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Vol. 8, Issue 3
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November 2006
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LEAD STORIES: Preserving Ancient Ways with 21st Century Technology (Part 2)
When to Wiki, When to Blog - Is either ready for your business?
EXTRA:
DCL's "Digital Information" Survey: Detailed analysis and iPod winner announcement
Limited Time Offer - Life Sciences Survey
Upcoming DCL conference participation
OTHER NEWS:
SEC raises the XML ante with XBRL
Is print Dead? - they don't even want to talk about it
General Aviation goes digital
Video Game designers should limit their creativity?
ASIDES:
Lennon: "I've been an idiot. One should read the manual."
Real Life "Dilbert" Quotes
FAVORITES:
Popular articles from recent issues
New feature! QUOTE OF THE MONTH
LEAD STORIES
November 7, 2006: DCLnews
Last month DCLnews reported on the origins of a program to develop data conversion facilities on remote Native American reservations. This month we discuss the reality of creating these high-tech facilities in remote locations, and how the opportunities the program offered affected the tribes.
More...
November 7, 2006: DCLnews
For anyone disseminating information (and who isn't?) the current buzz is around Blogs (web-logs) and Wikis. But what are they? And are they for you? DCLnews takes a look at these new presentation methods and presents some guidelines on when you should use them.
More...
EXTRA
November 7, 2006: DCLnews
80% of Companies are making improvements to documentation process.
A detailed analysis of the results from the recent "digital information" survey carried out by DCL showed that 57% of organizations are already in the process of implementing process improvements while an additional 23% have plans to make changes.
>> Survey iPod Winner Announcement
More...
November 7, 2006: DCLnews
Are you in the Life Sciences industry? Enter to win an iPod Shuffle by taking our survey on documentation issues in the Pharmaceutical, Medical Devices, OTC, Vaccines, and other related Life Sciences markets. We've put together a survey on "Digital Information" and we would appreciate your input. It's a great way to understand what your peers are doing, what documentation related challenges you have, and what issues are important to you. The results will be announced in a audio conference on November 30th hosted by Foreign Exchange Translations and later in the December issue of DCLNews.
Besides gaining some basic benchmarking information, you can also win an iPod Shuffle. We'll be randomly selecting five winners from respondents who complete the 10-minute survey.
The survey is at http://www.dclab.com/ipod_survey.asp
and is available through November 17th.
November 7, 2006: DCLnews
Framemaker 2006 Chautauqua
November 8th to 10th, Austin, TX
DCL will be presenting a paper on Planning A Large Scale Conversion Project
http://www.travelthepath.com/conf/chautindex.html
OTHER NEWS
September 25, 2006: U.S. SEC
XML continues to make inroads into the world of high finance following an announcement by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that they will be awarding three contracts totaling $54 million to modernize the EDGAR (Electronic Data Gathering Analysis and Retrieval) public company disclosure system into a dynamic real-time, interactive search tool based on an XML application known as XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language - http://www.xbrl.org). With the new system the SEC joins the FDIC, the Federal Reserve, and the Comptroller of the Currency in the adoption of XBRL.
More...
Related topic: The SEC’s Plans to Reinvent EDGAR
September 22, 2006: Forbes.com
It's no secret blogs and news Web sites are killing print newspapers, but how sad is it when you can't even round up people to exploit your death throes? The New York Society of Security Analysts called off a breakfast seminar scheduled for this Wednesday due to "speaker unavailability." The title of the seminar? "Finding Value Series: Opportunities In The Newspaper Industry." To quote Austin Powers, "Ouch baby. Very ouch."
More...
October 6, 2006: Airport Business
Airport Business magazine reports that many general aviation pilots now have the opportunity to replace the paper documentation in the cockpit with digital versions loaded on the new eFlyBook developed by ARINC. The eFlyBook comes preloaded with several industry standard documents. The device can also accept uploads of PDF documents so aircraft manuals etc. can be easily added.
More...
September 25, 2006: Gamasutra
When running through alien landscapes blasting away at bug-eyed monsters we rarely give much thought to how a video game's story line was constructed, written or documented. Yet it's a major part of any game development project. A recent online article for game developers suggested that one way to approach story documentation, and stay focused, would be to adopt the Technical Writing techniques.
More...
ASIDES
November 7, 2006: DCLnews
At the recent opening of his new record label offices singer Sean Lennon, son of ex-Beatle John Lennon, declared his new found appreciation of Technical Manuals. Lennon said that as a kid he had what he felt was an intuitive understanding of machines and never bothered to read the owners manuals. It was an ex-girlfriend and band mate who suggested that he should try and read how things worked before using them. Lennon continued "So I did for this sampler that I bought, and it changed my life. I realized, my god, I've been an idiot. One should read the manual."
More...
