I just read Zinsser (2010), and I though that his approach has a lot in common with good programming, and indeed with some good universal design principles.

Zinsser basically resumes his thoughts with these sentences:

• Short is better than long.
• Simple is good. (Louder)
• Long Latin nouns are the enemy.
• Anglo-Saxon active verbs are your best friend.
• One thought per sentence.

I think all of that are equivalent to a combination of these universal principles of design: William Lidwell (2003):

1. Accessibility - the principle that asserts that the design should be usable by people of diverse backgrounds.

2. Chunking - accommodates short term memory limits by formatting information into small number of units.

3. Interference effects - when outputs of different mental system are incongruent, interference occurs and additional processing is required.

4. Ockham's razor - Oldie but goodie. As Einstein puts it Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.

To close, this little exercise was a great evidence on how writing is simply to program in a different media for a different audience (or vice versa) but the same principles apply to both of them.

Bibliography

Jill Butler William Lidwell, Kritina Holden.

Universal Principles of Design.
october 2003.

William Zinsser.

Writing english as a second language.
2010.
URL http://www.theamericanscholar.org/writing-english-as-a-second-language/.