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tekom report

Wednesday, November 12, 2008 — posted by Sarah O'Keefe

I hope that the cognitive impairment resulting from jet lag has dissipated enough to write this post.

Last week, I attended tekom/tcworld. With approximately 2200 attendees, plus 1200 trade show-only visitors, this is the largest gathering of technical communicators in the world. Over 180 vendors were at the trade show, along with some fairly impressive accessories.

Things you don't expect to see at a tech writing conference

I am sorry to tell you that the chocolate fountain people showed up with a juice bar this year.

Wednesday morning started off on a fun note, as several people stopped by to congratulate us on the election. The European population is at least as interested in this year's U.S. election as we were. (Side note: During an extended beer-and-sausage dinner at the Ratskeller, a group of us were sitting behind a group of German bikers. They were in full biker regalia, with patches for something like "Rolling Thunder Wiesbaden." Lots of beards, beards with braids, long hair, and leather. In fact, other than the German language, they would have fit right in at Myrtle Beach during Bike Week. So, at one point, their table got loud(er), and we looked over to see them crashing their beer mugs together yelling, "OBAMA! OBAMA!")

We had an opportunity to catch up with conference buddies and fellow consultants. Tony Self's description of Australia's fierce killer magpies was especially entertaining. I'm afraid I didn't quite believe the story at first, but wikipedia says it's true. (Bike helmets with fake eyes on the back to fool the magpies into attacking the back of your head instead of pecking out your real eyes!)

On a work-related note, I delivered two sessions, one on XSL and one on Web 2.0. If you're interested in a (very) basic introduction to XSL, the content of the XSL workshop is now available. You'll need the instructions (PDF, 1.1MB), the XML sample file, and the CSS file for formatting. The workshop is based on information from our three-day XSL class, which is obviously far more detailed.

The Web 2.0 presentation, in Flash format, is available below:





Notes: Use the arrow keys to navigate through the slides. The first slide may take a few seconds to come up; the presentation file is quite large. If you prefer a narrative white paper version, we have one here.

A few final thoughts about the conference:

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12:47 PM Permalink | |

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Coming attractions

Wednesday, October 22, 2008 — posted by Sarah O'Keefe

DocTrain East kicks off next Wednesday, October 29. Scriptorium will be well-represented; Simon Bate is delivering a day-long workshop, Authoring and Publishing with XMetaL and DITA. If you have signed up for this workshop, expect details on the software you need in the next 24 hours or so. If you don't hear from Simon, please contact DocTrain to make sure that you are registered for the event.


Thursday morning (October 30), Simon will deliver a session comparing DITA support in XMetaL and FrameMaker. Meanwhile, Matt Arnold will be camped out in the trade show area. We're bringing tons of goodies, including the usual chocolate, so be sure to stop by and say hello. We're also doing several giveaways. (Yes, we will bribe you to visit us. Those trade shows can get really tedious...)


The following week, Matt and I will be attending tekom/tcworld in Wiesbaden, Germany. At this conference, I'll be doing a workshop on XSL and a presentation on Web 2.0 and technical communication. Both are on Thursday. Instead of bringing coals to Newcastle (and taking up precious space in our limited baggage), we'll be picking up chocolate for our booth at a local (and excellent) shop. I visited Kunder last year and, as usual, spent way too much. (Fair warning, they don't take U.S. credit cards, so bring euros. Lots of euros.)


Again, please stop by the booth and visit if you're at the conference.


tekom ends on Friday (November 7), but we're staying until Sunday morning to take advantage of cheaper airfare. Saturday, I'm planning a field trip to Bingen am Rhein, which has connections to the medieval Hildegard von Bingen. We can reach Bingen by train in about an hour. If you're interested in going, leave me a comment or send email and I'll attempt to coordinate.



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12:21 PM Permalink | |

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Vade mecum tekom

Friday, September 12, 2008 — posted by Ethan Duty

This year's tcworld conference and tekom-Trade Fair is November 5–7 at its usual location in Wiesbaden, Germany. Sarah O'Keefe has two presentations scheduled*, and Matt Arnold will be camped out at the Scriptorium trade show booth as usual.

If you have never attended tekom/tcworld, we highly recommend it. The conference is the largest gathering of technical communicators in the world. (Yes, it's bigger than STC.) Wiesbaden is a lovely town and was an R&R facility for soldiers (Roman soldiers) who came to soak in the hot springs. In addition to the historical interest, tekom and Scriptorium have a special offer for first-time attendees from non–German-speaking country. Use this registration form and get 20% off your registration.


* The sessions are both on Thursday: Introduction to XSL workshop (11:15 a.m. to 1 p.m.) and The Implications of Web 2.0 for Technical Communicators (3 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.)

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10:48 AM Permalink | |

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tekom: Benefits for North American writers

Tuesday, November 13, 2007 — posted by Sarah

My post about tekom generated some interesting comments, including this one, which I will address in pieces:
Thanks for this info. I've been lobbying my company to send me to Tekom for the last few years, unsuccessfully. I submitted 2 times for presentations but both were rejected. Our company is in Concord, Massachusetts, USA.
Could you discuss the benefits to North American writers attending such an international event. Are there things you learned there you will not learn anywhere else (business/tech stuff of course )
Interesting question.

The perspective at tekom is different from STC. For example, there was a session on how to integrate outsourcing into a documentation effort. Given the very diverse audience, you have people on all sides of the outsourcing issue. In the U.S., the outsourcing discussions generally center around how evil it is. :-)

There is a heavy emphasis on discussing globalization, localization, and internationalization issues.

