Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips A recent manager wrote his thoughts in the air with his finger. There was some good, some bad, and some annoyances with this habit. But, as with most things people do, there was plenty to learn. I worked on a short project recently where the project manager wrote in the air. To […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips There are various techniques to start a piece of writing. One involves copying the words of another writer for a sentence or two until your brain warms and your own words flow. I think of those words as writing seeds. Staring at the screen with the little cursor bar blinking with a […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips eBooks are taking over the world. Well, they won’t finish off the published paper books this weekend, but the trend is there. As with most things, I see some good and some bad in this. I think it is good that college textbooks are becoming available in digital form. Pay $10 for […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips This is the first post with this title. In the future, I will probably have more with the same or similar title. Just some thoughts about things I find essential, or at least somewhat important, for a writer. Essentials Paper and Pencil – Yes, let’s start with some real basics here. If […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips Handwriting is not dead. It lives on despite the computer age. Cursive, however, is on the way out, and I for one am happy to see it go. (Start writing comments about how bad a person I am) Time magazine mourns the death of handwriting. That is a nice headline, but I […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips I like writing exercises – things that make me think. I came across a good one today from Kenneth Davis at ManageYourWriting.com. He calls it the Alphabet Shift. choose a word you’ve written beginning with a letter from the first half of the alphabet. Replace it with a more effective word beginning […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips For writers and those who name products and services: standard items have shorter names than special ones. Attach modifiers to exceptions to the rule, not the rule. Apple recently changed their line of laptop computers. As expected, the newer computers have more performance and a lower price than last year’s models. In […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips The May/June 2009 issue of IEEE Software has a paper by Greg Wilson on books that are “Not on the Shelves.” In it, Wilson gives the synopsis of 12 books that should be on the shelves, but are not. At least he can’t find them. Wilson asks for more suggestions of such […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips Blogs can be repetitious. Don’t bloggers tire of writing the same thing? No, they don’t. Each blogger is writing what she writes for the first time. I find much good in that. A reporter asks a clergyman, “What are you going to say to that family whose house just burned to the […]

[Read more →]

by Dwayne Phillips Author and consultant Ed Yourdon is updating his book “Death March.” He is working on the book online as a type of blog. You can participate by reading and commenting. The instructions for joining are here. I have joined in the discussion. I like this type of thing – reading something written […]

[Read more →]