As a technical content material author for Cisco ThousandEyes, I’ve to confess, my best worry is to get replaced by a generative AI algorithm. Within the spirit of “protecting my mates shut and my enemies nearer,” I made a decision to befriend my potential adversary. On this article, I’ll share how utilizing CIRCUIT, Cisco’s inner AI assistant, has augmented my potential as a technical author to maintain up with the fast tempo of change in our business.
Fast context switching
I work on a number of merchandise for ThousandEyes and, because of my earlier lives as a NOC Engineer (Community Operations Heart) and Backend Software program Developer, my technical experience means I’m usually referred to as upon when the crew wants further protection. Whereas I’ve a broad and deep understanding of many applied sciences, the focus required to successfully write about them is on par with the focus I as soon as wanted as a developer to construct them.
In engineering, “rubber ducking” means to speak out an issue both at somebody or one thing with a purpose to manage one’s ideas (not essentially for a response). I take advantage of CIRCUIT as a rubber duck in context switching conditions. With generative AI chat, I’m in a position to preserve a dialog the place I can current concepts and ask it to summarize the important thing factors I must refresh on. The conversational type strikes me rapidly into the headspace needed for making troublesome context switches. Moderately than needing half a day to get again within the movement, I can pivot to a brand new activity inside half-hour.
Shorter SME interviews
One thing I get pleasure from about being a technical author is attending to study new stuff. As a lot as I like studying, nevertheless, given our present velocity (and quantity) of innovation, I usually really feel like I’m ingesting from a firehose. CIRCUIT offers me with a quiet house the place I can safely ask dumb questions on unfamiliar applied sciences. This maximizes the worth I can carry to SME (Topic Matter Professional) interviews.
When an SME has to stroll me by means of the fundamentals, interviews can take as a lot as an hour and will even span a number of periods. Even after I put together alone, I spend loads of time gathering the knowledge I want and discerning what’s truly helpful. With the assistance of CIRCUIT, the knowledge is offered to me in a summarized kind that’s simple to digest. I can rapidly assess it for accuracy and I can ask questions for clarification, in addition to reply with corrections to enhance my outcomes. It even exhibits me what sources it used, so I can go deeper alone. This considerably reduces the time I must ramp up on a brand new expertise. Because of utilizing CIRCUIT to ramp up on unfamiliar applied sciences, my SME interviews are extremely concentrated and environment friendly, sometimes lasting a mere 15-20 minutes.
Lowered repetitive duties
The Documentation Group at ThousandEyes makes use of a “docs-as-code” method. For us, this implies our documentation lives in Github and we format it utilizing markdown. Markdown tables are very tedious and error-prone. When I’ve to create a brand new markdown desk, I take advantage of CIRCUIT to create it with the values I present. Then, all I’ve to do is copy and paste. It’s additionally helpful after I must summarize content material, corresponding to offering a one-sentence description or writing a brief introductory paragraph to a technical article. CIRCUIT can present me with the summaries I want immediately, sourced from our personal documentation.
On the spot contextual data
The toughest factor to doc isn’t the technical stuff. It’s the stuff that connects the technical stuff to what the person actually wants and desires. That is the a part of the writing course of that depends upon the author’s expertise and instinct. Technical writing isn’t simply making a bunch of screenshots and describing them. It’s determining what the person needs to do after which determining the easiest way to current the knowledge to attenuate the person’s cognitive load.
Suggestions gathered by one in all our product managers, prospects appreciated ThousandEyes’ documentation higher than our opponents’. Caring about our customers is a giant precedence for my crew. For instance, I perceive how difficult making sense of documentation will be within the midst of a high-severity outage, particularly while you’ve been woken up in the midst of the night time. Once I’m figuring out methods to doc one thing, I do loads of background analysis, together with perusing instructional supplies on the ThousandEyes weblog and user-contributed content material on websites like Reddit and StackOverflow. Asking CIRCUIT why somebody may use one thing makes a part of the writing course of a lot sooner (though it does take finesse to phrase my prompts successfully).
The checklist of use instances and descriptions I get from the AI not solely permits me to extra deeply empathize with our customers, but in addition helps me to craft my content material to make sure relevancy and ease of use.
Embracing GenAI
Generative AI has reworked my method to technical writing at Cisco ThousandEyes, turning what may have been a frightening adversary into a robust ally. By streamlining context switching, accelerating studying for SME interviews, automating repetitive duties, and offering prompt contextual insights, CIRCUIT has not solely boosted my effectivity however continues to raise the standard of our user-focused documentation. Moderately than changing the human contact, CIRCUIT amplifies my potential to empathize with customers and ship clear, related content material that meets their wants, even in high-pressure eventualities. Because the tempo of innovation continues to speed up, integrating AI into technical writing is not only a sensible alternative—it’s a strategic one which empowers writers to remain forward in a quickly evolving business.
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