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Choosing publishing tools

When choosing publishing tools, we base our recommendations on your project requirements and on our experience with a variety of applications, technologies, and processes. Here are some of the factors we consider:

Do you need structured authoring?

Working in a traditional word processor or desktop publishing package lets you create unstructured content, which is paragraph-based. Structured authoring is based on elements, or units of content, which can be nested hierarchically. Structured authoring allows you to describe—and enforce—document organization automatically. In unstructured authoring, enforcement usually requires a human editor to verify the content.

Implementing structured authoring is more expensive than implementing unstructured authoring; however, structured content is more consistent and repeatable, making it more valuable than unstructured content in many situations.

Do you need XML?

Extensible Markup Language (XML) is rapidly emerging as the format of choice for developing structured content. Because XML files are plain text, they facilitate content interchange. XML, however, is only a means to an end. Consider the reasons for implementing XML before adding it to a project as a requirement. In some cases, an easy conversion path to implement XML at a later date may suffice.

For more information about XML and structured authoring, see our white paper, Structured Authoring and XML (PDF, 600K).

What are your output requirements?

Some projects require just one form of output—for example, printed user manuals, product data sheets in PDF format, online help, or HTML. For those projects, you can select a single-purpose tool that produces high-quality output in the format you need.

In many cases, though, you’ll need to produce closely related information in several different formats, such as printed documents, PDF, HTML, XHTML, XML, and so on. In these cases, we generally recommend a single-sourcing workflow, in which all of the output is created from a single set of source files. Establishing a single-sourcing environment requires careful analysis and planning. Each process has advantages and disadvantages; for example, a highly automated approach requires significant amounts of scripting and tight adherence to templates. An approach with more formatting flexibility usually results in significant amounts of manual post-processing work.

What are your content management requirements?

Content management refers to the ability to store, retrieve, and search for chunks of information. In smaller publishing shops, content management is often based on folder structure and other techniques. In larger groups, dedicated software tools provide more robust ways to track information. Before recommending content management processes and tools, we evaluate your need for content modularity and reuse, the amount of information that requires management, and your network infrastructure. There may be additional factors, such as translation/localization requirements, cross-department content sharing, compliance requirements, and security issues, that affect decisions about content management.

For more information, contact sales@scriptorium.com.