FW: Use of 'populate'

["Combs, Richard" <richard -dot- combs -at- Polycom -dot- com>]

Roy Jacobsen, whose posts are still arriving devoid of content, asked me
to forward this to the list for him.

-----Original Message-----
From: Roy Jacobsen [mailto:royj -at- writingclearandsimple -dot- com] 
Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2008 9:27 PM
To: Combs, Richard
Subject: Re: Use of 'populate'

Aarg! That's twice, now. I'll take up the issue with TECHWR-L
management, but in the meantime, could you send this to the list?

That was peculiar. I was using the web interface for my mail service,
and I thought it DID send things as plain text.

Anyhoo, what I wrote--really and truly I wrote something--was something
like this:

Why would you want to use "populate?" And I don't mean that
sarcastically.

I've always thought that our job is to make things easy for users, and
that includes using words that will give them a clear idea of the
_concrete_ actions we are instructing them to take. I don't know
anything about the users or the application that Michelle is working
with, but the verb "populate" doesn't give me any clear picture of a
specific action I'm supposed to take.

For example, the already-suggested "type" or "enter" work well for text
entry fields, and for drop-down lists, "select" gives me a pretty good
idea of what I'm supposed to do. "Populate" is an abstract verb, and I
think, as much as possible, we should try to use concrete terms instead.

So, back to the question: Why would you want to use "populate?" Is there
something about the audience or application that makes this a better
choice than the alternatives?

Thanks,
Roy Jacobsen

Combs, Richard wrote:
> Haven't you heard of minimalism? ;-)
>
> Seriously, these empty messages seem to come through fairly often and 
> from many different posters. Is this because the listserv is stripping

> out RTF content or something? Anybody know? What did you send, royj?
>
> Reminder: post plain text messages with no attachments.
>
> Richard
>
>
> ------
> Richard G. Combs
> Senior Technical Writer
> Polycom, Inc.
> richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
> 303-223-5111
> ------
> rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
> 303-777-0436
> ------
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>   

-- 

*Roy Jacobsen*

Writing, Clear and Simple
1043 10^th Street North
Fargo, ND 58102
USA

	

701.866.9920
royj -at- writingclearandsimple -dot- com <mailto:royj -at- writingclearandsimple -dot- com>
<mailto:royj -at- writingclearandsimple -dot- com>rmjacobsen.squarespace.com
<http://rmjacobsen.squarespace.com/>



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