Highlights

The following is a collection of my best work (aka ‘Highlights’) from English 301 Technical Writing. The progress of my technical writing and communication skills are best seen in the following list of academic works

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Definition Assignment: User Interface

Introduction: The purpose of the following assignment is to define the term and concept of User interface to a non-technical audience through a series of definitions, such as situational , parenthetical, sentence, and expanded definitions. The assignment also utilizes graphic images to portray examples of the term’s definition and its history while maintaining a professional and informative tone.

Reading Situation:

The purpose of defining “user interface” is to provide non-technical readers a simple and more relatable understanding of what a user interface is, how it works and how it can be applied in a technical and non-technical setting.

Parenthetical Definition: When using a technological device, users often use a user interface (a virtual space that visually represents users’ current interaction with their computer) to navigate social media websites.

Sentence Definition: User Interfaces (UI) are virtual spaces that create graphical representations of device’s virtual space that allows users to visually see accurate representations of the specific commands given to the device through a WYSIWYG display (what-you-see-is-what-you-get display).

Expanded Definition:

History

In the 1980’s, computer scientists at Xerox PARC created a graphical user interface which allowed users to interact with computers by using virtual icons. This allowed users, both technical and non-technical to enter in computer commands through virtual buttons or text-boxes as opposed to inputting commands through code. (Figure 1)

Over the years, as technology became more advanced in the 1990’s and early 2000’s, companies like Apple and Microsoft began creating personal computers which allowed even less experienced non-technical users to access computers. By using various forms of buttons and checkboxes, user interfaces were rapidly becoming a portal into accessing technology.

The community of individuals who were able to operate computers grew, and as a result, the demand for efficient user interfaces grew. This gave the user interface rapidly increasing demand, especially in the late 2000’s-late 2010’s as almost everyone began owning personal computers. As of the early 2020’s, the term user interface has become synonymous with the front-facing layout of websites and the space where users can interact with website applications, such as Facebook or Google.

Figure 1. 1980’s Commodore PET personal computer (Round, 100)

Figure 1.1 1990’s Apple computer (Friedman, 40)

What is needed to make it work or occur?

User interfaces require a graphical user interfaces (GUI), a screen and a back-end operating system that transfers information from computer script language (e.g. code) to graphic images of icons, buttons or text-boxes. The backend systems that power UI spaces in computers are more commonly referred to as Mac OS in Apple or Windows for non-Apple personal computers.

On websites, like Facebook or Amazon, users usually encounter a user interface made up of a combined set of Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML) and Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) code which primarily dictates the webpage’s layout, colour schemes, and text-box sizes, to name a few. For more advanced animations, such as drop-down menu bars or log-in text-boxes, user interfaces on modern-day websites use the JavaScript programming language to create animated functionalities.

How does it resemble or differ from something else?

Since user interfaces are often designed with the goal of allowing non-technical users to operate technical computers, digital UIs are often made to replicate what the user is currently doing on their device. This is done through the WYSIWYG display, where the user would navigate a device or webpage and their actions would be mirrored in the UI.

Although they often have a close relationship to each other, user interfaces are very different from the user experience (UX) itself, which non-technical people often think of as interchangeable terms. UIs are only the space that represent the what the user sees while UX is the users’s direct interactive experience with the UI of a computer or website.

How is it used or applied?

Digital device users use a user interface everyday, whether it’s to surf the web or to use the navigation GPS (Global Position System) in their cars. Today, user interfaces are most commonly associated with personal computers or smartphones but the prevalence of UIs is wider than the most people know. TVs, smartwatches, and even tangible keyboards are user interfaces since they allow humans and computers to interact and communicate. Likewise, UIs have become very useful for many businesses trying to improve sales profits.

By creating a user-friendly UI, businesses like Amazon, increase sales profits by incentivizing users to purchase more items virtually than they normally would in-person. For example, Amazon’s “Customers who bought X, also bought Y….” UI feature provides users with recommendations to products that are similar to those they’ve “Added to their [shopping] cart”. (Figure 2).

Likewise, for the non-technical person, UIs are often a way businesses can gain user/customer trust. For example, Google’s consistent logo-search bar placement on a web browser has remained consistent since 1998 due to its user-friendly layout (Figure and as a result Google has become the most popular search engine today.

Figure 2. 2021 Amazon feature “Customers also bought..” (from Amazon Canada Website)

 

Figure 3. Google 1998 UI (Friedman, 85)

 

Work Cited

Friedman, Ted (2005). “Chapter 5: 1984”. Electric Dreams: Computers in American Culture. New York University Press.

