Understanding Technical Writing: Its Relationship with Programming and How to Practice It

Author Bio The author is a senior front‑end development expert at Ctrip, creator of open‑source projects such as react‑lite, react‑imvc, and farrow, with many years of writing experience.

1. The Relationship Between Technology and Writing

Programming and traditional writing share many similarities: both use languages with syntax rules to express ideas, and both can be seen as forms of language. The article cites Chomsky’s hierarchy (regular, context‑free, context‑sensitive languages) to illustrate why regular expressions cannot fully parse HTML, which is a context‑free structure.

From this perspective, programming is "machine‑oriented writing" while conventional writing is "human‑oriented writing"; both are writing activities that follow grammatical rules.

2. What Is Technical Writing?

Technical writing is defined as text‑creation activities that revolve around technology and convey technical content to other developers. It includes code comments, API documentation, requirements documents, work emails, bug reports, instant messages, technical blogs, and more.

Although many developers view technical writing as a hobby, it actually occupies a significant portion of a programmer’s daily work.

3. Why Participate in Technical Writing?

The article presents a five‑layer capability model:

Knowledge reserve (theoretical foundations learned in school)

Understanding level (deep comprehension of that knowledge)

Practical ability (applying knowledge to write elegant code)

Textual expression (producing clear technical articles)

Oral expression (presenting ideas verbally)

Each higher layer depends on the lower ones; improving knowledge and understanding leads to better code, which in turn enables clearer technical writing and communication.

4. Positioning in Technical Writing

Developers can adopt different writing roles—technical expert, tech‑media creator, technical author, etc.—depending on their career stage. The article introduces a "Impossible Triangle" of high output, high quality, and sustainability, noting that usually only two of these can be achieved simultaneously.

5. The Quality Spectrum of Text

The article presents a spectrum ranging from subjective, emotional content on the left to objective, rational content on the right. Good technical articles balance facts and reasoning, using existing knowledge while adding modest personal insight.

6. A Basic Pattern for Serious Technical Writing

Adopt a paper‑like structure: Abstract/Preface, Introduction, Overview, Main Body, Conclusions/Reflections, Acknowledgements, References. This provides a clear roadmap for readers and lets writers focus on content quality.

7. Review and Summary

Programming is a form of writing; technical writing is an essential part of a developer’s work; engaging in technical writing bridges practice and expression; writers should choose a suitable position for their career stage; quality should be measured by moving toward objective, fact‑based content; and the classic paper structure remains the best template for serious technical articles.

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