Some General Guidelines for Technical Writing in English

1
Some General GuidelinesforTechnical Writing in
English

• Dr. Arthur Chiou
• College of Science Engineering
• National Dong Hwa University
• Shoufeng, Hualien, Taiwan
• aechiou_at_mail.ndhu.edu.tw

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Effective Oral Presentation All you need to
know To become a confident joyful speaker
Dr. Arthur Chiou College of Science
Engineering National Dong Hwa University Shoufeng,
Hualien, Taiwan aechiou_at_mail.ndhu.edu.tw
3
Outline

• The way we learn how to write (a technical paper)
  whats wrong?
• The No. 1 problem in our writing the logical
  structure the logical link
• The structural principles
• Active vs. passive
• The strong verb vs. the weak verb the abstract
  noun
• Write the way you talk write (and read) with
  your ears
• Parallelism
• Conciseness
• The English grammar the tenses
• The English grammar the dangling
  modifiers/participles
• The ambiguity
• The generic vs. the specific
• What scientists said vs. what they meant
• The general components of a typical technical
  paper
• References

4
The Way We Learn How to Write(a Technical Paper)
Whats Wrong?

• Lectures on Technical Writing in English
• The teachers
• The students
• The 3 Cs Correct, Clear, and Concise
• The readers The readers do not just read
  they interpret.

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The No. 1 Problem in Our Writing the logical
structure the logical link

• Technical or Business Writing vs. Mysteries The
  Readers Expectations
• From Old to New The Stress Position
• The Logical Link The Transitional Phrase or
  Sentence

Sentence 2
Sentence 1
A (or) B (or) C
B C
D E
A
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George D. Gopen Judith A. Swan,The Science of
Scientific Writing, American Scientist, Vol. 78,
550 (1990).

• The misplacement of old and new information turns
  out to be the No. 1 problem in American
  professional writing today.
• Put in the topic position the old information
  that links backward put in the stress position
  the new information you want the reader to
  emphasize.

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The Structural Principles

• Follow a grammatical subjects as soon as possible
  with its verb.
• Place in the stress position the new
  information you want the reader to emphasize.
• Place the person or thing whose story a
  sentence is telling at the beginning of the
  sentence, in the topic position.
• Place appropriate old information (material
  already stated in the discourse) in the topic
  position for linkage backward and
  contextualization forward.
• Articulate the action of every clause or sentence
  in its verb.
• In general, provide context for your reader
  before asking that reader to consider anything
  new.
• In general, try to ensure that the relative
  emphases of the substance coincide with the
  relative expectations for the emphasis raised by
  the structure.

George D. Gopen Judith A. Swan,The Science of
Scientific Writing, American Scientist, Vol. 78,
550 (1990).
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From Old to New An exercise
Brewery Effluent in China

• With an estimated annual production of 6 million
  cubic meters, China has become the fifth-largest
  beer-consuming nation in the world, after the
  United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, and
  Russia.
• As a result of this heavy output of effluent,
  the brewery industries has become one of the
  major polluters in China.
• As the standard of living has improved in the
  last ten years, beer, a Western beverage, has
  become very popular in China.
• For each cubic meter of beer produced, these
  plants in general generate 20 to 30 cubic meters
  of effluent, much more than that reported to be
  produced by modern plants in Western nations.
• Of the thousands of breweries in China, most are
  located in rural areas, use outdated technology,
  and until recently, have been little concerned
  with pollution.

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Find the Missing Logical Links An example
Biomedical fiber-optical sensors attract a lot of
attentions in last ten years. Bending
fiber-optic sensors are simple and cost
effective. The fiber-optic bending sensors can
be applied to measure many physical quantities,
such as voltage, strain, temperature, pressure,
etc. With the wavelength division multiplexing
techniques intensively grew up, the multi-channel
high-speed WDM distributed fiber-optic bending
sensor become an important issue. Such WDM fiber
bending sensors can be applied in biomedical
sensor systems.
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Active vs. Passive Voices

• Bees disperse pollen.
• Pollen is dispersed by bees.
• Three phases of analysis are included in their
  approach.
• Their approach includes three phases of analysis
• I was robbed (by somebody).
• Somebody robbed me.
• The building was completely destroyed in the
  second world war.
• Leonard was rushed into the operating room.
• Three hospital attendants and the ambulance
  driver rushed Leonard into the operating room.

