full-on dita strategies beyond technical publications with rob hanna, ecms
TRANSCRIPT
Full-on DITA strategies beyond tech pubs
2015 DITA Summit – Information Development World, San Jose, California
Presentation abstract• DITA has the potential to add tremendous utility to high-value content
for the enterprise. Before embarking on a DITA transformation project, organizations must first take a step back to examine their requirements for utility, maintainability, and usability of their content. This means not putting the technology cart before the horse. This session will take a brief look back at exploratory work conducted by the Business Documents Subcommittee of the DITA TC and how tools and methods have evolved since. We will examine the value of useful semantic markup and models for the enterprise and talk about several DITA projects involving non-traditional users and audiences.
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About your presenter• Rob Hanna, ECMs
• President of Precision Content Authoring Solutions Inc. and a director of AIIM First Canadian Chapter
• Expert in structured authoring and content management practices and technology
• Instructor at the University of Toronto School of Continuing Studies – Metadata and Controlled Vocabularies
Who is Precision Content Authoring Solutions Inc.?• We help organizations make their information easier to use• Our solutions consist of • Content strategy• Detailed information architecture• Content lifecycle design and development• Turn-key content transformation• Tools selection and development• Multi-channel publishing
• www.precisioncontent.com
©2015 Precision Content Authoring Solutions Inc.
WE ARE YOUR CONTENT
TRANSFORMATION
SPECIALISTS
Full-on DITA Strategies• Look for problems in likely places• Soft-peddle the technology and focus on the content• Show the end-result as the “art of the possible”• Look for Cloud or SaaS solutions for early prototyping – keep IT at bay• Look to other less traditional outputs• Keep pushing your solution upstream• Think globally and act locally
STOP THE INSANITY!Stop throwing
more technology at your content
problems!
Content problemsrequire
content solutions!
Importance of Content StrategyBefore any technology is considered, organizations must first consider their content strategy to fully understand what they need and how they are going to get there.
Several factors must be examined.
@20
15 P
reci
sion
Cont
ent A
utho
ring
Solu
tions
Inc.
Do we have a problem that needs solving?• 5,900,000,000 google searches per
day (who did we ask these questions to before Google?)• 540,000 word in the English
language – 5 times more than in Shakespeare’s time• 90% of the world’s data has been
generated in the last 2 years
In the year … Human knowledge doubled every…
1900 100 years
1945 25 years
2014 13 months
2020 12 hours
Did you know? Shift Happens 2014 Remix – Youtube.com
Early days in structured authoring• 1997 GML• Documentation process long and
fraught with opportunities for human error• Parsed GML into Access• Created taxonomies• Integrated structured data• Output to HTML (.chm)
Enterprise Business Document Subcommittee – OASIS DITA TC• Examined authoring issues• Content models• Tore down templates• Built up models from architypes• Developed abstract layer
Language ArtsLanguage Arts for Personal Response (LAFPR)• To emotionally engage the reader• Techniques:• narrative style• varied vocabulary & sentence
structure• withholding information
• Writer driven• Meant to be READ
Language Arts for Information (LAFI)• To convey information that
readers need to use• Techniques:• consistent modular structure• concise, direct vocabulary• use of graphics
• Reader driven• Meant to be USED
Ikea Instructions: LAFI
Ikea Instructions: LAFPR • If novelist Michael Ondaatje wrote Ikea instructions ….
“The eel-shaped talisman squirms inside the raspy recycled box. A series of quarter turns – clock hands marking time – bonds back to base. An alphabet of
connections in English and French. A into groove B. C slots into D. Chipboard credenza communicating Swedish
hegemony.”• Author/parodist: Geoff Thomas
Globe & Mail, August 27, 2009
analyst brake market stapler seat traders alternator investor calculators
scissors engine pedal dashboard pen backers marker tape profit starter
ruler prospects
Thinking about ClassificationHow many words can you memorize in 20 seconds?
