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E x t r a: O t h e r N e w s: A s i d e s: F a v o r i t e s: LEAD STORIES New S1000D specification fuels content reuse and IETMsDec 7th, 2004, DCLnewsDennis Raitz, co-chair of the Technical Publications Specifications Maintenance Group (TPSMG) and tech fellow at Boeing, talks to DCLnews about the new S1000D documentation standard used by the military, aerospace, and industry - and how it powers content reuse and Interactive Electronic Technical Manuals (IETMs).
Content reuse slashes costs of Standard Operation Procedures (SOPs)Dec 7th, 2004, DCLnews
Reusing and harmonizing content not only makes it easier to conform with FDA rules, it also slashes costs, writes Chris Whalley of digital publishing firm Doxpub, in a special guest article for DCLnews. EXTRA 50% of technical data is "wasted words"Dec 7th, 2004, DCLnews
New research at Data Conversion Laboratory (DCL) finds that more than 50% of data in corporate and government technical manuals and other documents is literally "wasted words". The firm analyzed documents over a range of industries, including aerospace, pharmaceutical, and defense - and found much of the content was duplicated. "Our research reveals that most document collections contain more than 50% redundancy," says Mark Gross, president of DCL. "This means organizations are maintaining twice as much content as they need to - at twice the expense." The DCL research found a 83.1% level of redundancy in one aerospace company’s maintenance manuals, and 68.3% in a pharmaceutical firm’s product data. To find out if you are carrying more data than you need to, DCL is offering a "Content Reuse Assessment." The service quickly reveals just how much data is redundant and measures the return-on-investment potential you would get from implementing a content reuse strategy. "Our new tools and services are unique," says Gross, "in that they allow you to gain accurate metrics on what has only been discussed anecdotally in the past - i.e. how much money can be saved in corporate and government documentation by cutting out wasted words."
New XML resource page from DCL - get the complete lowdownDec 7th, 2004, DCLnews
Need to get the lowdown on XML? If you're a beginner, DCL's new XML Resources page brings you the all the basics. If you're an expert, it brings you articles on converting PDF to XML, how it is used in technical, educational, and newspaper publishing, and how it is a key driver of content reuse. And much more! OTHER NEWS Pentagon building "war web" with eye in the skyNov 14, 2004, ABC News Online
The Pentagon calls this new secure network the Global Information Grid (GIG). It was conceived six years ago and the first connections were laid a couple of months back. It is expected to take two decades, and hundreds of billions of dollars, to build the war network and its components. Critics say the cost will be astronomical. But advocates say it will be worth the huge sums involved because the network will become one of the most powerful weapons in the U.S. arsenal. Vint Cerf, one of the inventors of the Internet and a consultant to the Pentagon on the project, is more concerned that the project keeps its feet on the ground. He told the New York Times: "I want to make sure what we realize is vision and not hallucination."
New York Library predicts e-book futureNov 10th, 2004, News8Austin
The New York Public Library (NYPL) has become the latest of just a handful of public libraries throughout the U.S. to offer e-books for lending. Around 3,000 titles are currently available for download onto your PC, laptop, PDA, or cell phone. Patrons can borrow up to ten e-books at a time, which are available in Adobe Reader or Mobi Pocket Reader formats. Michael Ciccone of NYPL sees the adoption of e-books as a way of keeping the library relevant to the 21st century. He also expects other libraries to follow suit. "The library is trying to anticipate a need [for e-books] in the future and is trying to build the infrastructure for that. [And] when the New York Public Library does something, the rest of the country will look at it and say, 'oh, better get on the bandwagon," he says.
Content reuse is more than multichannel publishing, says content management guruNov 1st, Transform
In a recent article in Transform magazine, content management guru Ann Rockley said content reuse is now a key part of managing content - and that multi-channel publishing for the web, print, and wireless content is just not enough. "The biggest payoff lies in reusing content objects in many types of documents, for many different uses and in every publishing channel," she said. Rockley cited brochures, technical manuals, training materials, troubleshooting guides and positioning papers as prime candidates for content reuse. "Done right," she said, "content reuse can dramatically change the way you do business, giving you a strategic edge over companies using traditional content creation and management methods. Next time you think reuse, think object-oriented reuse, not just multichannel publishing."
"Topic maps" make searches smarter
Nov 30th, 2004, Wired News
Databases and search engines provide instant access to information about anyone or anything. The only problem is, search results nearly always bring as many misses as hits. To generate more relevant answers, organizations - including the federal government - are using "topic maps" to index their data. Topic maps categorize search terms based on their relationships with other information. So "William Shakespeare", for example, would be mapped to essays about him, his plays, and famous quotes. Without topic mapping, searching Google for "Franz Ferdinand", for example, would bring results for the rock band and the Austrian archduke. With topic maps, the musical and historical links would be separated. The IRS is currently using topic maps to compare its data with that of the Social Security Administration. Michael Biezunski of InfoLoom helped write the topic maps specification that was passed by the International Organization for Standardization. He says several U.S. Department of Defense agencies are building topic maps, and that the legal and pharmaceutical industries will be the next ones to index their data. "We are only at the beginning of adoption," he adds.