November 7, 2006: DCLnews
Do you find yourself nodding your head in silent recognition when you read the Dilbert comic strip? Is his cube dwelling life all too familiar? Well you aren't alone. A recent survey asked readers to submit their favorite examples of real life Dilbert style management quotations. These gems of management insight were among the top submissions:
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As of tomorrow, employees will only be able to access the building using individual security cards. Pictures will be taken next Wednesday, and employees will receive their cards in two weeks.
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What I need is an exact list of specific unknown problems we might encounter.
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E-mail is not to be used to pass on information or data. It should be used only for company business.
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This project is so important we can't let things that are more important interfere with it.
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Doing it right is no excuse for not meeting the schedule.
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No one will believe you solved this problem in one day! We've been working on it for months. Now go act busy for a few weeks and I'll let you know when it's time to tell them.
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Teamwork is a lot of people doing what I say.
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We know that communication is a problem, but the company is not going to discuss it with the employees.
QUOTE OF THE MONTH
"How does a project get to be a year behind schedule? One day at a time."
--Fred Brooks, |
Author of The Mythical Man-Month |
U.S. software engineer and computer scientist |
FAVORITES
November 7, 2006
21st Century Tech Preserving Ancient Ways
http://www.dclab.com/21st_century_tech.asp
Converting From PDF To XML & MS Word:
Avoiding The Pitfalls
http://www.dclab.com/converting_from_pdf.asp
New S1000D Specification Fuels Content Reuse and IETMs
http://www.dclab.com/S1000D_Standard_Interview.asp
Virtual Exercises Beef Up Your Biceps...
http://www.dclab.com/aside_biceps.asp
Quark to XML Conversion
http://www.dclab.com/QuarktoXML.asp
Adobe PDF Conversion: How, For Whom, And When?
http://www.dclab.com/pdfwhitepaper2.asp
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DCLnews Staff
Publisher:
Mark Gross, President DCL
Editor:
Alan J. Porter, 4J's Group LLC.
Data Conversion Laboratory, Inc.
61-18 190th St., 2nd Floor
Fresh Meadows, NY 11365
Telephone: 718-357-8700
Website: www.dclab.com
Editorial: dclnews@dclab.com
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Ultramain User Conference 2008, Albuquerque, NM, May 11-15, 2008. More…
PTC User Long Beach, CA, June 2-4, 2008. More…
Mark Logic User San Francisco, CA, June 10-12, 2008. More…
X-Pubs London, England, June 22-24, 2008. More…
Doc Train Life Sciences Indianapolis, IN, June 23-25, 2008. More…
Best Practices Santa Fe, NM, September 15-17, 2008. More…
XyUser Phoenix, AZ, September 22-24, 2008. More…
9th Annual Vasont Users' Group Meeting, Hershey, PA, October 6-8, 2008. More…
DITA/TECHCOMM 2008, Raleigh, NC, November 3-6 2008. More…
ATA e-Business Europe. Details TBA.
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Documentation and Training West 2008 Vancouver, BC, May 6-9, 2008. More…
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CMS/DITA Santa Clara, CA, April 7-9, 2008. More…
DIA Med Comm Orlando, FL, March 10-11, 2008. More…
DIA EDM Philadelphia, PA, February 5-7, 2008. More…
Gilbane Boston Conference Boston, MA, November 29, 2007. More…
The LavaCon Conference on Advanced Technical Communication and Project Management New Orleans, LA, October 27-30, 2007. More…
2007 ATA e-Business Forum Miami, Florida, Oct 17-19, 2007. More…
DITA 2007™-East, Raleigh, North Carolina, October 4-6, 2007. More…
2007 XyUser Group Fall Conference, Boston, MA, Sept 23-26, 2007. More…
Mark Logic 2007 User Conference, San Francisco, CA, May 15-17, 2007. More…
Content Management Strategies/DITA North America
Conference 2007, Boston, MA, March 26-28, 2007. More…
DIA 18th Annual Workshop,
San Diego, CA. March 4-7, 2007. More…
DIA 2007 EDM & CDM Conference, Philadelphia, PA, Feb 6 - 8, 2007. More…
DITA 2007 – West, San Jose, CA, February 5-7, 2007. More…
Framemaker 2006 Chautauqua, Austin, TX, Nov 8-10, 2006. More…
PTC/User World Event 2006, Grapevine, TX, June 4-6. More…
19th Annual DIA Conference Philadelphia, PA, February 7-9. More…
XyUser's Conference, San Diego, California, September 11-14. DCL's Don Bridges delivered a presentation on "Content Reuse" More…
Structured Product Labeling, Washington, DC, August 23-24. More…
Tri-XML 2005, Raleigh, NC , July 28. DCL's Don Bridges delivered a presentation on "Content Reuse" More…
Pharmaceutical Labeling and Product Identification, Whippany, NJ, June 16-17. DCL's Don Bridges delivered a presentation on "Structured Product Labeling (SPL) and the Implications of Implementing an XML Solution." More…
More…
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