A product that ships with defects in documentation is considered a defective product in the European Union. Therefore, you also see discussions of regulatory requirements. In the U.S., these discussions are confined to the few industries that are regulated -- medical and nuclear come to mind.

If you have a significant market outside the U.S., or competitors based outside the U.S., I think tekom is well worth it.
Any suggestions on what types of presentations have a chance of being accepted? I do not have a long presentation resume, and I feel Tekom prefers more experienced presenters, not giving less experienced presenters a chance.
I think you've answered your own question. STC used to have an explicit policy of "giving less experienced presenters a chance," but they have moved away from doing so in an attempt to improve the overall presentation quality. The focus is on the attendee experience rather than the opportunity for presenters.

So...to improve your chances at tekom (or anywhere else), I would recommend getting more presentation experience. That probably means presenting a local user groups or STC chapters, and then moving up to regional and then national events. Once you have a reasonable U.S.-based presentation list with excellent evaluations, you could try tekom again.

Pay attention to the evaluations you get from the events where you do present. Fix the issues that are raised. Work on your presentation skills.

Send in proposals with compelling content. A conference committee may take a chance on an unknown or inexperienced presenter if the proposal is sufficiently fascinating.

And finally, presenting to a European audience, even in English, is quite a bit more challenging than presenting to a U.S. audience. Although most Europeans in attendance speak good-to-excellent English, there is still a language barrier. That means speaking more slowly, avoiding idioms, watching your accent, and so on. That does inflict an additional cognitive load on the presenter. And then you have the following:
I hope some of my European readers will add their opinions and ideas in the comments.

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2:59 PM Permalink | |

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tekom: Some thoughts on Germany

Saturday, November 10, 2007 — posted by Sarah

The tekom conference wrapped up yesterday (Friday), but like several other North American attendees, I stayed an extra day to bring the airfare down. (The difference between leaving Saturday and leaving Sunday -- over $1000. One extra night in the hotel? Significantly less than $1000. Extra night in hotel plus money spent while sightseeing on Saturday? Didn't look too bad until I converted back to Euros. At least I didn't buy the killer boots, NICKY. [Nicky: "They were on sale! And they fit! And it was only 80 euros." Me: "Per boot."]

Some differences between North American conferences and this one. Overall, attendees were:
The trade show component was enormous, and the booths were unbelievably elaborate. I think I might have mentioned the chocolate fountain, but there were also spinning logos atop the booths, juice bars, champagne, pretzels, croissants, fresh fruit, and assorted tchochkes including stuffed hamsters. Yodeling stuffed hamsters. Sadly, the trade show floor was so big that I could never find the stuffed hamster booth, even though my directions were to "look for the booth where the staff is wearing lederhosen." (Nobody could remember that company behind the yodeling rodents, which I suppose is bad.)

I was pleasantly surprised to find the hotel, conference center, and restaurants smoke-free. Apparently, an ordinance passed recently (since the last conference). (Discussion of the anticipated law, in German, here.)

Wiesbaden was founded because of hot springs and became a resort town back in Roman times. (more on Wiesbaden from Wikipedia in English and German) People still come to the various bathhouses (no, not THAT kind) for the water, which is said to have healing qualities. The hot baths go up to 66 degrees. Celsius. For those of us who think in Fahrenheit, that's...um....really, really hot. (150.8 degrees Fahrenheit)

In some of the baths, you are supposed to be "textilfrei." Hmmmm.

At several places in the city, you can see (and drink) water coming from the hot springs. The Kochbrunnen ("cooking well") has hot, salty water coming up out of the ground. While we looking at it and noticing the sulfurous smell, a woman walked up, filled a glass, and drank it down.

A colleague from a German consulting company stopped by our booth and said (in German), "I have come to assassinate you." (!) Now, I speak German fluently, but that was a new one. When you don't live in a country, you miss out on all the new slang and idioms. It turns out that he was not mad at me. The expression is similar to "I've come to attack you," which in a certain casual context might mean, "I've come to ask you to do something."

I've been de facto translator in several places. The waiters, of course, all speak English quite well, but when they discover that I speak German at the table (and nobody else does), they tend to start talking only with me and asking questions like, "And what does SHE want?" I suppose this is because they figure that speaking English runs the risk of miscommunication, but it does seem a bit impolite to treat the non-German speaker like a non-entity. One waitress did a great job of talking to me in German and everyone else in English, which was quite entertaining.

And finally, a sad story about being clueless. For dinner one evening, we went to a sort of quick-service Italian place. When you walk into the restaurant, you are handed a card, which apparently has an RFID chip. You go to the pasta station to order dinner, and the cook behind the counter rings up your order, waves your card at the register, and hands it back. Same thing at the bar. When you're done, you take your card to the cashier, who waves it at her register, which then brings up your bill.

So, after a tasty dinner, we go to pay, and after the waving operation, and a swipe (!) of my credit card, the cashier hands me a pen and a blotter-looking thing. I just assume this must be some new magic signature-capturing device, so I start to sign the blotter. The cashier looks at me kind of funny and says, "Um...it's still on its way." And about 5 seconds later, she places the PAPER credit card slip on the blotter. Oh. I console myself with the fact that at least she had something entertaining to tell her friends over beer later.

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11:24 AM Permalink | |

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tekom: Cultural awareness 101

Wednesday, November 07, 2007 — posted by Sarah

The difference between North American trade shows and European trade shows:


Chocolate fountains at the booth

I think I'm officially speechless.

Note: Char informs me that there was also sushi. At a different booth. The Cognitas people have a juice bar. And rumor has it that the beer taps will open on the show floor at 6 p.m.

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11:22 AM Permalink | |

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