elephant.org.il is the official site of Elephant, Israel's organization of technical/marcom writers and copy editors. Elephant's Code of Ethics is just one reason why Israeli companies prefer to hire members of Elephant.
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Translatable But Debatable - L'havdil
I don’t find many dictionary definitions of להבדיל. Dov Ben Abba’s dictionary in Signet paperback says “not to be mentioned together,” which makes sense — or at least reasonable partial sense, since whenever we say להבדיל we are indeed mentioning things together, while simultaneously we point out that they are not to be compared except in the narrow sense that we intend.
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Translatable but Debatable - פירגון (Firgun)
A contributor to “Better than English” writes that פירגון is “An act of saying nice things or doing nice things to another person without any other purpose, but to make the other feel good about what he is or what he does” but another contributor responds that “It can also be to share the credit with someone or not try to stab them in the back. Not to be jealous of someone’s accomplishments.”
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Resilience Tip - Confusion's Beauty
“I’m confused”, clients have said with a look of dismay. “Great!” I say. “That is the first step toward new thinking.” We humans use routine thinking for routine situations. We compartmentalize incoming data to help us manage the vast amounts of information coming our way. Hmm, seat, back, some legs – goes into our “chair” compartment of our thinking, and then we can move on to another thought
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Observations on Design and Illustration #4: Design Elements and Principals
Design Pet Peeve #4: Unreadable text. Can’t find that shop? Can’t read what’s on that jar? How many signs or labels around the world do you know that are unreadable or confusing for one reason or another? I know a lot.
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Observations on Design and Illustration #3: Design Considerations and the Process.
Design and place human-scale objects taking into account the largest number of potential users with the widest range of physical abilities; in other words, to design universally.
Design Considerations. Questions to ask while developing designs for any two- or three-dimensional purpose. Not all necessarily apply to all designs. The most important consideration from the beginning of the design process is the ultimate outcome of the design, the end-user, and their interaction with one-another.
The Design Process. A generic guide that can be adapted for use through any design development.
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Observations on Design and Illustration #2: Design
Design Pet Peeve #2: Sales Receipts. In the USA there is a standard chart-style label mandated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for inclusion on most food packages. Similar charts are required or recommended in many other countries including Australia, New Zealand, India, Mexico, Canada, and the European Union. In the USA, it’s a small black and white list titled “Nutrition Facts. Are you familiar with it?
The label was controversial at the time the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) required it in 1994, but has since gone on to be considered one of the finest single design breakthroughs in the history of graphic design. Why? Because each label has more-or-less the same look, layout, size, shape, content, and placement no matter what product it explains.
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6th Annual Tech/Marcom Writers Family Picnic - A Great Success
All of those who came had such a good time that no one remembered to take pictures this year. For all those who missed it, hope to see you next year.
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6th Annual Tech Writers Picnic
Mark your calendars. This year's picnic will be July 9 at the the Kibbutz Hazorea swimming pool. The picnic is open to all technical writers, marcom writers, copy editors and members of similar professions. You do not need to be a member to come. It is always great fun for the whole family and fun to meet your colleague's families. There is a great swimming pool for kids and infants, and an even better one for the adults.
Mike Lee has arranged for a special price of 25 NIS per person over 3 years old (infant - 3 years old are free). The entrance fee is charged by the kibbutz for entrance to the area regardless of whether you use the pool. This is really inexpensive and covers you for the entire day.
Please fill in the preregistration form in the body of this article. It will help us plan. Click here for directions...
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Photos from the 6th Annual Techshoret Convention
Nadina Rosentuler and Sharon Mink posted some nice photos at http://elephant.org.il/elephant_event_photos/techshoret_conference/
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Mike Altman to represent Elephant at Techshoret Convention in Jerusalem
If you will be at the convention, look for Mike. In addition to enjoying the convention, he will be there to answer questions about the Elephant organization and help members.
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Being Proactive - Finding Freelance Technical Writing and Editing Opportunities
Professional conferences and workshops are great opportunities for freelance technical writers and copy editors. The presenters often need your professional services and
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Promoting Your Business
According to Hillel Porath of Gavoah Marketing, "attracting clients is probably one of the hardest aspects in running a small business". For many of us, he is right. With his permission I've uploaded a copy of his 11 page list of recommendations that I think is worth reading. Click here to download...
