Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Engineers Should Blog

insights.excitingrole.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 130 posts

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#71

Post by et-al »

pavfarb wrote: post #20

Engineers should blog publicly when they have something to say. Something useful for their colleagues. Engineers shouldn't waste time forcing themselves to blog instead of work just to push their career forward: frequently they just expose they don't have anything to say in extremely unreadable way. What a waste of time for everybody. Soft skills helps you grow as an engineer, it's true, but I think it's important to…

> But, in a generation publishing their every 2nd gym workout on instagram, who am I kidding anyway.

This is the issue. The latest generation has been told to constant work on their personal brand (ugh), and blogging is one way to do it. Though if we're working together, keeping the engineering wiki up-to-date is probably more helpful for the team than a some Medium fluff piece.

Don't get me wrong, there are some great blogs out there (e.g. A List Apart), and there's a benefit to a blog post reaching 100 people versus a Stackoverflow answer relevant for 10, but I think those that will blog well will do it naturally ("hey, people have been asking about this a lot, I should share a write up").

If everyone just contributed more by answering questions, or updating wikis, that'd would already be hugely beneficial, but to tell people sit down and write long-form is asking a lot. And JCDenton2052 also mentions the possibility of fucking up the signal-noise ratio.

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#72

Post by pcmonk »

pavfarb wrote: post #20

Engineers should blog publicly when they have something to say. Something useful for their colleagues. Engineers shouldn't waste time forcing themselves to blog instead of work just to push their career forward: frequently they just expose they don't have anything to say in extremely unreadable way. What a waste of time for everybody. Soft skills helps you grow as an engineer, it's true, but I think it's important to…

> Engineers should blog publicly when they have something to say. Something useful for their colleagues.

This sounds a lot like saying, "You should only learn to code when you have something useful you want to build. Something useful for other people".

You can't write a good blog post without having already written some number of bad ones. If you think you might someday have something to say, you should practice blogging.

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#73

Post by laktek »

Rapzid wrote: post #23

What do people view as good blogging platforms for this stuff these days? Jekyll on Github? Something else? I'd like to get going fast focusing on content, but of course want good syntax highlighting, comments, and such features.

If you are interested in having a static site with a browser based composer check Pragma (currently in private beta) - https://pragma.build

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#74

Post by JonoBB »

Rapzid wrote: post #23

What do people view as good blogging platforms for this stuff these days? Jekyll on Github? Something else? I'd like to get going fast focusing on content, but of course want good syntax highlighting, comments, and such features.

Been using hugo the last few months, and absolutely loving it. Easy to get going, great in-built functionality, cross platform executable and super super fast.

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#75

Post by drdeadringer »

pcmonk wrote: post #72
pavfarb wrote: post #20

Engineers should blog publicly when they have something to say. Something useful for their colleagues. Engineers shouldn't waste time forcing themselves to blog instead of work just to push their career forward: frequently they just expose they don't have anything to say in extremely unreadable way. What a waste of time for everybody. Soft skills helps you grow as an engineer, it's true, but I think it's important to…

> Engineers should blog publicly when they have something to say. Something useful for their colleagues. This sounds a lot like saying, "You should only learn to code when you have something useful you want to build. Something useful for other people". You can't write a good blog post without having already written some number of bad ones. If you think you might someday have something to say, you should practice blog…

Perhaps one should refrain from posting their practice posts, then. Write bad blog posts to get better, sure, but it does not need to be published by necessity.

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#76

Post by blueyes »

One of the rarest and most under-appreciated skills in tech is the ability to explain things. As an industry, we mostly focus on building and selling, and the twain don't always meet. Many of the builders have deep and excellent understanding of the tech they work with; many salespeople are excellent at persuading customers to do x. But there's a very important and underused bridge between insiders who understand, and everyone else. Blogging is a great exercise for deeply technical, because it's a chance for them to actively ask themselves: What do others not understand, and how can I explain it clearly?

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#77

Post by saxonklaxon »

blueyes wrote: post #76

One of the rarest and most under-appreciated skills in tech is the ability to explain things. As an industry, we mostly focus on building and selling, and the twain don't always meet. Many of the builders have deep and excellent understanding of the tech they work with; many salespeople are excellent at persuading customers to do x. But there's a very important and underused bridge between insiders who understand, an…

"If a thing be really good, it can be shown to be such. If you cannot demonstrate its excellence, it may well be suspected that you are no proper judge of it."

-- William Godwin

goo.gl/wylZZm

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#78

Post by tomatsu »

xiphias wrote: post #3

When I read ,,the only thing you need is an editor'', I thought how cool it would be if what I write would be reviewed by some people before going public...it would make me less shy about it. Then I realized he means a text editor (though he's an editor himself)

If you hang out in some IRC (or whatever) channels which are related to the topic at hand, you can ask the people over there.

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#79

Post by tomatsu »

Rapzid wrote: post #23

What do people view as good blogging platforms for this stuff these days? Jekyll on Github? Something else? I'd like to get going fast focusing on content, but of course want good syntax highlighting, comments, and such features.

> Jekyll on Github?

Yep. That one is quite nice.

There is a bit of a learning curve, but actually using it is great. All your content is versioned, there are always backups, performance is most excellent, and security is a complete non-issue since there is no server-sided logic involved.

I also like writing articles in Markdown. It's a good fit.

The git/md combo also allows you to write anywhere without requiring an internet connection. I do write quite a lot during my train commutes, for example.

Re: Engineers Should Blog

#80

Post by graeme »

kedean wrote: post #19
graeme wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Post stuff for people to view. Pay attention to what is popular, and what isn't 2. Read stuff aloud before posting 3. Read widely, and pay attention to writing you like. I've built a business off of writing: https://lsathacks.com/explanations/ I got started by writing a travel blog during a yearlong trip. I posted each entry to Facebook. When an entry got a lot of comments/views, I could tell it was better. I also…

The problem doing that with technical writing is that your audience isn't going to be judging you on your writing skills, they'll be judging you on the technical content. OP isn't worried about their technical content, they're worried about their writing skills. The technical audience is going to be affected by writing skills (it'll affect how well points are made, etc), but they aren't going to give feedback on that…

They don't have to start with technical writing. I didn't. I wrote a travel blog and shared it with my friends on facebook.

That transferred directly to my later technical writing.

You can also do technical writing, share that with a few technical friends, and get feedback.

I don't think any of my comment was about doing technical writing immediately though.

Post reply on HN