Category Archives: Blog

This web portfolio site is meant for an audience to not only be interested in potentially employing me, but also to get a sense of who I am as a person. It contains all the appropriate categories, such as the Home, Biography, LinkedIn, Resume, and Sample Writing sections. On the home screen it shows a welcome message with an introduction.

Design
The layout of the site is simple and easy to navigate. There are no unnecessary distractions on any of the pages that get in the way of the main text.

The design of the site is simple with a black a white color scheme. The picture of ink in water is used because it is beautiful. It also represents my personal beliefs regarding old ways of doing things. Despite my work in the field of an ever changing landscape of technology, I appreciate the more quiet and intimate ways of writing without ink and paper, or even a mechanical typewriter with its clicks and clacks. The use of Chinese characters for my name at the top of the site also represents my feelings toward the beauty of Chinese words. It looks more ancient and less technological, more like it would be written with a brush rather than with bits and bytes.

Strengths and Weaknesses in Learning and Assignments
In my assignments, my biggest hurdle is working on large projects that seem very difficult to finish in a single session. It’s far easier for me to finish something that seems more bite sized. I think this has to do with my wanting to have something that is polished and perfect the first time, which actually hinders me because it means I end up with very little material early on. In the future, it would be best if I simply was more willing to be more “rough” with rough drafts.

Strengths and Weaknesses as a Student
I believe I am technically very competent, and with this class, it has definitely helped me be a better communicator. The lesson that sticks with me still is the one on having a “You Attitude” when speaking to others through emails or letters. For example, creating this web blog in WordPress was technically not too difficult for me, since I understand these platforms, and at work, whenever there is an email I have to respond too, I use a you-attitude towards that person. I’m sure there are other ways I can improve, but I’m definitely a better communicator now.

Design is a field that is quite competitive, and the reason for that is simply because despite how difficult it is for someone to become successful as a designer, it’s still a desirable thing to do. Design is fun – you create something beautiful, with your own esthetic, while making it also functional, with a logical order.

For me, designing this site has been a fun experience. I enjoyed making it look nice, while still keeping it functional. My target audience are people who would come to read my blog to get a sense of who I am as a person, not just as someone who is looking for a job. After all, LinkedIn and other sites serve that purpose. To that end, I decided to make the blog look very simple, without too many distractions, so that it can be navigated easily, but still beautiful in a minimalistic way.

In this unit we went through two major tasks, our formal report draft, and learning and using the you attitude to communicate effectively.

The lesson with the you attitude communication paper is one of the most informative papers I have ever read through. After reading through the paper, I came to recognize when it was and wasn’t used in communication in work emails. Using you attitude to write to colleagues comes off much more affable. Placing the work I in an email or other writing comes off as self-centered and may even sound confrontational, even when the writer does not mean to be. Formal emails which are distributed company wide and from higher up in the organization seem to always have a you attitude in the tone. I will definitely incorporate this technique in my future communication, and in all the emails I have sent after reading the paper, I have tried to reword it in order to have more of a you attitude.

Reviewing my group’s papers where they wrote with a you attitude to a student writing to the professor in order to get into a class made me realize how well my classmates write. It is difficult not to be dismissive of a person with such significant flaws in their writing, but all the group members in Mystic Minds, including my writing partner, who I reviewed, wrote very well and professionally. It seems that we all learned a valuable lesson from reading the you attitude paper – we have become more professional and positive when writing.

The draft for the formal report was very challenging to write because there is so much content. The most challenging aspect was the difficulty in communicating a technical topic without rushing through it with too much jargon. Reading through the review of my report, I agree with many of the points. I still would like to collect more data and information in order to have a more developed paper. Otherwise, it was a satisfying experience to have so much information in the draft. The polish seems like it will be much easier since the basis is done.

In this unit, we started on our projects with and outline and progress report, as well as set up a LinkedIn profile. I especially enjoyed the LinkedIn assignment, since even though I’ve had one set up for some time now, I’ve never investigated the proper techniques and methods to set up an effective profile. The project I think will be challenging, since it’s a relatively large assignment, but with the step-wise fashion we are approaching it, I think it will be manageable. I am excited about the topic I am writing on (continuous integration) since it is a topic I have been working with for several months, and this project will give me to chance to write down and define this very important topic, and perhaps even convince some faculty to add the topic to the course syllabus for CS classes.

