Qualifications needed for Editing?

[Karsten Wade]

On Tue, 2003-12-23 at 18:27, Daniel Gonzalez wrote:
> I was just curious as to what sort of qualifications are needed to
> become an editor? I'm not a programmer by any means (basic scripting
> etc) but would be very interested in editing/proof-reading etc. I
> apologize in advance if this is not the correct forum in which to ask my
> question.

I don't think this has been formally defined, although I'm sure someone
can dig up a job description for editor.  But in the spirit of "it seems
to me", here are some ideas.

Technical Editors

People who focus primarily on catching technical errors.  Activities
include:

* Performing all actions as directed in the tutorial
* Verifying accuracy of output
* Tracking down technical answers to questions writers have, or errors
they have made and don't know how to correct

Language Editors (Wordsmiths)

People who focus primarily on catching grammatical, spelling and
idiomatic errors in their language.  Activities include:

* Reading for grammar, spelling and correct idiom usage
* Correcting transliteration errors
* Reading for clarity (language, flow of prose or narrative)

General Editors

These are tasks which could be performed by anyone:

* XML accuracy and tag usage
* Code formatting (adherence to standards)
* Refactoring for accuracy, clarity and tag usage

... just some thoughts ...

- Karsten
-- 
Karsten Wade   :      Tech Writer, RHCE     :  o: +1.831.466.9664
kwade at redhat.com : http://rhea.redhat.com/ :   c: +1.831.818.9995
         Red Hat Applications : WAF, CMS, Portal Server         
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --