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DITA Quick StartSelvakumar T.S

August 9, 2009 Cadence Confidential: Cadence Internal Use Only1



Agenda

• A quick look at XML

• Understand DITA’s overall approach

• Understand DITA’s core content structures and how youcan customize them

• n ers an e scope or reuse n

• See DITA at work!!




A Quick Look at XML




Extend tagging through elements and

• XML tagging can be extended as data access requirements change:

– For example, you can add a “surname” element to identify the lastname for sorting purposes

• Attributes provide information about your data: – Adding an attribute called “gender” to the “child” element allows you to

– Examples of possible attribute applications for content:

• Product Name, Product Version, etc.

“ ”.

<family>

<father><name>Joseph<surname>Clark</surname></name></father>

<mother><name>Mary <surname>Clark</surname</name></mother>

<offspring>

<child gender=“girl”><name>Jennifer <surname>Clark</surname></name></child><child gender=“boy”><name.Joseph <surname>Clark</surname></name></child>

<child gender=“girl”><name>Taylor <surname>Clark</surname></name></child>

</offspring>




Does extensibil ity lead to chaos?

• If XML allows custom elements and attributes, how do we ensure

consistency of information and formatting across many authoring

• We define a Document Type Definition (DTD) that allows us to setrules:

–

– Required or not?

– Number of elements allowed and whether ordering rules apply –

• Other elements

• Text

• Attributes

• Predefined attribute values




The benefits of XML

• XML is a text format that follows an open standard – Is not bound to proprietary authoring tools or formats

– - ,

• Enables information reuse at the sub-document level

– Hierarchical nesting of markup tags creates containers of content within

– Referencing an element includes the information contained within that

element, allowing reuse of information at multiple levels of granularity:an entire topic, a set of steps or individual step; a glossary entry (term +definition)

• Separates content from formatting

– Different groups/formats can point to the same piece of content without

reformatting or retagging the information

– Enables dynamic transformation of data

If XML can do all this, wh do we need XML standards for technical documentation?




Need for XML standards for technical documentation

• Document-centric XML didn’t grow nearly as fast as

data-centric XML. XML standards bodies focused more

on data-centric standards.

• Home-built DTDs a challenge“Com anies often s end tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars develo in

custom DTDs, yet they often turn out to be inflexible and costly to maintain”

- JoAnn Hackos, Comtech Services

• Need for more collaborative authoring within and acrossorganizations




XML standards for technical documentation

• Two “popular” open source standards – DocBook

–

• Each standard takes fundamentally different approaches

• DocBook – Best suited for linear content: books and articles.

– DTD covers all possible authoring requirements.

– Does not su ort trul modular content.

– Incomplete reuse and cross-referencing mechanisms

– Difficult to customize the DocBook DTD. Customization isthrough hiding of elements that are not required.

Does DITA solve core documentation challenges?




What is DITA?

• DITA = Darwin Information Typing Architecture

• Developed by IBM

• Now an OASIS (Organization for the Advancement ofStructured Information Standards) standard

– urren vers on: .

“We propose the XML-based Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) as an

end-to-end architecture for creating and delivering modular technical information.”

— Michael Priestley, IBM




High-Level DITA Architecture

• DITA XML architecture is based on a Topic DTD and a

Map DTD

• DITA information architecture is based on topics ─

unitsof information that serve as building blocks for all

• DITA maps assemble topics for specific documentation

deliverables




Core design principles of DITA

• Topic orientation

– Discrete units of information covering a specific subject with a specificintent

• Topic granularity

– Topics combine with other topics into information sets

• Consistency

– DITA DTDs guarantee that DITA information types follow identicalinformation structures

• Separation of content (specific topics) from context (links to otherop cs, es, nav ga on

– Not just separation of content from formatting!!

• Inheritance

“ ” – -their structures

• Specialization

– Abilit to extend basic information t es for s ecial uses




Topic: a unit of information that is meaningful when it.




About DITA topics

• A chunk of information specific to a single subject.

• Short enough to be specific to a single subject or answer

a single question.

• Long enough to make sense on its own and be authored

.

• Each topic must follow the rules for a specific

information type.

• DITA prescribes three information types:

– Concept

– as – Reference

• To ic files can have the .dita or .xml extension




Information types in DITADITA’s base

information type

overview

information Referenceinformation

Procedural, step-

by-step

information

Can I have a topic that has a

mix of information types?




Why only 3 information types?

• Standards like Information Mapping have six information types: – Procedure

– Process

– Structure

– Concept

– Principle – Fact

• IBM itself had 12 information types before DITA: – oncep ua

– Error

– General Reference

– Glossary – Language Reference

– Mapping

– Orientation

– Sample

– Task

–

– UI Reference – Walkthrough/Tutorial




Why only 3 information types in DITA?