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The Hardware Hunt
The Hardware Hunt
Only after a thorough understanding of how a computer works and boots will you be ready to shop for components and a respective operating system (OS). The hardware (HW) and OS go together because the final OS that you want on your computer often determines the type of HW that you will want to choose.
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Mouse Euthanasia with Camtasia
December 31 2008
(edited 2 year, 11 month ago)
Tags:Hi, you keyboard whiz readers! I needed to make a change in this month's featured application at the last minute. Because of some previous damage to my computer, the Captivate download did not work properly. No matter! Camtasia is an excellent tool that can do a lot of what Captivate does for less money. Unfortunately, Camtasia is no longer freeware, but you can download a 30-day trial version, as I did.
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Eye Spy
"You know your teacher is possessed by Beelzebub when his or her head rotates 360 degrees at the blackboard. But is this what it takes to effectively keep watch over a classroom while a teacher unveils a frontal lesson? All adults who work with kids instinctively understand that they love to deny their mischievous behavior when the teacher isn't looking. It's one of the hallmarks of adolescent classroom acuity. Lest you grow eyes in the back of your head, educators are in a significantly vulnerable position. So how does one fight back?
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Milestones: Does the concept of Project Management Exist in Israel?
When do I stop being considered new? Probably never. Our cousin Yossi, the tour guide says that to be considered old in Israel,something has to be at least 200 years old.
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התשתית החוקית, האתית והמעשית
תיאור של תהליך הגישור בפרק זה מתייחס לגישור באופן כללי כשיטה ליישוב סכסוכים בתחומים רבים – סכסוכים עסקיים ומסחריים, סכסוכים בצרכנות, בין שכנים, בין קרובי משפחה ועוד.
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All About Indexing #8: Starting An Indexing Business, Part 2: Marketing
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Creating Your Home Court Advantage
June 19 2008
(edited 2 year, 11 month ago)
Tags:You may root for your home team, but how often do you root for yourself? How to develop self-talk that is positive and genuine.
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Guide for the Perplexed: Where the How-To’s Are, and Office 2007 Commands
June 16 2008
(edited 2 year, 10 month ago)
Tags:Drop in for a roundup of helpful Web sites that offer instructional content in textual form, news about a Microsoft Office add-in that helps you adapt to Office 2007, and all about run-time environments in Linux.
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Thanks for Reading
With the column of June 1, “The Final Why,” The Why of Style has concluded a two-year fortnightly run. Any future columns will be occasional. My e-mail address remains open for questions and comments: . Thanks for reading, and particular thanks to those who wrote in from time to time. — Mark L. Levinson
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Play Music and Get a Date at the Tool Bar & Grill
June 9 2008
(edited 2 year, 11 month ago)
Tags:Wherein Jonathan recommends a great simple media player and a Web site that can get you out of trouble, and Mark reviews Linux calendar utilities.
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The Final Why
June 1 2008
(edited 2 year, 11 month ago)
Tags:“When we didn’t have a manual yet, when we didn’t know what to name the commands on our menus, when we needed our business cards spelled right, we couldn’t have done without you,” the boss said. “But now the product is in release, and I don’t see the ROI from fine-polishing the error messages.”
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What the Romans Knew
Memory improvement techniques are based on finding memory pegs, on which to hang the things one wants to remember. The principle of memory pegs is simple...
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What is PDC all about?
April 19 2008
(edited 2 year, 6 month ago)
Tags:TheP eopleD evelopmentC olumns help you maximize your chances for success. These columns are currently broken into 2 groups that appear 3 times per month.
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Loops
Excerpted from my book FrameScript for Newbies Copyright [7/17/2007] by Paul Schnall
Loops are a way of moving through a book or document and running lines of code on each object of a particular type. For example, looping through every paragraph (paragraph being the object) in a document and searching for a specific word or text is easily done using this construct.
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Create Screencasts and Quick Video Captures with Jing (Totally Free)
Jing,a new project by TechSmith, is a tool that allows you to quickly capture video or an image from your computer and share it with others, such as project team members or customers.
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God and the Technical Writer
And in the beginning there was nothing. And then one day a huge bang was heard that echoed round the universe and when the smoke had cleared, all that could be seen was a giant Product Manager and a petite Technical Writer
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