Scott Knaster Occasionally Misses Expectations
I worked in Silicon Valley for many years with brilliant people at amazing companies that changed the world. A lot of my stories are about those people and places. But some of them are about something unexpected I saw on a walk around my neighborhood. Stuff like that.
I tell stories face to face, over a meal, in online posts, and on stage. And now I’m trying this new way! Here I’ve written a bunch of stories in this Google Doc, like a little book. I’ve told some of them before and refreshed them a bit for this book. Others are brand new and I’m telling them here for the first time.
[…]
Steve entered the little interview room and sat down 3 feet away from me across a tiny round table. He leaned forward and said: “Are you the best technical writer in the world?”
I was stunned into silence for a few seconds, as I tried to figure what to say. And then, like an idiot, I gave a direct, thoughtful answer. “No. The best technical writer in the world is my friend Caroline Rose, and she already works here at NeXT.”
Via Dave Mark:
I’ve known my buddy Scott Knaster for a VERY long time. He and I wrote some of the earliest Apple developer books, became fast friends in that surprisingly small universe.
Scott just released a Google doc with a draft of his memoirs. Scott is a very entertaining writer, and the doc is chock full of pictures and wonderful anecdotes.
If you are a techie of any stripe, this is worth your time.
Some of his excellent books are How to Write Macintosh Software (PDF) and Macintosh Programming Secrets (PDF).
Previously:
- WWDC 2021 Preview
- macOS Special-Casing to Keep Apps Working
- Thank You, Caroline Rose
- Macintosh Folklore
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When I moved from Apple II Developer Technical Support to Macintosh Developer Technical Support at Apple, I learned to debug developer apps with MacsBug (with no source code) from Scott’s first book. I was lucky enough to work with him and become friends several years later.
