Being a non-native English speaker may be an advantage. You tend to use simpler and less complicated vocabulary when English is not your mother tongue, making it easier for a wider audience to understand.
Great article, Akos! & Thank you for the shoutout for the Leading Developers' article.
It's an interesting perspective, Michał! For me, simplifying my writing takes a bit of extra effort. I also found that the tools I always use—such as Grammarly—sometimes make things even worse by trying to sound more "correct" or "engaging." so I have to pay attention to what edits I'm okay with and what I want to skip.
But as you mentioned, reaching wider audiences with simpler writing is worth the extra work.
Tools are helpful in ensuring correct grammar. But, sometimes it feels as you described: the result can be too general and less personal.
I like to use a recorder with a transcript and work on it later. I say out loud what I want to write about, then I ask LLMs for support in removing all the stop words and repetitions. This often serves as a starting point for an article. Somehow, when speaking, it is easier to express thoughts simply.
Maybe I should give transcription a shot. I'm familiar with the API (I wrote a book about building apps using the Whisper API), but I have never used it for these newsletters. Thanks for the tip, Michał!
I definitely agree with this phrase 'One way to identify if your writing is hard to understand is that it takes longer to respond to whatever you wrote.' I wish I found this write-up a year back, it would have saved me from the hassle that I went through while writing ERDs and proposal docs.
This one is an important topic. Even when you are coding isolated in your cave, you need to submit a PR for someone else to approve. And the description and comments in that PR benefit from simple and concise writing!
Great tips Akos! Writing is a lifelong learning process.
Pascal's quote you shared sums it up beautifully “I have made this (the letter) longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter.” Writing less is far more difficult than writing more.
It takes more time, but it's a time well spent. Shorter, clearer writing is easier to understand and will more likely give value to the reader. Enjoyed your stuff! 👏
Being a non-native English speaker may be an advantage. You tend to use simpler and less complicated vocabulary when English is not your mother tongue, making it easier for a wider audience to understand.
Great article, Akos! & Thank you for the shoutout for the Leading Developers' article.
It's an interesting perspective, Michał! For me, simplifying my writing takes a bit of extra effort. I also found that the tools I always use—such as Grammarly—sometimes make things even worse by trying to sound more "correct" or "engaging." so I have to pay attention to what edits I'm okay with and what I want to skip.
But as you mentioned, reaching wider audiences with simpler writing is worth the extra work.
Loved your collaboration! 👏
Tools are helpful in ensuring correct grammar. But, sometimes it feels as you described: the result can be too general and less personal.
I like to use a recorder with a transcript and work on it later. I say out loud what I want to write about, then I ask LLMs for support in removing all the stop words and repetitions. This often serves as a starting point for an article. Somehow, when speaking, it is easier to express thoughts simply.
I'm glad you enjoyed the article, Akos!
Maybe I should give transcription a shot. I'm familiar with the API (I wrote a book about building apps using the Whisper API), but I have never used it for these newsletters. Thanks for the tip, Michał!
I definitely agree with this phrase 'One way to identify if your writing is hard to understand is that it takes longer to respond to whatever you wrote.' I wish I found this write-up a year back, it would have saved me from the hassle that I went through while writing ERDs and proposal docs.
Great work Akos, thanks for this !
Yep, I'm also speaking from experience. 😅 Thanks Anchal, glad it was helpful!
> congrats on the 10k Fran! 👏
Thank you, Akos!
This one is an important topic. Even when you are coding isolated in your cave, you need to submit a PR for someone else to approve. And the description and comments in that PR benefit from simple and concise writing!
Haha, true 😃 Even if you work solo, you'll have to talk to someone at some point, so getting better at writing is almost a no-brainer!
Great tips Akos! Writing is a lifelong learning process.
Pascal's quote you shared sums it up beautifully “I have made this (the letter) longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter.” Writing less is far more difficult than writing more.
Thanks for the mention as well!
Thanks Saurabh!
It takes more time, but it's a time well spent. Shorter, clearer writing is easier to understand and will more likely give value to the reader. Enjoyed your stuff! 👏