CM Pros Announces DITA Community

October 31, 2005 Blog No Comments

Content Management Professionals (CM Pros) has announced the formation of a DITA Community. The community will provide a much-needed technical resource for members seeking to learn more about XML authoring and editing and the Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA). Committee members JoAnn Hackos, Bill Trippe, Kay Ethier, Scott Abel, and Bob Doyle are leading the newly-formed community and are hoping to draw interest from others interested in participating. Learn more about the CM Pros DITA Community Join CM Pros

DITA at Adobe – The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

October 28, 2005 Blog No Comments

If you’re looking for information about real-world use of the Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA), check out this interview with Puny Sen, Project Lead, Instructional Communications, Adobe Systems. Sen is candid, sharing the good, the bad and the ugly about the software giant’s foray into the world of the DITA including: the percentage of content Adobe was able to reuse the difficulties writers faced moving from unstructured to structured FrameMaker the need for DITA specialization wizards the absence of mature Map editors why DITA needs to be constrained why information Read the full article…

Implementing DITA for DocBook

October 24, 2005 Blog No Comments

Norm Walsh does some analysis and attempts to tweak DocBook to address the four technical differences he says the Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) provides technical documentation authors. A topic-oriented authoring paradigm A cross-referencing scheme that’s more practical than XML’s flat ID space SGML’s conref, reinvented An extensibility model based on

Trippe on DITA: Yes, You Still Have to Model Your Content

October 23, 2005 Blog No Comments

In DITA Lets Tech Publishers ‘Eat Their Cake’ (Intelligent Enterprise), Bill Trippe writes: “The Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) is finally pushing aside roadblocks that have stood in the way of adopting XML-based publishing.” The article addresses (briefly) the often avoided issue of content modeling (some writers think adopting DITA means they don’t have to model their content—a fallacy). It also points out what many consultants have been saying: DITA requires customization (called ‘specialization’ in DITA lingo). There are significant costs associated with specializing DITA that may make it the Read the full article…

Seybold Warns of Content Silos

October 22, 2005 Blog No Comments

In Content Islands – Your Content Management Systems Are Multiplying: What Should You Do? (registration required), The Patricia Seybold Group says: “Content management systems are proliferating. You have one for every application that helps you deliver your customer experience on the Web

DITA: The Evolution of Structured Fashion

October 20, 2005 Blog No Comments

Are you a trend-setting fashionista with a penchant for structured content? If so, you want to stop by the DITA Shop at CafePress.com. The Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) is such a hot topic in technical communication circles that the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS) has joined forces with CafePress.com to provide a wide variety of DITA-branded clothing and accessories. What’s available? DITA logo t-shirts, barbeque aprons, mouse pads, sweat shirts, sweat pants, and more. OASIS says all items in their Cafe Press store are sold Read the full article…

Alphabetization Hell: Which State Comes First?

October 17, 2005 Blog No Comments

In Alphabetizing Should Be Simple, web usability guru Jared Spool asks: “Would you consider the following sequence to be alphabetical order: E, H, D, A, I, N, S, O, T? Well, according to American Express

Interaction Design Association Announced

October 17, 2005 Blog No Comments

The Interaction Design Group (IxDG)–which has served the needs of the international community of practitioners, teachers, and students of interaction design since 2003–has incorporated as a non-profit, member-supported organization and has officially changed its name to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA). The organization is committed to fully addressing the diverse needs of interaction design (IxD) professionals and the greater IxD community.

Auto-population: Who’s Doing It and Why?

October 16, 2005 Blog No Comments

You hate it! So does everyone else. Repeatedly you are asked by the Internal Revenue Service, your insurance company, your doctors—even your employer—to provide the same information over and over again. Much of the information they collect from you doesn’t change often, if at all. Your social security number, the names and birth dates of your spouse and children, your race, eye color, citizenship, previous surgeries, and the names of the drugs you are allergic to are all examples. And while these pieces of your personal and business data are Read the full article…

Maximizing Content Management ROI

October 14, 2005 Blog No Comments

Some organizations that make the move to content management do so without first analyzing their content and determining the needs of those who they hope will use it (customers, employees, media). Not a smart idea, according to the researchers at Nucleus Research. In Getting More from Your Content Management System, Nucleus says, “Taking the pulse of your content management system or portal today can help you identify areas to deliver greater returns from an existing project or plan a project sure to deliver increased productivity and reduced pain for users. Read the full article…

Comparing DITA with Alternative Schema

October 13, 2005 Blog No Comments

If you’re trying to determine whether the Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) may be the right choice for your documentation needs, read Comparison of XML schema for narrative documents, a whitepaper by Andrew Squire and Peter Meyer (Elkera Pty Limited, August 2005). The authors say the purpose of the document “is to identify and compare the key features of four XML DTDs or schema that may be considered as candidates to model a wide range of business, legal and technical documents commonly prepared by business and government enterprises (narrative business Read the full article…

Style Guides Galore

October 11, 2005 Blog No Comments

Need a style guide? Wikipedia maintains links to style guides for almost any need. Find general interest, technical, medical, international, journalistic, and computer industry style guides and more.

Using Content Management Technology to Increase Revenue

October 7, 2005 Blog No Comments

Much of the “irrational exuberance” of the dotcom boom was due to unrealistic expectations about the ability of personalization and Web commerce applications to dramatically increase sales – the mistake was to confuse the actual long term promise with severely limited short term deployments. The promise is still there and it is getting easier to benefit from commerce-oriented Web applications as enterprises, vendors, and consultants all gain experience with both the technology and the way customers use the Web. Today there are many successful e-commerce deployments, and this session will Read the full article…

Case Study: Adobe Uses DITA

October 6, 2005 Blog No Comments

It’s not often you see a software company practice what they preach (structure content; write it once, use it often). Just look at how many content management software company websites contain out-of-date content. Metadata anyone? Adobe Systems is, however, practicing what they preach. They recently used their own software (Adobe FrameMaker) and the Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) to create and deliver product documentation for its Adobe Creative Suite 2. In this Adobe on Adobe Case Study, the software giant explores how their writers and editors, production artists, localization managers, Read the full article…