Out of the box, the DITA Open Toolkit (OT) looks like it’s localization-ready. It handles the XML attribute xml:lang. It contains strings for more than 50 localizations. So it would seem that all you have to do is specify the language in your DITA files and maps and you’re good to go…or are you? In this webcast, I’ll discuss some of the issues Scriptorium has encountered while generating localized output from the DITA Open Toolkit—and how we solved them.
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XML and DITA
Webcast: Localization and the DITA Open Toolkit
September 14th, 2011 by Simon Bate
Localization and the DITA Open Toolkit
August 22nd, 2011 by Simon Bate
Read in PDF 
(205 KB, 15 pages)
Out of the box, the DITA Open Toolkit (OT) looks like it’s localization-ready. It handles the XML attribute xml:lang. It contains strings for more than 50 localizations. So it would seem that all you have to do is specify the language in your DITA files and maps and you’re good to go…or are you?
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Webcast: DITA OT essentials
July 27th, 2011 by Simon Bate
In this webcast, Simon Bate provides a “gentle introduction” to the DITA Open Toolkit (OT), the standard way to generate deliverables from DITA documents. This presentation shows how anyone can install the OT. A tour of the contents and how the plugin architecture works is included.
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FrameMaker, DITA, xrefs: I could tell you, but…
July 8th, 2011 by Simon Bate
Modifying FrameMaker cross-reference formats: it’s basic and one of the cool things about FrameMaker. But not if you’re editing DITA files using FrameMaker 9 or 10.
Early-bird discount on our Structured Authoring report
June 27th, 2011 by Alan Pringle
Can’t decide whether structured authoring is right for your organization? Curious about the costs and necessary effort? Our latest publication, The State of Structured Authoring, is for you.
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Inside the DITA Open Toolkit
May 18th, 2011 by Simon Bate
The DITA Open Toolkit (OT) is the standard way to generate deliverables from DITA documents. To the casual user, the OT may seem intimidating, but in reality, it’s fairly easy to download, install, and run.
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Calculating the ROI of DITA
April 29th, 2011 by Sarah O'Keefe
The Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) provides an XML architecture for technical communication. Although implementing DITA is likely to be faster and easier than building your own XML architecture from the ground up, DITA is not suitable for everyone. (more…)
It’s not easy being…clean
March 21st, 2011 by Sarah O'Keefe
published in STC Intercom, March 2011
A standards-based workflow is challenging. This article discusses the issues with DITA (an XML standard for technical communication content) and XSL-FO (Extensible Stylesheet Language Formatting Objects, a standard used to create PDF from XML (http://www.w3.org/standards/xml/publishing).
Webcast: DITA Best Practices
March 11th, 2011 by ScriptoriumTech
In this webcast hosted by Scriptorium, author Tony Self discusses his new book, The DITA Style Guide, and how it fits into a DITA workflow. (more…)
Webhelp for DITA
February 11th, 2011 by Simon Bate
A few weeks ago my esteemed colleague, David Kelly, published a blog post about his DITA Open Toolkit (OT) plugin that simplifies the customization of PDF output. In the post, David mentioned that I would soon be writing about a plugin to provide HTML-based web help. I found a bit of time to write about Scriptorium Help, so here is that post.
Webcast: Attractive DITA: it is possible!
February 8th, 2011 by Sarah O'Keefe
In this webcast, Sarah O’Keefe discusses the challenges of getting attractive output from DITA and demonstrates Scriptorium’s approach to web-based help and PDF.
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Webcast: Calculating the ROI for XML and DITA topic-based authoring
January 10th, 2011 by Sarah O'Keefe
In this webcast, Sarah O’Keefe discusses how to calculate the return on investment of an XML/DITA implementation for technical content.
If you are considering XML and DITA, but are trying to figure out whether you can justify the cost and effort, this session is for you.
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Conquering the Mark of the Web (DITA OT version)
December 22nd, 2010 by Simon Bate
Whew! Now I know how St. George felt after slaying the dragon. I’ve defeated the Mark of the Web beast and have lived to tell about it.