• DITA considers that other information types are basically

derivatives of the three core information types: Concept,

Task and Reference.

• If required, you can customize the core information types

specialization.

• Bottomline: DITA does not claim to cover allrequirements. It covers a base set or requirements and

allow other requirements to be covered by extensions.




Concept topics

• Concept topics introduce the background or overview

information for task or reference topics.

• Concept topics should not describe task or reference

information.

section or example, only other sections or examples are

permitted as content. This ensures that readers are notconfused about the content between sections or

examples.

• ,

concept.




Concept topic structure

<concept>

<title>

<titlealts>

<navtitle><searchtitle>

<shortdesc>

<prolog>

<conbody>

< > < >

<related-links>




Concept topic example




Task topics

• Task topics describe the steps of a particular task, or

provide an overview of a higher-level task.

• Task topics should not describe conceptual or reference

information.

,

one task.




Task topic structure

<task>

<title>

<titlealts>

<shortdesc>

< rolo >

<taskbody>

<prereq>

< >

<steps>

<result>

< >

<postreq>

<related-links>




Task topic example




Reference topics

• Reference topics provide quick access to facts. They

describe product features, commands, and so on.

• Information needed for deeper understanding of a

reference topic or to perform related procedures should

.

• Reference topics should be designed for quick scanning

of information using lists, tables, and such.• Reference topics should not describe conceptual or task

information.

,subject ─ for example, explain only one command.




Reference topic example




Why structure topics by information type?

• Benefits for Writers – Standard, consistent structures for authoring content

– Writers can use topic types to more effectively outline informationnee s

– Helps to analyze information according to the purpose or function itserves for the reader

– Organizing common types of information with topics help writers spendmore t me ocuse on aut or ng content

– Choice for selecting the best and most consistent way to presentinformation, based on information type

– Identify missing information – Breaking down information into chunks helps in better planning and

work distribution among writers

• Benefits for Users/Readers – ’

purpose – Readers learn and retain different types of information better when they

are written in a consistent, predictable way




DITA Maps

DITA maps assemble topics into a coherent set.




About DITA maps

• Ability to reuse and repurpose the same content for

different deliverable types and for deliverables for

different audiences and products.

• Maps can include DITA topic (.dita) files, XML (.xml),

, , , .

• Same topic can be referred to more than once in a map

or in different maps.• Maps can be nested into other maps to build

documentation deliverables.

scripts during the production process.

• DITA ma files have the .ditama extension.




Different deliverables using DITA maps

Topic 1

Quick

StartGuide

Topic 2User

Guide

Topic 3

Reference

Topic 4




Different formats using DITA maps




Map structure

<map>

<topichead>

<topicref>

<reltable>

<anchor>

<navref>

<topicgroup>




DITA Map example

• Example of DITA map in XMetaL




DITA maps do more!!

• Separate of content (specific topics) from context (links to other topics, files,navigation) – Links are s ecified in the DITA ma and not in the to ic file itself. Hel s to ics remain

“stand alone”.

– Links are automatically generated for the topics from the DITA maps. Helps automaticallyupdate links if topic title or topic file location changes.

• Build a relationship table to generate “related topics” links –

– Similar to creating cross references, but moves linking mechanism from content into themap

– Links are generated only in the output version of the topics

– Increases reusability—no broken links when taking a piece of content out of context•

– Properties include the title and metadata

– Can change the topic title relative to the parent topic

– Metadata can identify a topic as advanced for one deliverable and basic for another

• Can rovide multi le views on the same to ics: b roduct b task b to ic t e

audience and so on.




Metadata Support in DITA




Metadata support in DITA

• DITA supports a variety of standard and custom

metadata:

– Author information

– Copyright information

– Product information

– Resource IDs for help systems

– Document tracking information

–

– Keywords

– Custom metadata (otherprops)

• Metadata is supported using the <prolog> element intopics and <topicmeta> in maps.




Reuse in DITA




Reuse in DITA

• Reuse flows from the topic-based paradigm

– Topics can be reused in different contexts

– Topics from multiple components can be integrated as a solution

• Reuse methods

– -

– Topic-level reuse with <topicref>

– Map-level reuse with <navref> and <anchorref> – on t ona reuse




Element level reuse with <conref>

• Conrefs are a way to reference content from the same or

another DITA file

Example

– Code in source file source.dita:

<ste id="commonste "><cmd>This ste exists in a common file and is added

with a conref.</cmd></step>

– Code in target file B:<step conref=“source.dita#task/commonstep"><cmd></cmd></step>

Note that the <cmd> tags are included even through they will be

replaced by the conreffed information.




