mapping the content ecosystem
DESCRIPTION
Education Day Seminar Presented to STC Southwestern Ontario Chapter in 2005 featuring the Information Management ModelTRANSCRIPT
©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Mapping the Content Ecosystem
Single-sourcing and the Information Management
Model
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Session Objectives Defining the Issues of Single-
Sourcing Separating Information from
Content Building Content from a Single
Source Wrapping Up
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Session Format Introductions Guided discussion Jump in with your questions
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
About the Speaker Rob Hanna is a Senior Technical Writer at International Financial
Data Services (IFDS) where he is responsible for user documentation for their suite of software solutions for the financial services sector.
Hanna has been writing professionally across several industries since 1990. He has also enjoyed writing for many different types of audiences. Starting from a background in aviation, his career lead from writing reports and operation guides for municipal airports to the role of production editor for one of Canada's largest circulating aviation periodicals.
In 1997 his career began to take more of a focus on writing than aviation as he stepped off into the role of technical writer for CAE Electronics. Soon software engineering began to play a more prevalent role in the types of documents Hanna was responsible for. Since leaving CAE in 2001, Hanna has worked for two other information technology groups at Entrust Technologies and Canadian Tire before joining IFDS in Toronto.
Hanna is a Senior Member of the Society for Technical Communications and a very active participant in the local technical writing community. In 2002, Hanna was instrumental in forming the Toronto STC Single-Sourcing SIG. Since then, the SIG has grown from a small clutch to a mailing list in excess of 70 members.
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Section 1 Defining the Issues of Single-
Sourcing
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
What is Single-Sourcing? “…create and store reusable
content within a single source, and deliver that content to any number of multi-channel information products.” Ann Rockley – Managing Enterprise
Content 2003
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
What is Single-Sourcing? “A documentation method whereby
multiple deliverables differing in content and/or format can be created from a single-definitive source of information. These deliverables can be systematically recreated and the content reused without ever modifying the source.” Sean Brierley – STC Single-Sourcing SIG 2002
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
What is Single-Sourcing? “A combination of planning,
writing, and tools that lets you create a single content repository, then use that repository to create a variety of deliverables.” Sanders - 2002
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
What is Single-Sourcing? “Single-sourcing is any process
used to systematically create information products from a single defined source of information.” Hanna, Hills, and Marques – Single-
Sourcing Deconstructed 2003
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
What it isn’t? Why it isn’t strictly about
automation Why it isn’t strictly about reuse
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Why Single-Source Single-sourcing will…
Improve the consistency of information
Save on maintenance and customization efforts
Improve the quality of the content Require significant upfront planning
and investment
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
When to Single-Source Consider a single-sourcing project if…
The document is deliverable to clients or is tied directly to a product or service
The document has a long life expectancy Many updates can be expected over time Several variants may exist at any one time Parts of the document are reused elsewhere
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
10 “Problems”with Single-Sourcing
Adds a New Level of Information Management Emphasizes Specialization over Generalization Adds Unnecessary Overhead Involves Tools and Technologies Unrelated to
Writing Uses Small Strictly Defined Units of Text Further Separates Appearance from Content Requires a Migration Effort Introduces Stressful Change Requires Data Management Skills Costs Significant Time to Correct Small Mistakes
Presented at 51st Annual STC Conference by
Heather Hull, MotiveDave M. Yeates, Texas Tech
University
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Evolution of Single-Sourcing First Stage: Content Repurposing Second Stage: Content Reuse Third Stage: Content Management Fourth Stage: …
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
What’s holding us back? Exponential Increase of Cost
Tool Acquisition Vendor Support Consulting Services
Adoption of Change Going Beyond the Point of No
Return
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
What’s needed? Standards
Without standards, every implementation is different
Tools cannot be successfully developed Lack of standards breeds discord
Other industries manage single-sourcing with standards Software Manufacturing
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Developing a Standard In auto manufacturing,
engineers have long accepted the premise of reuse of standardized components and don’t reinvent the wheel each time
If it were left up to us, we’d still be fighting traffic in a horse and buggy
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Section 2 Separating Information from
Content
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
What is content management? Records Management Document Management Web Content Management Content Management Knowledge Management
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Managing the Content Metadata Ownership Scope Traceability
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Modelling Content Unified Content Strategy
Reuse Maps Information Mapping
Procedure Process Structure Concept Principle Fact Classification
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Modelling Content Darwin Information Typing
Architecture Topic (Base)
Task Reference Concept
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Modelling the Product Cycle Separation of Content from
Information Information vs Presentation Layers Differences are subtle but
significant
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Information Lives And it dies a thousand deaths Content is static
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Section 3 Building Content from a Single
Source
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Information Objects
Output: Information ProductInput: Information ObjectRepository: Information Core
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
123
Single-Sourcing Objects
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Building Traceability
12
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
The Content Ecosystem
Requirement
Design
Specification
Physical Capital
Resource
Task
Skill
Human Capital
Concept
Rules
Action
Result
Intellectual Capital
Objective
The BusinessWhy?
Who? How? What?
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
The Information Types 1 Objective 2 Resource 3 Task 4 Skill 5 Concept 6 Rule 7 Action 8 Result 9 Requirement 10 Design 11 Specification
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Wrapping Up
Section 4
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
ITIL Process Document
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Software Requirements
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Intranet
Mapping the Content Ecosystem©2005 R.Hanna, Southwestern Ontario STC Education Seminar
Other Resources Information Management Model Whitepaper
(http://www.ascan.ca/stc/imm_whitepaper.pdf) Single-Sourcing Deconstructed
(http://www.stctoronto.org/meetings/mtg-2003-03.htm)
Toronto STC Single-Sourcing SIG (http://www.stctoronto.org/sigs)
Or for more information, contact:
(416) 723-4183