Your work vs. work done by other researchers
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The Action Verbvs.the Abstract Noun the Weak
Verb

• To investigate
• To carry out an investigation of
• An investigation of has been carried out
• To decide
• To make a decision of
• To explain
• To provide an explanation of
• To understand
• To facilitate the understanding of

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Write the Way You TalkWrite (and Read) with
Your Ears
If you read your manuscript (or paper) aloud to
life audience, would it sound like a natural oral
presentation ?
See, for example, D. A. B. Miller, Quantum well
optoelectronic switching devices, International
Journal of High Speed Electronics, Vol. 1, No. 1,
19 46 (1990).
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The Action Verb

• The departure of the airplane is thought to be
  dependent on the weather.
• Bad weather may ground the airplane.
• To think that an answer that would be
  satisfactory had taken so long to arrive was
  something that put him into a state of deep
  resentment.
• He deeply resented the long wait for a
  satisfactory answer.
• It is clear that Deanna is in need of practice
  before the concert. The last time she played her
  violin was three weeks ago, and she is familiar
  with only the first movement of the Mozart
  symphony on the program.
• Clearly, Deanna needs to practice before the
  concert. She has not touched her violin in three
  weeks, and she knows only the first movement of
  the Mozart symphony on the program.

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Parallelism

• She liked games, movies, and going to picnics.
• She liked games, movies, and picnics.
• He was intelligent but a boring boy.
• He was intelligent but boring.
• The trip had been both difficult and a great
  expense.
• The trip had been both difficult and expensive.
• A time not for words but action.
• A time not for words but for action.

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Parallelism
Either/or, neither/nor, not only/but also,
first/second/third

• Either I am always in doubt or I am always in
  trouble.
• I am always either in doubt or in trouble.
• I am always in either doubt or trouble.
• They hoped to go not only to London but also to
  Paris.
• They hoped to go to not only London but also
  Paris.
• For love, for honor, for fame, or for money.
• For love, honor, fame, or money.

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Parallelism
President John F. Kennedys Inaugural Address
We observe today not a victory of party but
a celebration of freedom, symbolizing an end as
well as a beginning, signifying renewal as well
as changes . So let us begin anew,
remembering on both sides that civility is not a
sign of weakness, and sincerity is always subject
to proof. Let us never negotiate out of fear, but
let us never fear to negotiate. Now the
trumpet summons us again not as a call to bear
arms, though arms we need not as a call to
battle, though embattled we are but a call to
bear the burden of a twilight struggle, year in
and year out, rejoicing in hope, patient in
tribulation, a struggle against the common
enemies of man tyranny, poverty, disease, and
war itself. And so, my fellow Americans,
ask not what your country can do for you ask
what you can do for your country.
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Conciseness Make Every Word Count

• There is a slight difference in terms of speed
  between the two methods.
• The two methods differ slightly in speed.
• It is important to develop a more effective
  approach to solve the complicated problem.
• A more effective approach must be developed to
  solve the complicated problem.
• There is a comparison made in this article of the
  major differences between commercially successful
  keyboards.
• This article compares the major differences
  between commercially successful keyboards.
• It is interesting to note that .
• There is increasing evidence that .
• It has long been known that .

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Conciseness Make Every Word Count

• red color, or red in color red
• round in shape round
• falling down falling
• join together join
• actual fact fact
• very unique, or quite unique unique
• in a position to can
• despite the fact that although
• a length of 5 mm 5 mm long
• It is interesting to note that interestingly
• It is obvious that obviously
• It is our opinion that we believe that
• There is a necessity for must

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Conciseness Make Every Word Count
To All Employees   The management of this company
after due and careful consideration of certain
regrettable practices which have recently been
brought to our attention, is desirous of again
reminding you of the fact which of course has
been pointed out on several previous occasions
but which nevertheless has apparently been
overlooked or ignored by an all too preponderant
proportion of our present personnel that all
members of this firm should make an earnest,
sincere, continuous and persistent effort to
eschew and avoid all excessive wordiness,
repetitive phraseology, unnecessarily complicated
sentence structure and lengthy involved or
obscure paragraphs in transcribing internal
communications of any nature whatsoever to one or
more fellow employees.   The
Management   P.S. In other words, make it brief.
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Present, Past, and Present Perfect
Use present tense for well established
fact e.g - Smith (1975) showed that process A
is faster than process B by more than a factor
of 5. Use past tense for un-established
results or results that cannot be
generalized e.g. - In our study, the damage
threshold was about 10KW/cm2. e.g. - Jones
reported that 25 of the sample was damaged.
Use present tense to refer readers to your
figures or tables. e.g. - Table 5.2 shows that
.... e.g. - The peak occurred at m 5, as
figure 6 indicates. Use present perfect tense
for events that have been repeated or continued
from the past to the present e.g. - Optical phase
conjugation has been studied for aberration
correction since the first concept demonstration
in 1978.
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Present, Past, and Present Perfect
An example
Abstract
Digital data-page holograms consisting of 1024
x1024 arrays of binary pixels have been stored
and subsequently retrieved with an optical
exposure consistent with a data rate 1Gbits/s.
Each input pixel was precisely registered with a
single detector pixel, and a raw bit-error rate
as low as 2.4 x 10-6 was demonstrated with
global-threshold detection. To our knowledge,
this is the first demonstration of the
often-cited goal of holographic data storage of
megabit data pages and a gigabit-per-second data
rate.
R. M. Shelby, et al., Pixel-matched holographic
data storage with megabit pages, Opt. Lett.,
Vol. 22, 1509 (1997).
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Dangling Modifiers/Participles
As a mother of five, my kitchen is always
busy. No bacteria were observed using this
technique. Young and inexperienced, the task
seemed easy to me. Following experimentation,
bacteria multiplied. Being in poor condition, we
were unable to save the animals. Using this
method, a strong correlation peak was
observed. In drawing the picture, his wife was
used as the model.
As a mother of five, I am always busy in my
kitchen. Using this technique, we do not
observed any bacteria. Young and inexperienced,
I thought the task was easy. Following
experimentation, we found the bacteria
multiplied. We were unable to save the animals
because they are in poor condition. Using this
method, I observed a strong correlation peak. In
drawing the picture, he used his wife as the
model.
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The Ambiguity