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Webcast: XSL techniques for XML-to-XML transformations
October 6th, 2010 by Simon Bate
In this webcast, Simon Bate leads viewers through the key steps in using XSL (extensible stylesheet language) to perform XML-to-XML conversions, a process that differs from more traditional XML-to-PDF and XML-to-HTML conversions.
Webcast: Extracting deliverables from DITA
August 18th, 2010 by Sarah O'Keefe
In this webcast, Sarah O’Keefe of Scriptorium surveys DITA’s publishing options and weighs their practical implications.
Webcast: DITA Specialization 101
July 1st, 2010 by Simon Bate
Simon Bate of Scriptorium Publishing introduces specialization in the DITA open toolkit and walks viewers through the fundamentals. (more…)
Webcast: Managing technical communicators in an XML environment
June 14th, 2010 by Sarah O'Keefe
In this 41-minute webcast, Sarah explores how XML affects the management of technical communication and proposes a new system for measuring documentation quality.
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Managing technical communicators in an XML environment
June 14th, 2010 by Sarah O'Keefe
To understand how XML changes technical communication, we need to step back and look at how the rise of information technology has changed the content development process. Through the 1970s, most technical communication work had separate writing, layout, and production phases. Authors wrote content, typically in longhand or on typewriters. Typesetters would then rekey the information to transfer it into the publishing system. The dedicated typesetting system would produce camera-ready copy, which was then mechanically reproduced on a printing press.
In a desktop publishing environment, authors could type information directly into a page layout program and set up the document design. This eliminated the inefficient process of re-entering information, and it often shifted the responsibility for document design to technical communicators.
The PDF landscape for DITA content
May 1st, 2010 by Sarah O'Keefe
published in STC Intercom, May 2010
A condensed version of Creating PDF files from DITA content.
Download the PDF 
(130K)
There are numerous alternatives for producing PDF output from DITA content. The approach you choose will depend on your output requirements—do you need images floating in text, sidebars, and unique layouts on each page? How often do you republish content? How much content do you publish? Do you need to create variants for different audiences? Do you provide content in multiple languages?
Customizing PDF output with the DITA Open Toolkit
March 31st, 2010 by ScriptoriumTech
by David Kelly
Read in PDF (380 KB, 23 pages)
The default DITA Open Toolkit (DITA OT) provides XSL-FO stylesheets that create simple, generic PDF files. The default DITA OT PDF output is a good starting point, but it is an ugly place to stop.
To create better-looking PDF output with more publishing functions, you need to change XSL-FO stylesheets. What kinds of things can you do, and where do you start? This paper explains how to modify XSL-FO stylesheets in the DITA OT.
Webcast: DITA-FMx demonstration
March 16th, 2010 by ScriptoriumTech
This webcast demonstrates using the DITA-FMx plugin with FrameMaker 9 to author, edit, and create output from DITA content. Topics covered during the demo include creating DITA topics using different options and templates and generating a book from the map and then saving to a PDF file. (more…)
Webcast: DITA features in oXygen XML editor
February 17th, 2010 by Simon Bate
This webcast offers an overview of the oXygen XML editor and demonstrates DITA-specific features, including inserting cross-references and conrefs, working with map files, applying conditions, and generating output. (more…)
XML: The death of creativity in technical writing?
February 1st, 2010 by Sarah O'Keefe
Originally published in STC Intercom, February 2010
I spend a lot of time giving presentations on XML, structured authoring, and related technologies. The most common negative reaction, varied only in the level of hostility, is “Why are you stifling my creativity?”
Does XML really mean the Death of Creativity for technical communicators? And does creativity even belong in technical content?
Webcast: DITA features in MadCap Flare
January 19th, 2010 by Sarah O'Keefe
This webcast demonstrates how MadCap Flare supports DITA constructs, including mapfiles, conrefs, and relationship tables. The demo also covers exporting existing Flare projects to DITA. (more…)
Removing XML whitespace in structured FrameMaker documents
January 15th, 2010 by Simon Bate
An ongoing frustration with using structured FrameMaker to generate great PDF files from DITA or other XML files is that structured FrameMaker does not ignore whitespace, resulting in excess spaces in paragraphs and table cells and unnecessary space between paragraphs. These spaces are annoying and time consuming to remove. This paper describes an XSL transform that removes whitespace from XML documents. You can incorporate the transform into a FrameMaker structured application to remove whitespace automatically.
