writing technique in which a person explains an idea aloud to another person to obtain feedback while developing it.
• rubber duck dictationA writing technique in which a person narrates ideas aloud to capture them as transcribed text.
• backlinkA hyperlink on one web resource that points to another resource containing or associated with the original reference.
• review requestA message asking someone to examine a document and provide feedback.
• mind mapA nonlinear visual arrangement of a central topic and branching connected ideas.

These guides are generated from the text of Manning books by Manning's knowledge graph and link to the sections they draw on. The full books are available on liveBook and at manning.com.