Conditional reuse

• DITA gives you four ways of tagging conditionally using AND/OR

logic:

–

– Platform – Product

–

Example:

The king and queen of Olympus are <phau ence= gree eus p p au ence= roman up er p

and <ph audience="greek">Hera</ph><ph

audience="roman">Juno</ph>.

“ ” – ,

The king and queen of Olympus are Zeus and Hera.

– When audience=“roman” is set to include, this reads

The kin and ueen of Ol m us are Ju iter and Juno.




Specialization in DITA




Topics inherit from DITA’s base “ Topic” …

…making it possible to extend through specialization.




Specialization

• ’

publishing toolchains

• Specialization can occur in topics, maps, or domains




Specialization: Specializing Topics

• Topic is the core.

• Each specialization is a delta in design, and if it needs

special processing that's a delta too.




Specialization: Specializing Maps

• While DITA maps are flexible by default, you can use

map specialization to define or enforce a particular type

.




Specialization: Specializing Domains

• DITA domains extend DITA with a set of elements whose namesand content models are unique to an organization or field ofknowledge. For example, you may have elements specific to

ocumen ng so ware.

• Specialization lets domain-specific elements inherit from existingelements.




DITA Tools


DITA t l



DITA tools

• Modeling tools

– IBM Task Modeler-for creating DITA maps(http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/taskmodeler )

• Authoring tools

– Arbortext Epic Editor (http://www.ptc.com/) – XMetal (http://www.justsystems.com/)

– Syntext Serna (http://www.syntext.com)

– FrameMaker 8 with Adobe FrameMaker 8 Plug-in for DITA OpenToolkit

. . _ .

– DITA Storm (browser-based DITA editor)(http://www.ditastorm.com/onlineDitaEditor.html)

• Production tools

– DITA Open Toolkit (http://dita-ot.sourceforge.net/)• Content management systems

– Astoria CMS, EMC Documentum, PTC Windchill, SiberLogic Sibersafe,


ason ….

IBM T k M d l f DITA



IBM Task Modeler for DITA maps

• IBM was using Rational Rose XDE Developer for

content modeling

• Need for a customized modeling tool resulted in the IBM

Task Modeler:. . .

• Eclipse-based plugin for modeling tasks and designing

DITA maps


DITA Open Toolkit: the DITA production pipeline



DITA Open Toolkit: the DITA production pipeline

• rov es e au or ng an pro uc on n ras ruc ure or .• Open source: http://dita-ot.sourceforge.net/

• Supported outputs: –

– XHTML

– Eclipse help

– HTML Hel

– Java Help

– PDF using XSL-FO


DITA Open Toolkit



DITA Open Toolkit

• Consists of DTD, XML schema, stylesheets, samples, anddocumentation for DITA.

• Open source infrastructure

• Ant for builds• FOP for XSL-FO to PDF

• Xalan or Saxon for XSL-T

processing to HTML/xHTML

output• Java




DITA Resources


DITA Resources



DITA Resources

• DITA Standard

OASIS DITA Technical Committee http://www.oasis-

open.org/committees/dita

• DITA Articles – . . .

– DITA Users: http://www.ditausers.org/

– http://dita.xml.org

– ttp: www- . m.com eve operwor s xm rary x- ta

– http://www.slideshare.net/search/slideshow?q=DITA

• Books on DITA

– Introduction to DITA: A User Guide to the Darwin InformationTyping Architecture by Jen Linton and Kylene Bruski, Comtech

Services htt ://www.comtech-serv.com/dita.shtml


DITA Resources



DITA Resources

• DITA Demos / Webinars

– FrameMaker 8 Deep Dive: DITA Topic-based authoring

ps: a m n.a o e.acro a .com _a p

– <several>• DITA User Grou s

– http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dita-users/

– http://groups.yahoo.com/group/framemaker-dita/

– . . -


Real li fe DITA examples



Real li fe DITA examples

• WebSphere Application Server Documentationhttp://www-

. .

• Adobe Creative Suite documentation• Adobe Acrobat documentation

• Apache Derby documentation

• Eclipse documentation




DITA Demo


Typical DITA workflowUse DITA maps

for content



Typical DITA workflow modeling !!

1. Identify the task topics.

2. Identify the concept and reference topics needed to

support the task topics.

3. Create the topics.

. se maps o assem e op cs or eac

documentation deliverable.

Eclipse help

JavaHelp

Write Build ArchitectEclipse help

JavaHelp

Write Build Architect Write Build Architect

Web pages

Books & PDFs

Learning

Web pages

Books & PDFs

Learning


Architecture

Map

Maps

Architecture

Map

Maps

Architecture

Map

Maps



Thanks for our artici ation!!Thanks for our artici ation!!

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