Scott DeLoach is the founder and CEO of ClickStart. He has provided consulting and training services to US government agencies and over 100 companies across the United States and Canada, as well as around the world. In addition to presenting at the STC Summit and other user assistance conferences, Scott has written extensively on using CSS, HTML5, Madcap Flare, and single sourcing. Conference Chair Chris Hester chatted recently with Scott about his session at the upcoming Sumit.
CSS Like a Pro is an offering in our Responsive Design and Development certificate this year. What can you tell me about the workshop?
The original idea for the workshop is based on my book CSS to the Point, as well as the frequent questions that people tend to have while learning it. We’re going to focus on some of the biggest questions, plus how to experiment with CSS. CSS is probably the most important part of responsive design, and sometimes you have to experiment with it to get the results you want.
Complete the sentence: “You should absolutely plan on attending this workshop if you …”
Need to create content that is going to be viewed on the Wb, a desktop, or a mobile device, and especially if it’s going to be printed.
In the session evaluations, we ask attendees, “What is the best idea you heard in this session that you plan to use?” What do you expect the top answer to be?
How to single-source within a style sheet—that is, format information with a single style sheet for the screen, mobile, print, and more. You can customize the media section for a specific device or media type, and you can get very granular, like specifying that something should be printed only in black and white. You can make custom media types based on, say, a user guide and quick reference, and then control the output through the style sheet.
After attending your workshop, what can people do to build and reinforce their skills? What resources do you recommend?
They’ll have handouts from the workshop, a CSS quick reference card, and examples of code they can use and share. I’ll also provide a list of recommended books and resources.
You’re also presenting Motivating and Encouraging Users during the Summit. Would you mind giving me a brief rundown of the presentation?
I think one of the biggest challenges we face as tech writers is that our potential users are usually frustrated, stressed, and, to be honest, not very excited about using our UA products. In addition to making sure that our information is correct, complete, and well organized, we have to motivate and encourage users to help them succeed. In this session, I will share real-world examples of well-designed and well-written UA and explain how we can best deal with an often difficult and unreceptive audience.
What are you looking forward to most in Phoenix?
Exploring the city and the restaurants. It’s been a while since I’ve been there.
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