Round, Mark (February 26, 2004). “Emulating RISC OS under Windows”. OSnews. OSNews. Retrieved May 12, 2011.

Bevan, N. (1995). What is usability? In Y. Anzai, K. Ogawa, and H. Mori (Eds.), Symbiosis of Human and Artifact (pp. 349–354 ). Amsterdam: Elsevier Science B. V.

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Peer Review of the Definition Assignment / Term: “Health Equity” Definition

To: Morgan Lorenz, Student ENGL 301 Technical Writing UBC
From: Danisa Rambing, Student ENGL 301 Technical Writing UBC
Date: October 3, 2021
Subject: Review of Report Assignment 1:3 – “Self-management” Definition

Thank you for defining an interesting term and concept with the students of ENGL 301 Technical Writing UBC. This is a wonderful definition of the term “health equity” to a non-technical audience who may be unfamiliar with the concept and its context in healthcare. Please see the review of the document below with some suggestions for improvement.

First Impression: This is a very straightforward definition that meets all the assignment requirements: definition is structured, it includes visual aids, and it includes a list of references.

Organization:

• The organization of the definition is well structured out.
• The selection methods of expansion through history, operating principle, required conditions, and negation fit well and help to properly define the term.
• Great work on the definition of health equity.
• Visuals and figures used must be properly cited with correct placement, please review the textbook for further notes.

Language/Expression:

• In the parenthetical definition the tone is informative and professional, however it would help to use more colloquial terms to explain the term to a non-technical audience.
• The introduction provides context about the outline of the definition and explains the importance of the term.
• In terms of the sentence definition, referring to “social determinant” may be confusing to a non-technical reader. The concept of a determinant may not be very clear to a reader without a firm understanding of a variable or technical ways of analyzing social phenomena.
• Despite slightly esoteric terminology, both the parenthetical and sentence definitions provide a good explanation of the concept “health equity”.

Content:

• The assignment meets the needed requirements, which include the following:
  • relatively complex term within discipline
  • definition directed to “non-technical readers” with purpose
  • composes the forms of definition
  • contains four types of expansion methods
  • contains visuals
  • supplemented by at least three references

Visuals:

• Please make sure visuals are properly labelled and cited.
• Including a brief reference citing where visuals are from can be useful, as well as providing graphic visuals that do not include too much text. This can enhance the quality of the text provided.

Clarity:

• There were a couple of occasions where more specific terms could have been explained a bit more thoroughly to provide a clearer definition on health equity.
  • For example, in the operating principles section of the expanded definition, it was difficult to fully understand how analyzing social concepts through variables could provide a clearer picture of the “social determinants” of health.
• The explanation of negation and why health equity is important today is quite vague and doesn’t provide specific case examples of the current problems surrounding health equity or in what context might the audience relate to the term.
  • For example, the statement “individuals who don’t have access to fitness centres, medical facilities or community centres have lower health equity” shows a good understanding of health equity, but it does not specify an example of how it might be a disadvantage of “accessibility and convenience”.
• Being descriptive in the examples allows readers to clearly distinguish what it entails exactly.

Highlights/Weaknesses:

• The history portion in the expanded definition was very informative and interesting.
• The mix of active voice and passive voice worked quite well in the overall context of the term, since it provides a clear and direct explanation of the term while be cognizant of the fact that health equity varies for different demographics and specific individuals.
• The required conditions component could have gone deeper in explaining how assessment health equity requires a “myriad of variables” and what an “individual’s vitality” entails, specifically to different demographics of people.
• Some portions of the assignment were repetitive. For example, the “required components” were informative, but they repeated the same information provided in the operating principles, such as the concept of variables determining  health equity.

Works Cited List:

• The use of references were clear and informative, but it often included full authors’ names which made the text longer than it should be. As a result, this distracts the reader from the textual analysis by overwhelming them with in-text citations.
• Overall, the references demonstrated a thorough understanding of the concept of health equity.

Purpose/Audience:

• The definition has been described for the intended non-technical audience.
• It clearly describes the concepts needed to understand the concept of health equity.

Concluding Comments:

This definition was a very informative read, well organized and properly executed. The following edits should edits would make this wonderful definition.

• Further details on examples and descriptions
• Language use
• Reviewing Works Cited list and decreasing in-text citations.

Thank you for this wonderful definition. The written definition of health equity is on track to success, and clearly illustrates the ability to define technical terms in the ENGL 301 Technical Writing Course. Please do not hesitate to ask any questions.

Best,

Danisa Rambing

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