DITA Technical Communication SC

During our subcommittee call today we discussed the DITA lite initiative that Michael Priestly has been pursuing. I mentioned that I have put together a DITA authoring package that falls in between full DITA and DITA lite. If any of you are interested in trying this authoring package out, it is available as DITA OT plug-in com.tagsmiths.authoring.dita on my gitHub site . Here is an excerpt form the plug-in's readme file: This DITA OT plug-in contains the Tagsmiths authoring DTDs. These DTDs make heavy use of the DITA 1.2 constraints mechanism to remove element choices from various document contexts. The DTDs call in 32 constraints packages. simpleSectionConstraint.mod is an example of one such constraint. When it is active, an author cannot simply type text into a section. The author must first open a paragraph. Consequently, the number of elements an author can choose from in section has been reduced from 63 to 32 because inline-level elements are no longer available as child elements for section. Rest assured that text and each of the excluded inline elements can still be entered under ia paragraph in section. This plugin has also refactored the shell DTDs from the DITA technical communications package (concept, glossterm, reference, task) so that the inclusion or exclusion of domain packages (highlights, hazardstatement, etc) is controlled throught single parameter settings in a file named CommonSettings.ent. Changes in CommonSettings.ent propogate to each of the shell DTDs eliminating the need configure each shell DTD separately. Each constraint package can also be included or excluded from CommonSettings.ent. Best Regards, -- Bob Thomas +1 720 201 8260 Skype: bob.thomas.colorado Instant messaging: Gmail chat ( bob.thomas@tagsmiths.com ) or Skype Time zone: Mountain (GMT-7)

Bob Thomas’s plug-in to create a simplified authoring interface JoAnn T. Hackos, PhD President Comtech Services Inc. 710 Kipling Street, Suite 400 Denver, CO 80215 Joann.hackos@comtech-serv.com 303-232-7586   CIDM will be hosting the Content Management Strategies/DITA NA Conference 2014 in Seattle, Washington April 28-30. More information at: http://www.cm-strategies.com/2014/index.htm From: Bob Thomas < bob.thomas@tagsmiths.com > Date: Monday, January 6, 2014 at 10:05 AM To: DITA Tech Comm SC < dita-techcomm@lists.oasis-open.org > Subject: [dita-techcomm] Authoring DTDs During our subcommittee call today we discussed the DITA lite initiative that Michael Priestly has been pursuing. I mentioned that I have put together a DITA authoring package that falls in between full DITA and DITA lite. If any of you are interested in trying this authoring package out, it is available as DITA OT plug-in com.tagsmiths.authoring.dita on my gitHub site . Here is an excerpt form the plug-in's readme file: This DITA OT plug-in contains the Tagsmiths authoring DTDs. These DTDs make heavy use of the DITA 1.2 constraints mechanism to remove element choices from various document contexts. The DTDs call in 32 constraints packages. simpleSectionConstraint.mod is an example of one such constraint. When it is active, an author cannot simply type text into a section. The author must first open a paragraph. Consequently, the number of elements an author can choose from in section has been reduced from 63 to 32 because inline-level elements are no longer available as child elements for section. Rest assured that text and each of the excluded inline elements can still be entered under ia paragraph in section. This plugin has also refactored the shell DTDs from the DITA technical communications package (concept, glossterm, reference, task) so that the inclusion or exclusion of domain packages (highlights, hazardstatement, etc) is controlled throught single parameter settings in a file named CommonSettings.ent. Changes in CommonSettings.ent propogate to each of the shell DTDs eliminating the need configure each shell DTD separately. Each constraint package can also be included or excluded from CommonSettings.ent. Best Regards, -- Bob Thomas +1 720 201 8260 Skype: bob.thomas.colorado Instant messaging: Gmail chat ( bob.thomas@tagsmiths.com ) or Skype Time zone: Mountain (GMT-7)