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Cloud Computing: Get on Board
Cloud computing services have become a vital part of communication, collaboration, and the acceleration of producing documents. If you’ve used a computer in the last decade, you’ve used “the cloud”. Before this beautiful thing became a “thing,” computers were the source of immeasurable frustration. This is because computers were originally set up like an old fashion strand of Christmas lights. Operating systems, applications, and hardware were all built on top of one another, so when one failed, the whole system went down. Cloud computing systems made this inevitable domino-effecting-meltdown a thing of the past because cloud systems separate and disperse these connections to any number of servers in any number of places.
Cloud services allow you, and anyone you afford access, to contribute to a document simultaneously from any computer with an Internet connection. For example, you and three others have a presentation to construct, but time and space don’t allow you to physically meet. You can create a folder within Google Drive and invite your comrades. The cloud service permits you each to work from your own computers because the document is in an application that doesn’t actually exist in your server, it exists in one or multiple
communal servers that can be accessed from anywhere in the world. The server being used is part of a “cluster” of servers which prevents overload of users and data because when someone tries to access the document within the application within a server that has reached or neared capacity, the user is directed to the same document in the same application via a different server. Because there is no limit to contribution or access, cloud services make constructive work easier than ever. Basically, if you’re about production, you’re about “the cloud.”
iCloud is Apple’s cloud system that they developed to accommodate their vast line of products. This why an iPhone user can download a song on his or her cell phone and find it in their computer’s music library without connecting the two physically. iCloud is great for syncing data to all of your devices automatically but that’s only if your devices are all made by Apple.
Egnyte is another highly touted cloud service that allows you to upload files of any size and store them locally on a device without losing the cloud accessibility – however, it lacks the ability to stream media.
Google Apps separates your content into its respective categories – which can be both convenient and hindering depending on the need – such as: Docs (for word docs, presentations, etc.),
Picasa (for photos), and the most popular, Gmail.
These three cloud systems are among the best available services to date and yield nothing but production – something anyone in the world of professional writing can easily get on board with.
Digital Word Processing for Professionals
Shan Sheikh
Starting with the Right Tools
Choosing a word processor is perhaps the most important task for any writer. UAB students are required to use computer word processing throughout their academic careers, but requirements for academic writers are usually centered around a black and white document of a certain file type. Commercial, nonprofit, and government entities outside of academia require professional writers” to compose documents in a number of styles and formats. Professional writers with knowledge of the differences in word processors can be confident that the documents they compose will look and function as intended.
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Write Your Way In
Sullivan Sanders
Responsibilities
The responsibilities and expectations of a professional writer are always directly proportionate to and dependent on the desires of the writer’s employer, usually an editor of the publication. The relationship with this employer is the only aspect ensuring the continuation of a writer’s employment assuming that his or her initial hiring was based on the writer’s ability to write. As a student, your continued employment comes in the form of satisfactory grades and eventually sources for positive references. In my time as a student majoring in English and concentrating in professional writing and public discourse the relationships I have had with my professors have similarly affected my grades as in the professional world that relationship would affect the writer’s employment. In the professional world there are deadlines, length specifications, desired voices for particular audiences,etc.. These expectations are just the same for a student.
Critiques: How to Survive and Conquer
By: Ashley Carr
It’s Criticism Day! Whether it be for a writing workshop, meeting with an important client, or the day of a deadline on a creative project, we are all familiar with public critiques. Some find them helpful, but a vast majority find them excruciating. That’s unsurprising, as the actual definition of criticism is, “the act of passing judgement as to the merits of anything.” Yikes! As English Majors, it can be easy to get caught up in semantics. However, do not fret! It does not have to be as scary as it sounds.
Usability by Design
Amy Roberts
UAB Historical Collections Can Benefit Professional Writing Students
Melissa Hennessy Dougherty
The Lister Hill Library of Health Science contains three historical collections that are largely undiscovered by the students at UAB. All three collections focus on documents and artifacts from medical professions around the world. The manuscripts and materials were created over the span many hundreds of years. Some manuscripts date back to medieval Europe.
The collections are contained at The Alabama Museum of Health Sciences, UAB Archives, and the Reynolds Historical Library. All of these divisions are located on the third floor of the Lister Hill Library and are available to any staff member or student.
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How to Dress for Professional Writing Success
Haley Townsend
Your résumé is ready; your online portfolio is freshly updated. Now, what are you going to wear?
When you’re prepping for a big interview– for a much-needed copy writing internship or that fabulous editor job you’ve always wanted, you simply can’t overlook how you’re going to look!
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Food Writing in Professional Periodicals
Stephanie Patrick
Philanthropy through Writing
By: Veronica Tamburello
Philanthropy is not just for the elites. Donations and voluntary contributions are intrinsic to the American tradition of charity. Professional Writing Majors who desire to make the world a little bit better can attain this goal through the written word as a grant writer. A writer’s ability to persuade through a convincing argument and developed research can secure the funding that is necessary to support a philanthropic cause.