XML & lone writers: can they go together?
December 31st, 2009 by Sarah O'Keefe
STC Intercom, December 2009
The relatively low percentage of lone writers who have implemented XML is a logical result of the typical lone writer working environment. Given the current status of the authoring and publishing tools, any lone writer who implements XML will need to master fairly demanding tools and technologies.
Download the PDF (204K)
Structured authoring and XML
December 31st, 2009 by ScriptoriumTech
Structured authoring and XML represent a significant paradigm shift in content creation. Implementing structured authoring with XML allows organizations to enforce content organization requirements. The addition of hierarchy and metadata to content improves reuse and content management. These benefits, however, must be weighed against the effort required to implement a structured authoring approach. The business case is compelling for larger writing organizations; they will be the first to adopt structured authoring. Over time, improvements in available tools will reduce the cost of implementing structured authoring and make it affordable for smaller organizations.
Handling XSL:FO’s memory issue with large page counts
December 31st, 2009 by ScriptoriumTech
Formatting Object (FO) processors (FOP, in particular) often fail with memory errors when processing very large documents for PDF output. Typically in XSL:FO, the body of a document is contained in a single fo:page-sequence element. When FO documents are converted to PDF output, the FO processor holds an entire fo:page-sequence in memory to perform pagination adjustments over the span of the sequence. Very large page counts can result in memory overflows or Java heap space errors.
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Managing implementation of structured authoring
December 31st, 2009 by ScriptoriumTech
Moving a desktop publishing–based workgroup into structured authoring requires authors to master new concepts, such as hierarchical content organization, information chunking with elements, and metadata labeling with attributes. In addition to these technical challenges, the implementation itself presents significant difficulties. This paper describes Scriptorium Publishing’s methodology for implementing structured authoring environments. This document is intended primarily as a roadmap for our clients, but it could be used as a starting point for any implementation.
Hacking the DITA Open Toolkit
December 31st, 2009 by Simon Bate
Hacking the DITA Open Toolkit
The Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) defines a set of XML elements for creating and organizing content. However, the DITA specification is silent on transforming DITA into
user-readable -documentation. The DITA Open Toolkit (DITA OT) fills that gap, providing a mechanism for transforming DITA content into multiple output formats, including HTML and PDF. The DITA OT formatting for both of these formats is basic, at best. This paper focuses on the changes you can make to the DITA OT HTML output to create attractive output. These modifications include changes to cascading stylesheets (CSS), headers and footers, and more advanced customizations. The paper also illustrates how you can create -content-specific elements through DITA specialization.
Assessing DITA as a foundation for XML implementation
December 31st, 2009 by ScriptoriumTech
The Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) is being positioned as the solution for XML-based technical content. Is DITA right for you?
This white paper describes the potential business advantages of DITA, provides a high-level overview of DITA’s most important features, and then discusses how you can decide whether to develop a DITA-based XML implementation.
Configuring fonts in FOP and the DITA Open Toolkit
December 31st, 2009 by ScriptoriumTech
by David Kelly
The DITA Open Toolkit includes an installation of FOP, a tool used to convert DITA content to PDF. A user must configure both FOP and the Open Toolkit to use any other fonts beyond a few basic defaults. This paper supplements the Apache instructions for configuring FOP and provides additional information for integration of FOP with the Open Toolkit.
Webcast: Hacking the DITA Open Toolkit
December 31st, 2009 by Simon Bate
The DITA specification is silent on how to transform DITA into user-readable documentation. The DITA Open Toolkit (DITA OT) fills that gap, providing a mechanism for transforming DITA content into multiple output formats, including HTML and PDF. The DITA OT formatting for both of these formats is basic, at best. Usually people want more from the output: they want it to be more attractive or conform to their corporate look and feel (or both). (more…)
Webcast: DITA 101
December 31st, 2009 by Sarah O'Keefe
DITA, the Darwin Information Typing Architecture is the new buzzword in technical communication. But why? In this webinar, you’ll learn about DITA concepts, business case, and typical scenarios where DITA is used.
