DITA for Beginners Tony Self DITA Darwin Information Typing Architecture Photo Julia Margaret Cameron What is DITA DITA is a new open standard for the creation and management of written documents such as policies and procedures teaching and learning documents Help systems Web site ID: 808313
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Slide1
Can you explain that again?DITA for Beginners
Tony Self
Slide2DITADarwin
Information TypingArchitecture
Photo: Julia Margaret Cameron
Slide3What is DITA?
DITA is a new open standard for the creation and management of written documents such as policies and procedures, teaching and learning documents, Help systems, Web sites and instruction manuals.
DITA is many things in one. It is:an XML languagea writing methodologya topic-based information architecturea structured authoring platform.
Slide4For Tech Writers...The DITA approach utterly separates content from its presentation by using document semantics as the basis for mark-up.
It takes a modular approachIt is very different from the existing methods of:
linear writingstyle-based markup
Slide5Two differences to focus on
Separation of content and formAuthor not concerned with presentational formModularityDocuments written as re-useable components
Slide6Different Approaches
Slide7Influences on Tech Comms
Technical Communication
Globalisation
Embedded
UA
Agile
Single-sourcing
Re-use
Facets
Dublin Core
Modularity
Slide8What is DITA again?
A revolutionary approach to writing manuals, online Help systems and other publicationsXML is used to separate content from form (ie, presentation) and from context
Uses semantic markup instead of “style-based” markupModular approach enables flexible “single-source” publishingAn OASIS open standard for technical communication
Slide9What is OASIS?
Organisation for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards
International, not-for-profit“Advancing open standards for the information society”5000 participants, 600 organisations, 100 countriesDITA TCDITA Adoption TC
Slide10Hippies
Counter-culture sub-group
Opposed political and social orthodoxyGentle and non-doctrinaire politicsFavoured peace, love, and personal freedomHip: “to be aware”
Slide11OASIS DITA Technical Committee
Charter: to promote the use of the DITA architecture for creating standard information types and domain-specific markup vocabularies.TC members are representatives from different industries, organisations and countries.
Chairs: Don Day, Kris Eberlein
Slide12OASIS DITA Adoption TC
Charter: to provide expertise and resources to educate the marketplace on the value of the DITA OASIS standard.Actively solicits participation from non-US members and help to facilitate providing information promoting DITA adoption globally.
Chairs: Gershon Joseph, JoAnn Hackos
Slide13What DITA is An open standard
A writing methodologyA topic-based information architectureA structured authoring platformAn XML
vocabularyA file format
Slide14What DITA is notSoftware
Programming languageThe DITA Open ToolkitSomething that readers will know about
Slide15The End
Slide16IBM IA Workbench
Slide17Sissel’s generation tool
Converts database tablesSpecialised information type13,000 generated topicsVisual Studio.NET
Uses Web Services to interrogate databaseNamed DITA File GeneratorGenerates map and specialised DITA topicsAdds descriptive text via conref
Slide18DITA File Generator
Slide19Dynamic content
Slide20Dynamic UA