Effective Communication: Tips on Technical Writing

hen writing tech-nical articles,engineers and re-searchers shouldinvest the timeand energy to write as clearly and effi-ciently as possible. Sometimes we failto do that, perhaps because we fall intothe fallacy that results speak for them-selves or because we feel that we don’thave time to read books and articles ontechnical writing. The impact of atechnical article may have as much todo with how well it is presented as withthe engineering or scientific signifi-cance of the work. A well-written arti-cle is easier to understand and easier toremember; the more readers thatremember your work, the higher thelikelihood it will get cited. This articlereviews some basic principles and dis-cusses a few tips (dos and don’ts) aboutwriting technical papers.