confessions of a ditafile: what’s in and what’s out for project success
DESCRIPTION
The truth is that DITA works as specified, but that’s just it. DITA is just a specification and nothing more. It is designed to give you freedom to develop a solution that satisfies your particular needs and requirements. It can be whatever you want it to be. This lack of restriction might seem simultaneously overwhelming and exciting. It might even blow your mind!TRANSCRIPT
& why are we here
Who are we
Who are we
Confessions of a DITAfile:
What’s In & What’s Out for Project Success
—Paula Toth
Who are we
• Wisdom Story
• Confession
• 2 Major IN Things
• 2 Major OUT Things
• Tips
• Top 10 INs
• Top 10 OUTs
• Summary
• Group Exercise
• Questions
Who are we
Wisdom Story
Youthful writing
• Book reports
• Expositions
Make critical decisions based on tolerance not love!
Wisdom Story
Confession
• Chunk into blocks
• Move blocks
• Reuse blocks
• Tag and sort blocks
• Share blocks
Confession
• Reduce content development and maintenance costs
• Enhance user experience
Confession
Confession
I love DITA because
• I’m lazy
Confession
I love DITA because
2. I dream big
Confession
I love DITA because
1. I’m lazy
Confession
I love DITA because
2. I dream big
Blocks would magically appear
In all the right places
What’s IN
Push button publishing
What’s IN
What’s IN
Automated comment and reviewer tracking
What’s IN
Automation for repetitive tasks…
• Entering content
• Managing DITA tags
• Standardizing terminology
• Entering taxonomies and indices
• Publishing to multiple outputs, even mobile
What’s IN
Content from application source code inserted in publications
Content Times
Business Rules
Parameter Descriptions
Works as advertised!
What’s IN
1. DITA supports automation
What’s IN
Think differently about content
What’s IN
Think beyond linear books …
What’s IN
Searchable, interconnected, interactive content delivered to any device
What’s IN
Spicing Up DITA With a Little
Automated delivery of the right content, to the right people, at the right time
What’s IN
What’s IN
DITA can blow you mind
What’s IN
2. DITA supports an ecosystem of dynamic, accessible content that is the basis of knowledge transference
Love the two INs
• Automate repetitive tasks
• Create an ecosystem of dynamic and accessible content
What’s IN
To get the IN things
• Tolerate what’s OUT
What’s OUT
Changes that require and investment of …
• Time
• Money
• Commitment
Need …
• Vision
• Stakeholder support
What’s OUT
What’s OUT
Make the business case 1. Identify the pains and drivers
2. Show how solving the pains adds to the bottom line
3. Show how DITA addresses the pains
4. Calculate the ROI
5. Support the benefits
–Surveys, metrics, case studies, estimates, budgets, and roadmaps
6. Do a pilot as proof of concept
7. Win stakeholder buy-in
8. Pitch to management
1. NOT making a strong business case
What’s OUT
Beware of potholes
What’s OUT
DITA is not a boxed product
What’s OUT
What’s OUT
DITA is about …
• Automation
• Creating an ecosystem of knowledge transference
Rather than working with one boxed product, work with a toolbox
What’s OUT
What’s OUT
Software products
• Content conversion
• Authoring
• Grammar checker
• Language control
• Content repository/version control
• Review workflow
• Content/XML rendering engine
• Output transforms
• Translation management
What’s OUT
People
• DITA aware project managers or advisors
• DITA aware writers, editors, illustrators, and publishers
• DITA aware software/web developers
• Information architects and strategists
• CMS advisors
• Process analysts and strategists
• Governance committee
• Trainers and mentors
• Help desk support
2. Trying to use DITA like a boxed product instead of a toolbox of helpful products and people
What’s OUT
Tolerate the two OUTs
• NOT making a strong business case
• Trying to use DITA like a boxed product
What’s OUT
Focus on vision
―What is the pain I am trying to solve and how would solving that pain add to the corporate bottom line?‖
Tips
• State the pains and benefits in a short, concise paragraph
• Make a presentation by following these steps
1. Show how solving the pains adds to the bottom line
2. Show how DITA addresses the pains
3. Calculate the ROI
4. Support the benefits
–Surveys, metrics, case studies, estimates, budgets, and roadmaps
5. Do a pilot as proof of concept
6. Win stakeholder buy-in
7. Pitch to management
Tips
Tips
A hammer is to the architect, as DITA is to your vision
Keep pilots small
• Under 50 pages
• No tricky features
• Default DITA OT output
Tips
Plan for simplicity
• Branded transform outputs
• Limited number of DITA tags and conditions
• Content structures
• Processes
Tips
Set expectations realistically
• DITA ripens over time
Tips
Every NO…
Just puts you on the long road to YES!
Tips
Top 10 INs
• Build vision first
• Know your business goals and requirements, then define success criteria
• Calculate ROI both before and after the pilot
• Track how you are holding to your original vision
• Simplify everything you can including brand formatting
• Separate roles for publishing, authoring, and editorial (indexing, linking, taxonomy)
• Automate anything that makes sense and adds ROI especially publishing to multiple output channels and translation
• Train your people and create a mentoring program
• Provide help desk support
• Promote DITA adoption as a process, not an event!
Top 10 OUTs
• The one and done attitude—instead of systems and teams evolving over time
• Fearing loss of control—instead of trusting your team members
• Siloing content—instead of sharing content across publications, products, and business units
• Book ownership—instead of topic ownership assigned by subject expertise
• Reviewing entire books—instead of reviewing topics within a subject area
• Converting unstructured content—instead of structuring content before conversion
• High-priced CCMS systems—instead of stealthy, lean native XML CCMS systems
• Using all the DITA element tags—instead of restricting the number of tags
• Creating output formats that limit search engine and device access to individual topics, such as PDF and some help outputs—instead of search engine and device friendly outputs, such as HTML
• Not valuing content as a corporate asset; after all, a lot of time and money goes into creating and maintaining it so it might as well be accessible and useful to the reader!
DITA changes
• How you view content
• How you work with it
And
• Could blow your mind!
Summary
Easy to Love Effort to Tolerate
Automation possibilities Developing the business case and gaining stakeholder support
Support for creating dynamic, accessible and intelligent content
Collecting a toolbox of helpful products and people with diverse skills to play on collaborative, cross-functional teams
Summary
Clear vision ensures implementation
Vision Exercise
The CEO has stated that he will fund any initiative that helps him address his major pain.
CEO Pain: Adoption rates of products/services are too low. They need to be raised.
Your Driver: Users can’t find getting started content.
Given experience with DITA and content management, What can you do positively effect the bottom line?
Vision Exercise
Vision Exercise
Make the content more accessible
–Reorganize content for clarity
–Apply an information model
–Create output that is searchable on the Internet
–Optimize content for SEO
–Create a user assistance portal
–Create output to mobile devices
–Provide feedback loops from users to authors
Any questions
925-956-4215
WWW.techprose.com
http://www.linkedin.com/in/paulatoth
Happy Authoring!