How to quickly and easily leverage your word processor to effectively write about tech tasks

We tech people have our own language.

Now I’m not talking about all that esoteric terminology and all those acronyms, though we have that too. “I tried pooling my SQL connections but ODBC doesn’t allow IP tunnelling.” Or “why should I be calm when my COM component can’t access my COM port?”

No. What I’m referring to here is basic rules of English grammar, syntax, punctuation, and vocabulary. We have our own rules.

To start with, we like to use T words; in particular, we have two T words that we use over and over again: “tools” and “tasks.” We sure like to talk about tools and tasks. When we talk about doing something, we don’t say “say you have to do something;” oh no – we say “say you have to perform some task.” And software applications are not software applications – they are “tools.” Tools and tasks, tools and tasks, tools and tasks. Use this tool to perform this task. Perform this task with this tool.

A word we don’t like to use is “use.” Oh no. why use “use” when “utilize” is so much longer? So we utilize “utilize:” “Utilize this task to perform this tool.”

But really even “utilize” is for sissies. The word real developers use is “leverage.” Of course we have no idea what it really means, so we use it as a synonym for “utilize.” Good: “Leverage your knowledge of VB to learn VB.NET.”
Better: “Leverage VB.NET to build robust tools.”
Best: “You can leverage this book to perform doorstopping tasks.”

We like to create ambiguous negatives. What’s an “ambiguous negative?” “The data is not compressed in order to save processing time.” You have no idea now whether the data is compressed or not.

We scramble up meanings: “The method does not return all the data you may need.” (If you are thinking about that, it should be “The method may not return all the data you need.”)

Sometimes we feel that we have too many sentences. “However” is the word that can fix that: “This tool is not very useful, however it still does many tasks.” We mix up singular and plural: “The company can always change their policies.” We mix up indicatives and participles just by using “as well as”: “The user can change their password, as well as changing his username.”

We lie, particularly about the ease and speed of performing difficult tasks. We like to say that things are quick and that they are easy, especially when they are slow and difficult. “You can quickly create an application that will save all the world’s rainforests.” “You can easily use multicast delegates to create events that are hooked into the operating system’s kernel mode.” Right.

We like to add extra prepositions, particularly “for.” “This allows for you to work quickly and easily.”

One thing we are particularly addicted to is splitting infinitives. Now in this we are not alone. But we do it more than anyone else does, and particularly unnecessarily. “You can leverage this tool to quickly and easily generate code.” We go out of our way, in fact, to look for unnecessary adverbs, lest an infinitive be left in peace: “This allows you to visually see the results.” “This tool performs the task that can quickly and easily allow for you to properly log errors.” Thank goodness. I’m so tired of tools that log errors improperly.

I could go on, however I am certain that this has all been written before. I am not stopping now because I am lazy – no need for me to unnecessarily reinvent the wheel. I can leverage my time more effectively to perform needed tasks…