| Vol.
4, Issue 3 |
March
12th 2002 |
HEADLINES
 COVER
STORY
Oil-well giant
Schlumberger
harnesses
XML power
SPECIAL REPORT
The
knowledge economy and how XML
is set to play a major role
in shaping it
WORKING
WITH DCL - TECH DOCS
Tech
doc account manager gives inside story
EXTRA!
DCL
Library gets thumbs-up from ContentBlog ezine
New FAQ:
which should I start with - XML or SGML?
Free
newsletter for aviation pros and flyers
OTHER
NEWS
UK
students turning to electronic sources for information
E-books
go down a storm with senior
surfers
DoD
tool key driver in government e-learning
Vision
of an e-book revolution
Info at hand
for medics
ASIDES
;-)
Flight insanity?
Irish drinkers cry "blasphemy!"
BEST
OF DCL-NEWS
Check Out The Best Stories From
Previous Issues
COVER
STORY:
TECH DOCS DOWN THE
WELL...
Oil
giant Schlumberger harnesses XML power
Date: 3/12/2002,
DCLnews
Exclusive
 When
oil services giant Schlumberger
decided to set up an XML
publishing system and covert
their business-critical documents to XML, they had a problem
on their hands. Each of the firm's bases around the world was
using its own custom-built publishing system; plus a lot of
the material that needed converting was legacy data and a good
deal of that was on paper - all of which demanded a mammoth
inventory of materials and a huge job of standardization...
 Find
out how the documentation
team at Schlumberger overcame the problem at:
http://www.dclab.com/schlumberger.asp
Table
of Contents
SPECIAL REPORT:
THE NEW KNOWLEDGE
ECONOMY AND HOW XML IS SET TO PLAY A KEY ROLE IN SHAPING IT
Date: 3/12/2002,
DCLnews
Special Report
 In
his new book, The
Wealth of Knowledge, top business journalist Thomas Stewart
argues that companies can make untold millions of dollars (or
equivalent currency) by managing
knowledge more effectively. As chance would have it, the realization
of the importance of knowledge to the corporation came at the
same time as the emergence of XML as a tool to organize
knowledge. Commenting on this, Mark Gross, president of Data
Conversion Laboratory, said: "XML ties right into making
intellectual capital more valuable into the 21st century..."
Read
more at:
www.dclab.com/wealth_knowledge.asp
Table
of Contents
WORKING
WITH DATA CONVERSION LABORATORY:
THE TECH
DOC PERSPECTIVE...
DCL tech doc account manager rejects 'canned' presentations in favor of getting to
the roots of a client's conversion needs...
Date: 3/12/2002, DCLnews
For Don Bridges,
account manager for technical documents at Data Conversion Laboratory,
life can be hectic. He likes to meet prospective clients face-to-face
and so his job demands a fair degree of travel. But he doesn't
rely on the usual laptop presentation routine, still in vogue
with the majority of companies today...
Find
out why at:
http://www.dclab.com/profile_donbridges.asp
Table
of Contents
>>>EXTRA!!!
DCL
LIBRARY GETS THUMBS-UP FROM CONTENT-BLOG
Date: 3/12/2002, DCLnews
Anne Holland, editor of the ContentBlog
ezine, gave the thumbs up to the DCL
Library recently, recommending readers visit the popular
resource with their document conversion questions.
New
material is added all the time, so stop by regularly...
http://www.dclab.com/dcllibrary.asp
Table
of Contents
THIS
MONTH'S FEATURED FAQ:
"Forget
the mumbo jumbo: just tell me - which
should I start with, XML or SGML?"
Mike Gross,
DCL's Chief Technical Officer, was challenged by a reader this
month to "cut the technical mumbo jumbo" and answer
the following question: which should I start with - XML vs. SGML?
Find
out how Mike rose to the challenge at:
http://www.dclab.com/dclfaq.asp#xmlvsgml
Table
of Contents
FREE
NEWSLETTER FOR AVIATION PROS AND FLYERS
Date: 3/12/2002, DCLnews
 If you work in the commercial aviation business (or are a frequent
flier), we've found a FREE newsletter you may find useful. It's
called the ATA SmartBrief,
and is published by the Air
Transport
Association. It's a no-cost daily newsletter that focuses on up-to-the-minute
commercial aviation
issues under the topics of Company Watch, Regulatory Update, and Industry
Trends.
Put
on your flying goggles and check it out at:
http://www.smartbrief.com/ata/
Table
of Contents
OTHER
NEWS:
STUDENTS
TURNING TO ELECTRONIC SOURCES FOR INFORMATION, BRITISH
SURVEY REVEALS...
Date: 2/25/2002,
UK Guardian Unlimited
A
survey of three hundred British college students found that
63 percent would turn to the internet for information rather
than buying books, and 22 percent would use e-books.
Linda Bennett, the market researcher who carried out the survey,
said: "Students want electronic delivery, particularly law
students, who resent buying new editions of course books every
year that only have very tiny, but important changes. Electronic
books would be more useful in that they could be updated online."
Not only that,
but electronic books are lightweight and don't take up bag room.
Whether on CD or downloaded to a handheld device, students can
carry them in a pocket or small bag - which has got to be better
than lugging a knapsack around, full of weighty print text books.
Another bonus is, e-textbooks have search facilities, so there's
no more tearing your hair out trying to locate a reference you
forgot to make a note of.
Read more about
the UK survey
at Guardian
Unlimited
Do
you publish e-textbooks? If so, DCLnews
would like to hear from you for future stories. E-mail DCLnews
editorial at: DCLnews@dclab.com
Table
of Contents
E-BOOKS
GO DOWN A STORM WITH SENIOR SURFERS
Head of American Publishers
Association may be mistaken - seniors are getting to grips with
computers and e-books...