Content reuse brings big savings for boat engine firm
Dec 1st, Transform
This changed when Mercury Marine implemented a content management system from Vasont Systems, which lets the firm build content objects that can be reused for more than one product line and document type. Crucially the objects can be translated into multiple languages. Mercury Marine now has one year's worth of owner's manuals and related service documents under centralized management, and according to the firm's technical literature department, the new system paid for itself in less than one year through savings on translation alone. Data Conversion Laboratory (DCL) had a hand in Mercury Marine's new system. "We converted owner's manuals from Interleaf to XML with a content DTD," says DCL's Don Bridges. "Data was converted at paragraph level into chunks in order to enable extensive content reuse. This was done in English as well as in a dozen or so other languages."
STM open access costly for universities, says UK minister
Dec 3rd, 2004, Cordis News
The system of open access to published research, a controversial topic previously discussed in DCLnews, would be costly for both universities and the government, according to British science minister Lord Sainsbury.The UK Parliament's Select Committee on Science and Technology has been campaigning for scientific research results to be made freely available in libraries and universities. Members argue that the current system sees libraries and other institutions with limited resources struggling to pay high subscription fees, while scientific publishers' profit margins remain exceptionally high. Lord Sainsbury, however, believes the system proposed by the committee would be detrimental to universities. Around ten per cent of publication costs are currently met by the private sector through subscription payments. Under a free access system, all costs would have to be met by the government and universities, he said. "Would the alternative system of open access actually provide a cheaper system for universities and researchers? There is no evidence for this; in fact it is almost certainly the other way round," Lord Sainsbury said in a UK parliament question time debate. Unlike Britain, Denmark has made a nationwide commitment to open access for the biomedical research it funds. All universities, hospitals and other research institutes in the country became BioMed Central members in October. The membership agreement covers the cost of publication, in BioMed Central's 120 Open Access journals, for all publicly funded researchers and teachers in Denmark.
Read DCLnews coverage of the open access debate:
War front mail call is now instantaneous
Nov 22nd, 2004, Bend Bulletin
In a January survey he conducted among 400 military members, Moskos found that at least two-thirds of them use e-mail at least once a week. To Brian Paul, a 22-year-old Marine who has been deployed to Iraq twice, being able to use the Internet regularly helped span the distance between Iraq and home. He got to see his nephew in a digital photo just hours after he had been born, and sent his own photos from Iraq. "It made a big difference," Paul said. "Any communication you can have from home when you're that far away is a good thing."
ASIDES Sympathy for the docoholic technical writer...Dec 7th, 2004, DCLnews
Natalie Dyen says she loves her job to the point that she "even speaks in bulleted lists". But complains she gets no respect. When she tells people what she does for a living, one of the following happens:
Have some sympathy at:http://www.nataliewrites.com/techwriter.htm FAVORITES Popular articles from recent issuesDecember 7th, DCLnews
Converting From PDF To XML & MS Word: Avoiding The Pitfalls STM open access: Point-counterpoint (interviews)
Adobe PDF Conversion: How, For Whom, And When?
Quark to XML Conversion
S1000D standard to revolutionize content reuse in defense documentation
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The Pentagon is building its own Internet to give U.S. commanders and troops a satellite video picture - what Lockheed’s Robert Stevens calls a "god’s eye view" - of all enemies and threats. "This Internet in the sky would allow marines in a Humvee, in a faraway land, in the middle of a rainstorm, to open up their laptops, request imagery from a spy satellite, and get it downloaded in seconds," Peter Teets, under secretary of the Air Force, told Congress last month.
Mercury Marine's boat engines come with a heavy documentation load, including service manuals, parts catalogs and other owner and dealer publications. What's more, they come in print and online versions, and in 15 foreign languages. Up until 18th months ago delivering those documents was no easy matter – mainly because Mercury Marine was using a legacy Interleaf publishing system and it could not produce some of the foreign languages.
E-mails - along with instant messaging, and weblogs - are taking over from handwritten letters for soldiers on the war front. Whereas letters took weeks or even months to arrive, news from home is now just a click away. "The [e-mail] threshold has been crossed," says Charles Moskos, a military sociologist at Northwestern University. "Having ready access to families and friends is a strong morale booster for troops and their loved ones.".
The Rolling Stones once made quite a case for sympathizing with the Devil himself. Not easy work being the lord of darkness, I'm sure. But no rock band has ever asked us to have sympathy for the plight of the humble technical writer, whose work arguably is a lot harder.Which might be why one tech author has bared her soul online.
Content Management Strategies/DITA North America 2010 Conference,
2010 ATA e-Business Forum,