• He noticed a large stain in the rug that was
  right in the center.
• He noticed a large stain right in the center of
  the rug.
• You can call your mother in London and tell her
  all about Georges taking you out to dinner for
  just sixty cents.
• For just sixty cents, you can call your mother in
  London and tell her all about Georges taking you
  out to dinner.
• New Yorks first commercial human-sperm bank
  opened Friday with semen samples from 18 men
  frozen in a stainless steel tank.
• New Yorks first commercial human-sperm bank
  opened Friday when semen samples were taken from
  18 men. The samples were then frozen and stored
  in a stainless steel tank.
• All the members were not present.
• Not all the members were present.
• He only found two mistakes.
• He found only two mistakes.

To avoid ambiguity, keep related words together.
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A Dozen Fumblegrammar Rules for Scientists

• It is recommended by the authors that the passive
  voice be avoided.
• Subjects and verbs even when separated by a word
  string has to agree.
• Writing science carefully, dangling participles
  must not appear.
• If you reread your writing you will find that a
  great many very repetitious statements can be
  identified by rereading and identifying them.
• Avoid using quotation marks incorrectly and
  where they serve no useful purpose.
• The naked truth is that editors will read the
  riot act to any Tom, Dick, or Harry that uses
  cliches avoid them like a plague.
• In formal scientific writing, dont use
  contraction or exclamation points!!

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A Dozen Fumblegrammar Rules for Scientists

• If weve told you once, weve told you a thousand
  times, a writer who uses hyperbole will come to
  grief.
• In scientific writing, and otherwise, avoid
  commas, that are, really, unnecessary.
• Subjects and their verbs whenever you notice and
  can do so should be placed close.
• Remember it is better not to, if you can avoid
  it, split an infinitive.
• Proofread your manuscript carefully to be sure
  you didnt any words out.

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The Generic vs. the Specific

• Action of antibiotics on bacteria
• Inhibition of growth of mycobacterium
  tuberculosis by streptomycin and neomycin
• The temperature changed.
• The temperature increased from 15C to 23C.

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Ten Principles for Improving Clarity
Precision of Written Documents (Writing with
Precision, by Jefferson D. Bates)

• Prefer active voice
• Dont make nouns out of good, strong working
  verbs
• Be concise
• Be specific
• Keep related sentence elements together keep
  unrelated elements apart
• Avoid unnecessary shifts of number, tense,
  subject, voice, or point of view
• Prefer the simple word to the far-fetch, and the
  right word to the almost right

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Ten Principles for Improving Clarity
Precision of Written Documents (Writing with
Precision, by Jefferson D. Bates)

• 8. Dont repeat words, phrases, or ideas
  needlessly, but dont hesitate to repeat when the
  repetition will increase clarity
• Use parallelism whenever it is appropriate that
  is when you are expressing similar thoughts, make
  sure you write your sentences so that the
  elements are in similar or parallel forms. But do
  not use parallel structure when expressing
  thoughts that are not truly similar
• Arrange your material logically

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What Scientists Said vs. What They Meant

• It has long been known that .
• I have not bothered to look up the original
  reference, but
• Of great theoretical and practical importance
• Interesting to me or important for me to publish
  
• Typical results are shown .
• The best results are shown .
• It is clear that much additional work will be
  required before a complete understanding of
• I do not understand it.
• It is suggested that . Or It is believed that
  
• I think
• Agree to within an order of magnitude .
• Disagree by a factor of

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The General Componentsof a Typical Technical
Paper

