New member looking for style manual
New member looking for style manual
(OP)
Is there a manual of style for engineering documents? Some of the usage questions are general but others are specific to, say, engineering and construction.
I found this forum via a Google search regarding comply with comply to. Thanks!
Lizzie
I found this forum via a Google search regarding comply with comply to. Thanks!
Lizzie





RE: New member looking for style manual
MS Word 2010 (and Word 2007) allows you to set the document style under References/Citations & Bibliography to various styles like APA, Chicago, Harvard or MLA plus others. Word 2003 also had style settings, but the location may be different.
"Wildfires are dangerous, hard to control, and economically catastrophic."
Ben Loosli
RE: New member looking for style manual
RE: New member looking for style manual
Mike McCann
MMC Engineering
RE: New member looking for style manual
There's always the old standby Strunk and White Grammar and Style or Chicago Style Writing Guide.
Out in the real world, the company you work for likely has at least a loose guideline for organization of a technical report suited to their line of work. Not all companies seem to settle on a grammar and spelling guide, though. It's always good to have your own source other that MS dictionary/spelling/grammar guide loaded onto the PC.
"Gorgeous hair is the best revenge." Ivana Trump
RE: New member looking for style manual
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Design Solutions
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
http://www.siemens.com/plm
UG/NX Museum: http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209
To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.
RE: New member looking for style manual
Then there is the whole legalese aspect of specifications. I don't like working with specs, and I try not to, but I should probably learn more about them.
The Mayfield guide sounds intriguing & I will look it up, thanks. I think I downloaded a copy of some kind of style guide from the Corps of Engineers as well, which could come in handy.
RE: New member looking for style manual
Arguing about it is what people do who are without enough actual work to do or have a deep-seated psychological need to meddle. I had an old boss who used to call it 'picking fly sh!t out of pepper.'
Pick a source. In my world, technical terms are spelled, and abbreviated the way Means Construction Dictionary does. For regular language, it's Merriam Webster.
Technical writing covers many things, specifications is just one of them. In general, specifications are a completely different animal from other technical writing, such as investigation, soils, or due dilligence reports. One thing they should NOT be is filled with legalese. Specifications should be just the opposite. There are more resources and guides than I can list for specifications. I have the Army Corps of Engineers guide, but I would not use their style for other projects. There are some governmental agencies that have far more generic guides.
To begin to understand specifications, start with just looking at the oganization of a Project Manual. Download the MasterFormat list of specification headings. Be careful about just hitting the print button. It's close to 200 pages long. The most recent version was issued this year in March. The Construction Specification Institute has many useful guides as well.
And stop using Google to figure out if a word should be one or two.
"Gorgeous hair is the best revenge." Ivana Trump
RE: New member looking for style manual
Sadly, if I recall correctly, the style guard was 'classified' or maybe 'restricted' - go figure. However, if you have govt contracts you may be able to get a copy.
Certain industry standards can give some guidance.
For instance I think ASME Y14.100 dictates meaning of Shall, Will etc.
Some argue we shouldn't use 'passive voice' anymore but per Y14100 it's implied that we should - at least on drawings.
To my mind for formal documentation, especially standards, requirements etc. passive voice just seems more explicit etc.
What is Engineering anyway: FAQ1088-1484: In layman terms, what is "engineering"?
RE: New member looking for style manual
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Design Solutions
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
http://www.siemens.com/plm
UG/NX Museum: http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209
To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.
RE: New member looking for style manual
There is MIL-STD-961, -962, and -967.
There is MIL-HDBK-61.
And of course you can follow the bread-crumb trail of referenced specs in any of those.
--Scott
http://www.wertel.pro
RE: New member looking for style manual
I think I would have found your old boss to be an unhelpfully vulgar person.
I appreciate your time and thought in response to my post. I am working with small enough companies, and individuals, and independently, such that there are Not existing manuals, etc., to draw from necessarily, and one needs to establish these baselines and even teach people some of the basics, more importantly things like, yes, using Google to see if something is one word or two, because knowing how to look something up is more important than knowing one or two snippets of dogma.
I don't really care much about the "squiggly line" as there are too many words that the built-in checkers don't know. Unfortunately I do not have the budget to purchase as many hard copies of reference materials as I need to cover the several fields that I work in.
Sometimes the problem is that technical people have less respect for language than literary people have for science.
RE: New member looking for style manual
h
You can dl a pdf or even get a free copy. I use a combination of this and British military standards, although the latter is more difficult to get hold of.
RE: New member looking for style manual
http://www.apstylebook.com/
Engineering is not the science behind building. It is the science behind not building.
RE: New member looking for style manual
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"Is it the only lesson of history that mankind is unteachable?"
--Winston S. Churchill