Category Archives: Web

Easel.ly

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Easel.ly is a simple web tool for creating and sharing infographics, posters, and other visuals with no design experience needed. They provide the canvas, you provide the creativity.

How it is useful to technical communicators:

While perhaps not ideal for high-end designs, Easel.ly is an excellent tool for quickly creating vibrant, punchy infographics that convey information through organized visual templates. Use Easel.ly for presentations, as visual aids accompanying other information, or for general diagramming and flowcharts.

Learn more:

You can access Easel.ly on any web browser http://www.easel.ly/. Both free and pro ($3/month) account options are available.

Other software like it:

Infogr.am, Visual.ly

Google Drive

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Google Drive provides access to files anywhere through secure cloud storage and file backup for your photos, videos, files and more. Besides providing access-anywhere file storage, Drive is also your main access to the Google Suite of tools, including Docs, Slides, Sheets, Forms, and others.

How it is useful to technical communicators:

Google Drive is a great file storage system. However, its value to technical communicators comes from its capability for supporting real-time collaboration and editing. Multiple users can be given access to view, comment on, or edit files, thus enabling a great method for collaboration when users are in disparate geographic locations.

Learn more:

When signed in to a (free) Google account, you can access Google Drive for that account on any web browser at https://www.google.com/drive/. You can also access Drive from the mobile app available for free on app stores.

Other software like it:

Dropbox, OneDrive

GoTo Meeting

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GoTo Meeting allows video conferencing, screen sharing, and recording of virtual meetings.

How it is useful to technical communicators:

Technical communicators might use GoTo Meeting to communicate with team members and clients, especially if they are not located in the same area.

Learn more:

GoTo Meeting is available on web browsers or mobile devices via an app. For a fee, users can subscribe to a plan that best fits their needs.

Other software like it:

Google Hangout, Skype, WebEx

Toggl

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Toggl is a time-keeping app for logging one’s hours spent on projects (or anything, really).

A technical communicator may juggle a variety of roles as an independent consultant for multiple clients as well as a full-time student. You might need something to track your billable hours, as well as to record how much time you spend on schoolwork, so you can prioritize better and make time to have a life.

Similar apps that may be found on the Google play store include Timesheet, aTimeLogger, Time Tracker.  But I really love Toggl; I’m toggling right now.

Sway

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Sway is a Microsoft software for presentations and storytelling. I wanted a jazzier presentation format for a Digital Humanities project, one that would let me embed multimedia components and stretch across a four-wall 360 presentation space. It had to be shareable over the web.  Learn more at Getting Started with Sway.

Similar tools to consider include Microsoft PowerPoint and Prezi.