analyst brake market stapler
dashboard pen backer marker
seat trader alternator investor
pedalcalculator scissors engine
tape profit starter ruler prospect
Thinking about Classification1. Filter out all of the noise
analyst brake market stapler
dashboard pen
backer
marker
seat
trader
alternator
investor
pedalcalculator scissors engine
tapeprofitstarter
ruler prospect
Thinking about Classification2. Break into smaller groupings
dashboardalternator pedalbrake seatengine starter
marker
staplerscissorstape
pen calculatorruler
analyst market backer
investortraderprofitprospect
Thinking about Classification3. Organize words by similarities
dashboardalternator pedalbrake seatengine starter
marker
staplerscissorstape
pen calculatorruler
analyst market backer
investortraderprofitprospect
Stock market Office supplies
Car parts
Thinking about Classification4. Classify and label groups
Thinking about Classification
Stock market Office supplies Car partsanalyst stapler brakemarket calculator seattrader scissors dashboard
investor pen enginebacker marker alternatorprofit tape starter
prospect ruler pedal
How well did you do?
Thinking about Classification
Vegetables Computer parts Instrumentspeas hard drive violin
endive sound card harpcarrots monitor pianospinach mouse trumpetcelery processor cello
broccoli flash drive flutetomato keyboard guitar
Now how many words can youmemorize in 20 seconds?
Structured building blocks of information
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XML is EverywhereXML defines meaningful data structures for documents and data. It is a human-readable file format used to power
• manufacturing assembly lines
• medical devices
• military applications, and
• many other things.
XML is the language of the Web. It enables smart phones and web browsers.
Intelligent Content• Content that is• not limited to one
• purpose• technology, or• output
• structurally rich and semantically aware, making it• discoverable• reusable• reconfigurable, and• adaptable.
A New Way of Thinking about ContentPrecision Content™ is like software for the brain
ProgrammedLearning
Instructional Systems Design
Human FactorsEngineering Documentat
ion Writing Research
MessageDesign
CognitivePsychology
Meeting 2 sets of fundamental needs
The Human Brain
Technology
Find
Understand
Use, and
Retain
Integrate
Search
Process, andReuse
Well-structured content helps
Excerpt from a medical reference...• pN3 description only closely
mirrors descriptions for pN3a +pN3b + pN3c• Use of footnotes confusing• “Clinically detected” and “Not
clinically detected” are not exact opposites, and• Inconsistent enumeration of lymph
nodes
Same content after Precision Content™• 44.2% reduction in word count• 20% reduction in passive voice• 18.4% increase in Flesch Reading Ease
score• 30% increase in white space• Elimination of footnotes, and• Addition of labels and visual elements
Information typing and classification• The cornerstone of the methodology is based on correctly identifying,
typing, and labelling blocks of content that comprise a topic• Each information type has its own rules and semantics for authoring,
labelling, and presentation.• Precision Content consists of 5 distinct information types including• Reference• Principle• Concept• Task, and• Process.
Adapted DITA topic types and structures• Concept, task, and reference are simplified but essentially the same• All topics are authored using blocks and titles• New sub-blocks introduced• Each block is assigned an information type
New Precision Content™ topic typesProcess• Specialized from Task• Introduces• Stages• Actors, and• Actions
Principle• Specialized from Topic• Introduces• Principle Statement• Applicability• Outcome, and• Resolution
Information Types
Reference
Principle
Task
Process
Concept
“We will be flying at an altitude of 60,000 feet.”
“Always put on your oxygen mask before
assisting other passengers.”
“To open the emergency exit,
look out the window, pull the
lever, and push out the exit door.”
“In the event of loss of cabin pressure,
an oxygen mask will drop from the
overhead compartment.”
“We are a member of the Star Alliance group of airlines.”
Flight safety briefing
Architectural modularity of Precision Content™ Client Specilization
Modules
Precision Content™ Modules
OASIS DITA Domains
OASIS DITA 1.2 Modules
Our solution can be implemented at varying levels of architectural precision
Each layer represents greater consistency and guidance for authors
DITA constraintsUsing DITA’s standard constraint mechanism, Precision Content™
• eliminates 77 elements from the base specification
• eliminates elements unnecessary domains
• simplifies element structures, and
• introduces controlled vocabularies for element attributes.
Where?
Who? What?
How?
Why?
What is the Enterprise Content Metamodel?
• first published in the 2005 STC conference proceedings• describes the
relationships of information within the information ecosystem
Role
Ability
Objective
Event
Process Task
Concept
Reference
Principle
Design
Requirement
Past
Pre
sent
F
utur
e
When?
Questions?Rob Hanna, ECMs+1 (289) 290-4337www.linkedin.com/in/[email protected]