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This content was developed by Bob Doyle and is being hosted here to make it more accessible to the user assistance community.
DITA.XML.ORG is the official community gathering place and information resource for the DITA OASIS Standard. The standard is advanced through an open process by the OASIS DITA Technical Committee, a group that encourages new participation from developers and users. DITA.XML.ORG is a community-driven site, and the public is encouraged to contribute content.
This group meets on the second Wednesday of each month. Join us for some networking, tasty dinner, thought-provoking speaker, followed by lively Q & A.
If you'd like to be notified of group meetings and events, feel free to join the SVDIG Yahoo group http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/svdig/.
The Boulder-Denver DITA User Group has presentations on the last Thursday of each month. If you are interested in participating in this group, contact julie.baldwin at sybase.com
The Indianapolis DITA users group now being formed, spearheaded by Ruth Nickolich. The address is http://groups.yahoo.com/group/IndyDITA/
The Boston group meets alternating second Mondays and Tuesdays each month. Please contact Liz Augustine or Bob Doyle for further information.
NYDUG's mission is to provide a vehicle for technical communication professionals in the New York metropolitan area to assist each other in adopting DITA, and to promote the growth of the local DITA community via information sessions, training programs, and networking.
In Austin, Texas, the Central Texas DITA Users Group (CTDUG) meets every third Wednesday--information available from locals Don Day and Wendy Shepperd.
For more information about the Vancouver DITA User Group, visit our Web site at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/van-dita or contact Nenad Furtula.
The Toronto DITA User Group meets once a month in Toronto. The Web site is at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/torontodita.
Founded by Alex Griessel and Michael Priestley.
Provides free online authoring, building, and publishing to web/XHTML, print/PDF, and help/Eclipse. Each member has a workspace folder with three documentation sets, including the Comstar User Guide files from the Introduction to DITA text, and two IBM docsets - Grocery Shopping, and Garage Concepts and Tasks.
Network with peers. Find jobs. Share information. Start a blog. Upload and watch videos. Join a group. Begin a discussion. Learn about software. Find events. Ask for help. It's all here. Become a member. It's free!
We use Help Authoring Tools (HAT) to provide Help for DITA Users.
We used Madcap Flare 2.5 to produce WebHelp files for DITA Users support (www.ditausers.org/help/).
We used Adobe RoboHelp 6 to convert the DITA Language Specification files to a Help interface with excellent full-text search (www.ditausers.org/oasis/).
And we have used DITA to create Help files.
We created a tri-pane DITA Infocenter using Eclipse Help that includes the DITA Language Specification, Architectural Specification, and OT User Guide in one searchable interface with TOC, Index, and Search. The DITA Infocenter is widely used as the go-to reference for DITA specs.
But how good is DITA as a HAT?
At this time, for web help the DITA Open Toolkit is limited to Microsoft HTML Help. And HTML Help is limited to Internet Explorer.
DITA OT can output JavaHelp and Eclipse Help. But JavaHelp appears to be in decline.
Since DITA Users is entirely web-based, we want Help files that can play on the web, and on all browsers, not just IE. So MS HTML Help is not good enough. Moreover, we cannot generate MS HTML Help with our web-based DITA Open Toolkit, since we are running on a Linux Apache server.
WebHelp versions from Adobe RoboHelp and Madcap Flare are playable in all browsers, as are many other HAT tools.
Here's a comparison of some leading Help Authoring Tools with the current DITA Help capabilities. See Char James-Tanny's HAT Matrix for many more.
| Help format | Adobe RoboHelp | Madcap Flare | DITA OT |
|---|---|---|---|
| MS HTML Help | yes | yes | yes |
| WebHelp | yes | yes | no |
| JavaHelp | no | no | yes |
| Eclipse Help | no | no | yes |
| FlashHelp | yes | no | no |
Help authoring tools have always been topic-oriented. Their topics have generally been like DITA tasks, the steps needed to solve some problem. So DITA should be a fine authoring tool for Help. The OASIS DITA Technical Committee authorized a subcommittee to study DITA and Help, under the leadership of Tony Self and Stan Doherty.
DITA News publishes a monthly newsletter and encourages vendors to distribute their press releases on the list.
The FrameMaker-DITA group is moderated by Kay (Ethier) Whatley. It is a private effort by a team of individuals and is not a corporate project. The group is a large, interacting community of hundreds (780 as of January 2007). Emails not on point may be declined by the moderator. Information posted herein is not copyrighted to the group but to the original poster.