Date: 3/4/2002, DCLnews/Yahoo!
News
 At
this year's annual meeting of the Association
of American Publishers (AAP), the discussion turned to e-books.
And the association's head, Patricia Schroeder, revealed
that she couldn't bring herself to try the new format. "Can
I label myself a creature of habit?" she asked. "I'm
61 years old and think this is going to be harder for people
like me to change..."
She may well be mistaken. Many
of her peers are taking to both the internet and to e-books.
Take the Newbie
Club website, which helps new computer users get to grips
with PCs and the web under the slogan:
Hey,
I'm a Newbie not a Dummy. Just show me HOW!
"The vast majority of our audience
is over 55," says Joe Robson, co-founder of the Newbie Club.
"Not only do they buy a lot of our e-books [written by
Robson and others], but some have gone on to write their own
and sell them over the web - yet they had never even
used a computer before retiring at 60!"
Read
more about the Association
of American Publishers recent annual meeting at Yahoo!
News
Visit
the Newbie Club website at: www.newbieclub.com
Table
of Contents
DOD
TOOL KEY DRIVER IN GROWTH OF GOVERNMENT E-LEARNING
Date: 2/25/2002, Potomac
Tech Journal
An interoperability tool developed
by Department
of Defense researchers at laboratories in Alexandria, Va.,
has become a key driver in the growth of government e-learning.
The tool, called Sharable Content Object Reference Model,
or SCORM, allows companies to develop and share e-learning products
on any computer platform.
The government stipulates that
would-be e-learning contractors adapt their products to the
system. The number of companies doing so is growing fast. Considering
that the federal government is one of the largest
employers in the nation and is continuously training and
re-training its workers, this is not surprising (it's a lucrative
market). But the level of take up reveals something more: It's
another sign that we have entered a new world, where knowledge
is the leading currency.
Click
here to catch the story.
Discover
more about "intellectual capital" at:
www.dclab.com/wealth_knowledge.asp
Table
of Contents
VISION
OF AN E-BOOK REVOLUTION - SCI FI OR REALITY?
Glenn
Sanders of eBookWeb sees a very bright future for e-books...
Date:
1/23/2002, Electronic Book Web
Glenn Sanders, Director
of the Electronic Publishing Resource Center (EPRC), has posted
a powerful vision of the near future, in which e-books
and e-publications are ubiquitous, and integrated with networks
and the web, and viewable in many mediums, including "wearable"
computers.
"I firmly believe and
know," states Sanders, "that e-books and e-publishing,
or more generally information devices, will play a primary role
in the way that people write, create, design, read, learn, access news and information,
communicate, interact, travel, enjoy art and entertainment,
and experience their world..."
Is
Sanders vision rooted in reality? Or is the e-book revolution he
envisages in the realms of Science Fiction? Judge for yourself, go to:
[Link no longer available]
Table
of Contents
INFO
AT HAND FOR MEDICS
New product from Ovid lets medical professionals download vital
information to PDAs
Date: 3/4/2002, Ovid.com
 A new product from Ovid
Technologies, called Ovid@Hand,
allows medical professionals to download vital information
to their hand held computers, or PDAs. Ovid touts the product
as an "ideal point-of-care resource for drug information."
Doctors on hospital wards can record clinical questions on a
PDA. Then when they later sync with their main computer, a
search is ordered, and full-text articles are retrieved.
More than anything else, what
this product does is add greater value to online libraries
- in that key information can be accessed on the move or "on
the job."
Click
here to find out more
Table
of Contents
ASIDES
;-)
A
Lighter Look at the News>>>
FLIGHT INSANITY?
New
book says 2 percent of the traveling public are insane
Date: 2/13/2002, New
York Times
Flight attendant and syndicated
columnist, Elliott Hester, has come to the conclusion
that 2 percent of the traveling public are certifiably
insane. In his hilarious new book, Plane
Insanity: A Flight Attendant's Tales of Sex, Rage, and Queasiness
at 30,00 feet (2002, St Martins Press), he relates tales
of full-blown passenger brawls, passenger stampedes, a stressed-flyer's
attempt to open the emergency exit six miles above the Atlantic,
and a high-altitude robbery in which $500,000 was stolen on
a 727 - along with tales of those attempting to join the infamous
"mile-high club."
Click
here to get a ticket for the crazy plane...
Table
of Contents
FAST
BEER BLASPHEMY
Irish drinkers
give thumbs down to speeding up pouring time of Guinness stout...
Date:
2/25/2002, Yahoo! News
 In a bid to revive declining
sales the makers of Guinness stout, Ireland's national
tipple, are testing a new pouring system, which they say will
slash the waiting time on a pint to 15-25 seconds, from the
traditional 2 minutes.
Irish drinkers responded with
cries of "Blasphemy!" The reason was explained by
Richard Donovan, manager of
a bar in downtown Dublin: "You pull a pint (of Guinness)
for an Irishman and he expects to wait. If you pull one in less
than a minute, he'll say 'where the hell did you drag that one
from.'"
Click
here for a pint of the black stuff...
Table
of Contents
Best
of DCLnews:
 Read through a selection of the best articles from previous
issues of DCLnews. You'll find articles on
e-books, technology, Internet, data conversion, and digital
publishing, as well as humorous looks at the news.
Go to: www.dclab.com/bestof.asp
Table
of Contents
| DCLnews
Staff::
Editor: John
E. Shreeve
Publisher: Mark Gross, President DCL
Data Conversion Laboratory
61-18 190th St., 2nd Floor
Fresh Meadows, NY 11365
Telephone:
718-357-8700
Website: http://www.dclab.com/DCLnews.asp
Editorial
e-mail: DCLnews@dclab.com
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