Wicked, Incomplete, and Uncertain: User Support in the Wild and the Role of Technical Communication

170 Pages·2018·3.572 MB·English

by  Jason Swarts

WICKED, INCOMPLETE, AND UNCERTAIN

WICKED, INCOMPLETE,
AND UNCERTAIN
User Support in the Wild and the
Role of Technical Communication
JASON SWARTS
UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY PRESS
Logan
© 2018 by University Press of Colorado
Published by Utah State University Press
An imprint of University Press of Colorado
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Louisville, Colorado 80027
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The University Press of Colorado is a cooperative publishing enterprise supported,
in part, by Adams State University, Colorado State University, Fort Lewis College,
Metropolitan State University of Denver, Regis University, University of Colorado,
University of Northern Colorado, Utah State University, and Western State Colorado
University.
∞ This paper meets the requirements of the ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of
Paper)
ISBN: 978-1-60732-761-5 (pbk.)
ISBN: 978-1-60732-762-2 (ebook)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.7330/9781607327622
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Swarts, Jason, 1972– author.
Title: Wicked, incomplete, and uncertain : user support in the wild and the role of tech-
nical communication / Jason Swarts.
Description: Logan : Utah State University Press, [2018] | Includes bibliographical refer-
ences and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017045680| ISBN 9781607327615 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781607327622
(ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Technical writing. | Technology—Documentation. | Communication of
technical information.
Classification: LCC T11 .S775 2018 | DDC 808.06/66—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017045680
Cover illustration © Artem Kovalenco/Shutterstock.
CONTENTS
1 The Exigencies and Forms of Technical Communication 3
2 Task Shift: Changes in the Object of Documentation 23
3 Shifted Tasks and Shifted Problems: The Problem of Wicked
and Tame Problems 38
4 Credibility and User Interaction: The Challenge of Decentered
Expertise 64
5 A Survey of Action-Based Proto-Genres of Help 96
6 The Role of Technical Communication 132
References 153
About the Author 159
Index 161

WICKED, INCOMPLETE, AND UNCERTAIN

1
THE EXIGENCIES AND FORMS OF
TECHNICAL COMMUNICATION
A fundamental challenge of organized human labor is to coordinate
with others on both the concept and object of work. To assist with that
coordination, we have constructed a bewilderingly large and complex
array of supporting technologies and texts that orient us to our work.
Out of this context, the profession of technical communication has
emerged, to help accommodate technologies and texts to our situated
uses. Documentation including technical manuals, procedures, and
instructions has emerged mushroom-like around new technologies, as
they have since the origins of the field. What has changed about tech-
nological development since the first technical manual, however, is the
speed of technological development and iteration, the capacity for user
customization, and the extent to which technologies have become inte-
gral to daily work. The changes are reflected in the form and content
of documentation, and comparing technical manuals from the early
pre-history of the field of technical communication to today reveals dif-
ferences in approaches that tell of these changes in our access to and
use of technology. Also reflected are changes in the rhetorical situations
that we address with technology. Not only have our tasks changed, but
also the ways technologies portray those tasks to us.
It would seem that technical manuals have an increasingly important
role to play, mediating access to our technologies and, through them,
to our work and each other. Still, few people read manuals today and
the genre itself seems increasingly out of time. The reasons are compli-
cated. Users have not become more universally adept at learning and
using new technologies, as the idea of the “digital native” would have
us believe. We still need help, but increasingly we are ignoring manuals
because our purposes have grown beyond what manuals are capable of
addressing. This book offers a consideration of what users need from
technical communicators, which turns out to be much more than thor-
ough knowledge of a technology, presented with scrupulous attention
to the formal conventions of task-oriented manuals. Generating raw
DOI: 10.7330/9781607327622.c001