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Get active! Why content designers hate the passive voice
Content written in the active voice helps users understand what they have to do to complete tasks. It reduces confusion by making it clear who is responsible for every action.
Defra content
A pause on activities
We officially enter a pre-election period as of midnight tonight, so there will be no new blog posts until after the election.
Content clinic 23 February: what we talked about
We organise regular content clinics across Defra group publishers. Statutory guidance "What are the restrictions on publishing content as statutory guidance?" The style guide says use them for guidance that relevant users are legally obliged to follow. Don’t use for …
Content clinic 10 November: what we talked about
The Defra content team held its first content clinic on a slack channel with editors from Natural England, the Animal and Plant Health Agency, the Rural Payments Agency, Environment Agency and Defra. Headings Can we use H4s in detailed guides? No - …
Content designers need experts
You might have heard that people have had enough of experts. Those people are definitely not content designers. Experts help content designers write factually and legally accurate guidance. Without input from a subject-matter expert (SME) content could lead its users …
How the Defra content team works
Getting content into plain English isn't an art, it's a process.
Satellite data in Defra: collaboration, innovation and leading the way
The exciting vision of utilising satellite data to their full potential in policy development and operations by 2020 in Defra’s Roadmap for the use of Earth Observation (PDF) is being taken forward in many Defra work areas and with many partners, …
Do we have the right technical skills?
The JNCC Technical Skills Framework – a strategic approach to training The majority of staff at the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC) are scientists. We also have a dedicated technical development team but how do we know that we have …
Going open: assessing risk
Back in November, Alex Coley blogged about being comfortable with risk – explaining the risks we consider when making our data open and the simple tool we use to help assess them. The Open Data Risk Assessment Tool was developed by the Environment …
Content design at Defra
How Defra designs content in plain English that's easy to use and legally correct.