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Author: Jake Campbell

Podcast Podcast transcript

DITA: The next generation (podcast)

In episode 83 of The Content Strategy Experts podcast, Gretyl Kinsey and Jake Campbell talk about the next generation of DITA. What happens when you need to update your existing DITA structure?

“When you’re building everything out the first time around, you can do as much user acceptance testing as you want—but the best user acceptance testing is going to be live testing.”

—Jake Campbell

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Webinar

InDesign and DITA (webinar)

Jake Campbell talks about how you can utilize automated processes in a high-design environment.

“When we’re looking at high-design, we have a focus on form. When we’re looking at automated workflows, we’re looking at a focus on the content itself.”

—Jake Campbell

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DITA Tools

DITA to InDesign: getting your paragraph styles in order

Getting your DITA content into a high-design format like InDesign is a tricky prospect. The biggest stumbling block is the fact that there is no intrinsic link between your ICML and the template that you flow it into. In the end, your InDesign template (you’re using one, right?) is the most important part of a DITA to ICML workflow; it contains the actual styles that will control how your output appears.

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Reviews

Pokémon GO and community documentation

Yes, I'm playing.

Yes, I’m playing.

Even if you aren’t twitchily checking your phone and resisting the urge to run outside to catch a Pikachu or Gyrados, you’ve probably heard all about the phenomenon of Pokémon GO. One of the most common criticisms of the game is that the in-app documentation is sparse at best. In response, the community banded together and began to document their theories and findings. You can readily find articles covering “eeveelutions,” theories on how to more easily capture Pokémon, and how to capture opposing gyms. It hearkens back to a time of meeting up in schoolyards to swap tips and rumors.

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DITA Tools

SubjectScheme explained

Your project is coming along nicely. You have your workflow ready, your style guides are composed, and things are looking up. However, you have complex metadata needs that are starting to cause problems. You need a way to ensure that authors are only using valid attribute values, and that your publication pipeline isn’t going to suffer. This is a situation that calls for a subjectScheme.

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