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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DITA Open Toolkit
Webcast: Localization and the DITA Open Toolkit
September 14th, 2011 by Simon Bate
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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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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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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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: 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…)
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.
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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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.
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: 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.
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)