You can then evaluate for yourself whether DITA makes sense for your content.
Webcast: Demystifying DITA to PDF publishing
December 31st, 2009 by Sarah O'Keefe
When you implement a DITA-based workflow, you face myriad new challenges, such as getting accustomed to topic-based writing, exploring reuse strategies, and specialization. The most difficult technical obstacle is usually setting up a PDF/print publishing workflow. The DITA Open Toolkit provides very basic PDF output, but for organizations who require attractive, professional-looking PDF content, extensive and expensive customization is required. FrameMaker is easier to configure than the Open Toolkit and produces lovely PDF files, but can you work around the limitations of the DITA support? InDesign offers the highest quality typography but has significant limitations in working with structured content. This session discusses the advantages and disadvantages of each approach to extracting PDF from DITA content.
This session is intended for individuals who are considering a DITA implementation and expect to need PDF output. Basic familiarity with DITA, XML, and related technologies is helpful but not required.
NOTE: During the recording, the presenters will mention polls. You will not see these polls while viewing the recording, but the presenters will describe the results.
Webcast: What do movable type and XML have in common?
December 31st, 2009 by Sarah O'Keefe
The invention of movable type changed the economics of information, making the process of copying a book by hand obsolete. More than 500 years later, XML seems to be doing the same to desktop publishing. But where movable type changed the economics of a mechanical process—creating printed copies—XML changes the economics of content authoring, formatting, and customization.
This webinar takes a look at how publishing technologies revolutionize the way people consume information and how those technologies affect authors.
About Sarah O’Keefe
Sarah O’Keefe, owner of Scriptorium Publishing, specializes in streamlining publishing processes, including implementing DITA, for numerous high-profile clients in telecommunications, defense, technology, and other content-rich industries. Sharing knowledge is a priority for Sarah, who strives to be both entertaining and informative during training sessions and conference presentations.
Webcast: Dynamic text display: a space-saving alternative to conditional processing
December 31st, 2009 by Simon Bate
We needed to generate a Help set from DITA sources that applied to multiple products. However, serious space constraints prevent us from using standard DITA conditional processing to create multiple, product-specific versions of the Help; there was only room for one copy of the Help. Our solution was to create a single Help set in which select content would be displayed when the Help was opened.
In this webcast, we’ll show you how we used the DITA Open Toolkit to create a Help set with dynamic text display. The webcast introduces some minor DITA Open Toolkit modifications and several client-side JavaScript techniques that you can use to implement dynamic text display in HTML files. Minimal programming skills necessary. Simon Bate, Senior Technical Consultant will show you what to modify and how to do it.
Webcast: Cost-effective document design for a translation workflow
December 31st, 2009 by ScriptoriumTech
In this webcast, Nick Rosenthal discusses the challenges companies face when translating their content and offers some “best practices” to managing your localization budget effectively, including XML-based workflows and ways to integrate localized screen shots into translated user guides or help systems.
About Nick Rosenthal
Nick is the Managing Director of Salford Translations Ltd and has 20 years of experience in translator training and professional development. He sits on the Translation Subcommittee of the OASIS Committee, is a former member of the ITI Council, and past president of the UK chapter of the Society for Technical Communication.
Creating PDF files from DITA content
December 31st, 2009 by ScriptoriumTech
by David Kelly
When technical documentation groups adopt structured authoring, they often choose the Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) open-source standard because it requires no up-front investment. The DITA Open Toolkit (DITA OT) provides a way to produce multiple outputs, including Portable Document Format (PDF) files; however, the technology for creating PDF files is limited, and modifying the formatting is challenging.
Software companies have stepped in to offer methods for customizing and producing PDF files, but there are different levels of DITA support and various degrees of integration with the DITA OT.
How do you decide which method is best for you? This paper explains the alternatives and trade-offs for each method and helps demystify the decision process.
Download the PDF (950 K)
FrameMaker 8 and DITA
December 31st, 2009 by ScriptoriumTech
FrameMaker 8 provides support for creating, editing, and publishing DITA 1.0 content. You can use FrameMaker to author and publish DITA content as high-quality print and PDF output, or you can create content elsewhere and use FrameMaker strictly for publishing print and PDF output. This document describes FrameMaker’s DITA support and provides guidance on how you might best integrate DITA and FrameMaker.
