Last week I wrote about my personal journey with technical writing and my views on it, and I kept thinking about something. A while back I was reading about how people were using AI and one of the things that stuck was how some programmers were using it for their documentation. I’m not talking about vibe-coding, but people that claim to suck at technical writing and pass it off to AI. People who should have a better grasp on what they built than anyone else, with insights no one else would have. So why are they passing it off to AI?

AI, as we all know, is growing rapidly and releasing newer, better, versions all the time. This month there have been at least three new engines and we are only halfway to March! Due to the speed of growth, there is a large base of people who haven’t developed the skills to utilize this tool in a positive, professional, way. AI really hit the public hard only a few years ago, but with the rapid change between models it’s been hard for the masses to fully grasp use cases. Additionally, seeing as at one point it would lie with the confidence of being the top mind on the topic, trusting it fully is a pretty hard task for some.

When you do anything, having a second pair of eyes or someone to talk with can be a huge help. Typically when you get the help of someone else, you get feedback and go from there. AI should be no different. If you program a tool and aren’t very good at writing documentation, AI could be a huge help. The key is the utilization.

First you should note down everything you know about your tool, the use cases, options, bugs, future features, code explanation, whatever you can. Next you need to put it into sentences and paragraphs. Just take what you noted down and form it. Read through it and think “Is this everything I know? Did I write how to use the tool?” Once you’re done is when you can use AI. Share what you’ve done and ask it if you made any grammar mistakes. Ask if it makes sense, if it has any notes on what you can do to improve it. Maybe it will share with you a corrected version, save it. Read what you wrote, read what it gave you, and compare. Rewrite what it gave you to correct any mistakes. Remember, you are writing this and need to teach others.

Positive AI usage should always start with a human and end with a human. You should never have an AI do all of the work, whether it’s at the start or end. It should take the skills you suffer with and advance them while promoting your improvement. As you gain more experience you should be able to start recognizing errors you make when writing, errors the AI makes, and it should make you think critically on things you would not have before. Experience and feedback are important parts of growing our skills and we shouldn’t take that away with AI.