• Front Matter
• Title
• Byline
• Abstract
• Introduction
• Stasis define research territory
• Disruption interrupt stasis so as to create a
  niche within territory
• Resolution occupy or defend that niche
• Methods
• Procedures used to occupy or defend niche
• Materials used in carried out procedures
• Theoretical principles assumptions behind
  procedures

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The General Componentsof a Typical Technical
Paper

• Results and Discussion (separate or joined)
• Experimental or calculated results in text,
  tables, figures
• Comparison of results
• Present vs. published earlier
• Baseline vs. altered state
• Experimental vs. theoretical
• Reference to previous research for purposes of
  criticism or support
• Interpretation of significance of results
  comparisons
• Explanation for surprising or contradictory
  results

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The General Componentsof a Typical Technical
Paper

• Conclusion
• Main claims derived from having occupied niche
• Wider significance of those claims to research
  territory
• Suggestion on future work to validate or expand
  upon
• Back Matter
• List of literature cited
• Acknowledgement of assistance provided during
  writing or research

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Title for a Research PaperBe succinct specific

• Optics
• Nonlinear optics
• Photorefractive nonlinear optics
• Photorefractive two-beam coupling
• Photorefractive two-beam coupling in barium
  titanate crystal
• Photorefractive two-beam coupling in
  rhodium-doped barium titanate crystal
• Photorefractive two-beam coupling in
  rhodium-doped barium titanate crystal at 1.3mm
• Temperature dependence of photorefractive
  two-beam coupling in rhodium-doped barium
  titanate crystal at 1.3mm

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Summary

• The way we learn how to write (a technical paper)
  whats wrong?
• The No. 1 problem in our writing the logical
  structure the logical link
• The structural principles
• Active vs. passive
• The strong verb vs. the weak verb the abstract
  noun
• Write the way you talk write (and read) with
  your ears
• Parallelism
• Conciseness
• The English grammar the tenses
• The English grammar the dangling
  modifiers/participles
• The ambiguity
• The generic vs. the specific
• What scientists said vs. what they meant
• The general components of a typical technical
  paper
• References

35
References

•  
• The Plain English Approach to Business Writing,
  Edward P. Bailey, Jr., Oxford University Press,
  Oxford (1990).
• Plain English at Work A guide to business
  writing and speaking, Edward P. Bailey, Jr.,
  Oxford University Press, Oxford (1996).
• Style Ten Lessons in Clarity and Grace, Joseph
  M. Williams, Addison Wesley Longman, Inc, New
  York (1997).
• Style Toward Clarity and Grace, Joseph M.
  Williams, The University of Chicago Press,
  Chicago (1995).
• How to Write, Speak, and Think More Effectively
  Your complete course in the art of communication,
  Rudolf Flesch, Penguin Books USA Inc., New York
  (1946).
• Technical Writing and Professional Communication
  for Nonnative Speakers of English, Thomas N.
  Huckin, and Leslie A. Olsen, McGraw-Hill, Inc.,
  New York (1991).
• Style and Readability in Technical Writing A
  Sentence-Combining Approach, James DeGeorge Gary
  A. Olson, and Richard Ray, Random House, New
  York (1986).
• Better Scientific and Technical Writing, Morris
  I. Bolsky, Prentice-Hall, Inc. Englewood Cliffs
  (1991).

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References

• How to Write and Publish a Scientific Paper,
  Robert A. Day, ISI Press, Philadelphia (1998).
• How to Write Publish Engineering Papers and
  Reports, Herbert B. Michaelson, Oryx Press
  (1990).
• Successful Scientific Writing A step-by-step
  guide for the biological and medical sciences,
  Janice R. Matthews, John M. Bowen, and Robert W.
  Matthews, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
  (1996).
• Communicating in Science Writing and Speaking,
  Vernon Booth, Cambridge University Press,
  Cambridge (1985).
• Writing a Thesis Substance and Style, R. Keith
  Van Wagenen, Prentice-Hall, Inc. Englewood Cliffs
  (1991).
• Academic Writing Working with sources across the
  curriculum, Mary L. Kennedy, Hadley M. Smith,
  Prentice-Hall, Inc. Englewood Cliffs (1986).
• An English Style Approach for Chinese Technical
  Writers, Ted Knoy, Taipei (1998).
• An Editing Workbook for Chinese Technical
  Writers, Ted Knoy, Hsinchu, Taiwan (2000).
• English Scientific Reports and Presentations, C.
  J. Fraser, Taiwan (1996).
• IEEE Transaction on Professional Communication,
  IEEE Press, New York (1982).
• A Guide for Writing Better Technical Papers,
  Craig Harkins and Daniel L. Plung, Ed., IEEE
  Press, New York (1982).