Download the PDF file (5 MB, 55 pages).
The ABCs of XML
September 30th, 2009 by Sarah O'Keefe
STC Intercom, September/October 2009
XML is rapidly becoming part of the required knowledge for technical communicators. This article discusses the three most important reasons that you should consider XML: automation, baseline architecture, and consistency.
Download the PDF (144K)
Building efficient multilingual workflows
April 30th, 2009 by Sarah O'Keefe
STC Intercom, April 2009
A common argument for XML-based workflows is that they automate production and localization tasks. With XML, localization can be reduced to a fraction of its original cost, but how exactly does that happen?
Sarah explores automization in localization and two technology standards used in multilingual workflows: The Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL) and XML Localization Interchange File Format (XLIFF).
Download the PDF (125 K)
Web 2.0: The tipping point for XML
January 31st, 2009 by Sarah O'Keefe
STC Intercom, January 2009
As the many-to-many communication between blogs, forums, and the like grow in volume, official product information will become just one of the many sources available to readers. Product owners who isolate their official information from the conversation run the risk of not being heard at all.
XML authoring can help to close the documentation gap between official and user-generated content, integrating the two and ensuring their voice is in the mix.
Download the PDF (125 K)
What do movable type and XML have in common?
December 31st, 2008 by Sarah O'Keefe
Originally published in STC Intercom, December 2008
The invention of movable type changed the economics of information, obsoleting the process of copying and illuminating a book by hand. More than 500 years later, XML seems to be doing the same to desktop publishing. XML can automate structure enforcement, formatting, content customization, and many other tasks normally left for authors and production staff to do manually.
Download the PDF (250 K)
XML, growing up fast
July 19th, 2008 by Sarah O'Keefe
Originally published in STC Intercom, July 2008
In 2008, XML turns 10 years old. Today, an XML-based publishing environment is state of the art, but what will it be like tomorrow? Will we see the rise of better XML authoring tools? Will XML become as ubiquitous as HTML?
Download the PDF (600 K)
The hidden costs of DITA
April 19th, 2008 by Sarah O'Keefe
Originally published in STC Intercom, April 2008
DITA is a free, pre-made XML document structure. That statement can lead to a few erroneous assumptions: if it’s free, then it will cut down on costs, and if it’s pre-made, it will cut down on labor. There are several things to consider when choosing a DITA solution. Does your staff have the skills to author in a DITA environment? Will additional training be required? Does DITA even match your content model, and if it doesn’t, is it worth the effort to change?
Sarah’s conclusion? “DITA may be free, but it’s not cheap.”
Download the PDF (950 K)
Publishing XML content with XSL
January 19th, 2008 by Sarah O'Keefe
Originally published in STC Intercom, January 2008
Getting your content into XML might be difficult enough, but once it’s there, how do you turn it into something you can deliver? The Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL) is a free and effective tool that can transform your XML content into HTML.
Download the PDF (350 K)
Integrating XML and FrameMaker
December 31st, 2007 by ScriptoriumTech
| NOTE: | This white paper is based on FrameMaker 7. |
FrameMaker provides solid support for XML-based authoring workflows. Its PDF and print output capabilities are stellar. Because FrameMaker combines authoring and publishing in a single application, configuring XML support can be quite challenging.
It sounds too good to be true: store information in an application-independent, platform-independent format and then render that information through the software of your choice. XML does, in theory, deliver on this promise, but implementation is rarely as straightforward as you might hope.
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When is XML the wrong answer?
November 19th, 2007 by Sarah O'Keefe
Originally published in STC Intercom, November 2007
XML can benefit a publishing workflow in many ways: improving content reuse, consistency, and potentially automating much of the process. That all sounds wonderful, but XML is not the logical answer for everyone.
Implementing a structured authoring solution requires a significant change from the familiar desktop publishing routine to new tools, technologies, and processes. Switching to XML is going to cost time and money. Depending on your needs, it may not be the most efficient solution.
Download the PDF (350 K)