On Wed, 2019-04-17 at 08:26 -0400, Paul Frields wrote:
Overall I think this article turned out very good. A couple points,
though... I recommend using the Yoast SEO and readability plugins to
help guide writing. For instance, this article shows up with too many
passive voice sentences. In that case, it's useful to go back and
rewrite to make the prose stronger. If you can put "by Klingons" at
the end of the sentence and it makes grammatical and syntactical
sense, it's passive voice. So for example:
Passive: Using the --rebuild option, the RAID array can be
reassembled. ["...by Klingons" works, so rewrite.]
Active (better): Use the --rebuild option to reassemble the RAID
array. ["...by Klingons" test fails.]
I think I get the gist of the concept. I cringe a bit at writing thinks such as
"Use 'dd of=/dev/sda' to write to your hard drive" though. My instincts
tell me
it is better to write that sort of thing in a passive voice -- "The 'dd
of=/dev/sda' command could be used ...". The former is a command, the latter is
an explanation. Explaining how things work is great. But commanding people to do
things goes against my nature a bit. I guess I'd make a lousy Klingon. :-P
Is there any danger of people going after the magazine legally because "Well,
you TOLD me to ..."
Also the plugin notes this article could use some breaking up with
subheadings for more readability.
What the plugin things is readable and what I think is readable aren't always
the same thing. I tend to think my grasp of human languages is a bit superior to
the computer's personally.
There's also a snippet that should be filled out for SEO, so search
engines show the right kind of excerpt. I made a few tweaks and
will publish since no one scheduled it already.
Paul