A mailing list to support DITA was set up as a Yahoo Group by IBM in May 2004 and called the IBM DITA Forum. It has over 1200 members and is the main mailing list for DITA.
Books
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Introduction to DITA, by Jennifer Linton and Kylene Bruski (Comtech Services), 2006). |
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Introduction to DITA, by JoAnn Hackos, Arbortext, 2007. |
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DITA Pocket Guide, by SiberLogic, 2006. |
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DITA Open Toolkit User Guide 1.3.1 (PDF), HTML Frameset version by Anna van Raaphorst and Richard H. (Dick) Johnson, VR Communications, 2006. |
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Developing Quality Technological Information: A Handbook for Writers and Editors (2nd Edition) , by Gretchen Hargis, Michelle Carey, Ann Kilty Hernandez, Polly Hughes, Deirdre Longo, Shannon Rouiller, Elizabeth Wilde (IBM Press, Information Management Series, 2004). |
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Information Development: Managing Your Documentation Projects, Portfolio, and People, by JoAnn Hackos (Wiley, 2006). |
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XML and Framemaker, by Kay Ethier (Apress, 2004). |
Articles
Articles at IBM developerWorks
Online Tutorials and Workshops
From OASIS
The wiki is provided by the OASIS standards consortium as a collaborative tool for members of the OASIS DITA Technical Committee, who are permited to post to these pages. As this is an official workspace of the TC, the OASIS IPR Policy and other OASIS rules apply to its use. To learn more about the work of the TC, send a comment, or join this effort, visit the OASIS DITA TC homepage.
The DITA Open Toolkit is part of the Wikispaces in support of DITA at SourceForge, home of the Open Toolkit and the Open Toolkit User Guide.
Up-to-date links and descriptions of the latest resources for the DITA Open Toolkit from a top DITA Architect and head of the DITA Technical Committee.
Robin Cover provides the following DITA information:
The Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) is an XML-based, end-to-end architecture for authoring, producing, and delivering technical information. This architecture consists of a set of design principles for creating "information-typed" modules at a topic level and for using that content in delivery modes such as online help and product support portals on the Web. This document is a roadmap for DITA: what it is and how it applies to technical documentation.
A search of all IBM developerWorks pages on DITA
A gathering place for information about dita (xml), including:
One page of comprehensive links to DITA resources.
Comtech Services, Inc. provides a full-range of training, consulting, and support for any group considering a move to DITA. We offer a workshop series including DITA Getting Started, in addition to our regular offerings in structured writing, minimalism, and content management implementation. Dr. JoAnn Hackos, Comtech President, the industry's leading expert in information architecture, creates consulting arrangements that lead to information architecture, process redesign, and leadership in change management.
FrameDITA-lite (FDL) works with Adobe FrameMaker to create output that is compliant with the DITA specification. It is tested with FrameMaker 7.2 only, but seems to work with 7.0 and 7.1 releases as well.
It is not DITA. Instead, we use a subset of DITA (see the link in the bottom right of this page) and allow users to create sample files or to develop a proof of concept that DITA compliant content can be created from FrameMaker when it is configured correctly.
Suite Solutions offers training, consulting, custom development and support to groups of any size moving to or already using DITA. Based on a pragmatic approach, introductory and advanced workshops are offered in DITA authoring, information architecture, process development, DITA Open Source Toolkit, implementation of FrameMaker for DITA authoring and publishing, and more. Other specialties include high-level XSL-FO style sheet development; CMS requirements gathering, selection and implementation; integration of the DITA tool-chain and CMS with other enterprise systems such as PDM/PLM, ERP, CRM and support portals.
While some are using DITA right out of the box, more than half of the organizations that put DITA into production find they have to alter it to meet their particular needs. Rockley Group can implement your DITA specialized model in a DTD, EDD, or Schema and specialize the associated stylesheets.
A bibliography of various references that will help you learn more about DITA.
From OASIS.
From OASIS.
Describes the DITA Open Toolkit project--what the project is, and how to use the site.
A Zip file of PDFs from Comtech Services.
Yahoo dita-users mailing list.
Yahoo framemaker-dita mailing list.
We have combined our old specification pages for the DITA Language and Architectural Specifications, and the DITA Open Toolkit User Guide.
They are now published on their own new website as DITA Infocenter, which is a demonstration of Eclipse online help.