In regard to the peer review, I have organized some topics below:

Have you been surprised by what you have read in your colleague’s work?

Reading other students’ blogs has given me tips on improving my own writing. It’s been very useful to read through other student’s work so far. The open blog format of this course, where we can read each other’s work, is very useful to me. It makes it easy for me to gauge my own writing relative to other’s, and it also makes it easy to give feedback through peer reviews since we can find their documents quickly.

Consider the task of peer reviewing; what did you find most challenging about completing the peer reviews?

It’s been very pleasant to read through other people’s blogs. The quality of writing is high, so it’s not difficult to read.

What do you think was the most helpful feedback you were able to provide in your reviews?

For the LinkedIn review, I think I was able to provide helpful feedback regarding grammar and some tips on how to set up a good profile. It was very helpful reading my teammate Joanne’s report on setting up a profile, since it gave me a starting point for reviewing Jasmine’s profile.

What was the most helpful feedback you have received?

Jasmine gave me good feedback on changing my profile photo so that it is more clear. I will be changing my profile as soon as I can get one.

How do you think peer reviewing has affected your view of your writing, of your peers writing?

I think the process in the context of the LinkedIn profiles is fair and helpful.  I especially like getting the chance to analyze someone else’s assignment, since it gives me a chance to see how I could possibly improve my own work.

I was surprised in unit 1 by how a single word or phrase could be elaborated on so much. Reading through my classmate’s work, I realized that words we don’t think about while we use them in our fields because they have become ingrained in our vocabulary, are actually filled with meaning that a layman would not be able to grasp without explanation.

In the definition assignment for this unit, I learned how to define a word which is unfamiliar to someone with different levels of elaboration. I learned how to break down a phrase in a way that would give a reader not only the definition, but the history and use of the word.

My peer review from my classmate Hannah has taught me that the most challenging part of defining a technical term is to not include other technical terms in the definition. I simplified my definition so that the terms used for simplified. For example, instead of using the word myopia, I instead used the word nearsightedness, which most people understand the meaning of. Also, I realized that some terms would require definitions of their own that would be as long as the definition I had already written for the original term, to help with this, I added links to some technical terms so that people who are interested can click on them for more information.

My Edited Definition Assignment: PRK
Peer review for PRK

1526 West 66^th Ave.
Vancouver, BC V6P 2R9

ENGL 301: Technical Writing
The University of British Columbia
2329 West Mall
Vancouver, BC V6T1Z4

Dear Fellow English 301 Students,

We humans write for so many reasons. We write to tell stories, to give information, to convey emotions. Today I write to solicit you to join me in the quest to become a better writer through our English 301 course.

I have spent several years in the working world as a professional in the biotechnology field, where I have written many documents outlining procedures and to communicate with colleagues. At work, the goal is to get the job done as quickly and as competently as possible, so that at the end of the day we can go home, relax with our friends and family, and spend our well earned money and time on those who matter to us. Work is not a place where your colleagues will appreciate long and useless writing. I understand this, and cater what I write to meet this requirement. I do this because I respect my colleagues’ time, and I expect the same in the communication I receive.

Even though I believe writing needs to concisely convey information, I do not believe it should be dull. Dull writing is just as inconsiderate as overly verbose writing. Of course, not all situations warrant writing in a style that can be interesting, but when there is enough flexibility to make it interesting, I try to make it so.

I learn best by doing, and I believe in hard work, and that natural talent cannot trump determination in the long run. I believe the best writers write many volumes of terrible material before they become any good, and I plan on doing the same in order to master writing.

I have these writing goals and opinions in mind, and I strive to meet these personal requirements, but I don’t always, which is the reason I am taking English 301. If you think my philosophy is in agreement with yours, please join me in learning and developing our writing skills. You can reach me at liutenghou@gmail.com. I hope to hear from you soon.

Sincecerely,
Leo Liu
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