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Subject: OASIS TC Call for Participation: DITA TC
A new OASIS technical committee is being formed. The OASIS Darwin
Information Typing Architecture (DITA) Technical Committee has been
proposed by the following members of OASIS: Paul Grosso, Arbortext; Indi
Liepa, Nokia; Eliot Kimber, Innodata-ISOGEN; Don Day, Michael Priestley,
and Dave Schell, IBM; and France Baril, JoAnn Hackos, Debbie Aleyne
Lapeyre, and Paul Antonov, Individual members.
The proposal for a new TC meets the requirements of the OASIS TC Process
(see http://oasis-open.org/committees/process.shtml), and is appended to
this message. The TC name, statement of purpose, scope, list of
deliverables, audience, and language specified in the proposal will
constitute the TC's charter. The TC Process allows these items to be
clarified (revised); such clarifications (revisions), as well as
submissions of technology for consideration by the TC and the beginning
of technical discussions, may occur no sooner than the TC's first meeting.
As specified by the OASIS TC Process, the requirements for becoming a
member of the TC at the first meeting are that you must 1) be an
employee of an OASIS member organization or an Individual member of
OASIS; 2) notify the TC chair of your intent to participate at least 15
days prior to the first meeting; and 3) attend the first meeting of the
TC. For OASIS members, to register for the TC using the OASIS
collaborative tools, go to the TC's public web page at
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/dita and click on the button for
"Join This TC" at the top of the page. You may add yourself to the
roster of the TC either as a Prospective Member (if you intend to become
a member of the TC) or an Observer. A notice will automatically be sent
to the TC chair, which fulfills requirement #2 above.
OASIS members may also join the TC after the first meeting. Note that
membership in OASIS TCs is by individual, and not by organization.
Non-OASIS members may read the TC's mail list archive, view the TC's web
page, and send comments to the TC using a web form available on the TC's
web page; click the "Send A Comment" button. The archives of the TC's
mail list and public comments are visible at
http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/
Further information about the topic of this TC may be found on the Cover
Pages under "Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA)" at
http://xml.coverpages.org/dita.html
-Karl
=================================================================
Karl F. Best
Vice President, OASIS
office +1 978.667.5115 x206 mobile +1 978.761.1648
karl.best@oasis-open.org http://www.oasis-open.org
Name of the Technical Committee
OASIS Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) Technical Committee
Statement of Purpose
The purpose of the OASIS DITA Technical Committee (TC) is to define and
maintain the Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) and to
promote the use of the architecture for creating standard information
types and domain-specific markup vocabularies.
DITA is specializable, which allows for the introduction of specific
semantics for specific purposes without increasing the size of other
DTDs, and which allows the inheritance of shared design and behavior and
interchangeability with unspecialized content.
More specific semantics allow
* more automatable processes
* more consistent authoring
* better retrievability
* better applicability to specific groups
The work of this TC will differ from similar efforts such as DocBook
because of
* broader scope, inasmuch as DITA applies to more areas than just
technical manuals
* more specific scope, inasmuch as DITA applies to topic-oriented
information rather than all technical manuals
Scope of Work
The TC will create specifications for the Darwin Information Typing
Architecture suitable for submitting for balloting by OASIS membership
for OASIS standard status.
DITA is an XML-based specification for modular and extensible
topic-based information. DITA provides a model for defining and
processing new information types as specializations of existing types.
DITA populates the model with an extensible hierarchy of standard types.
DITA encourages reuse by reference either of topics or of fragments of
topics. DITA topics
* can be assembled in different combinations for many deliverables or
output formats
* are optimized for navigation and search
* are well suited for concurrent authoring and content management
Through use of a common specification, DITA content owners can benefit
from industry support, interoperability, and reuse of community
contributions. At the same time, through specialization, content owners
can address the specific requirements of their business or industry.
This committee builds upon the foundation established by the work of IBM
on DITA.
The tasks of the TC include
* To articulate the principles of the DITA architecture through formal
specifications
* To assess the relationship of DITA specialization to emerging XML
standards (such as the ontology initiatives associated with the Semantic
Web)
* To define appropriate enhancements of the architecture
* To standardize the information types in the DITA type hierarchy
* To encourage cooperation within and between the various topical
domains of potential DITA users. It is anticipated that, in addition to
the common information elements provided in the base specification,
specific communities of users may develop additional, specialized type
hierarchies of particular relevance to their use cases. The TC may
choose to recognize new information types or domain specializations
where a new specialization provides a standard solution for a
well-established need, has broad support, does not conflict with
existing types, and serves as a useful base for additional
specialization. For example, the concept, task, and reference
information types do so for the user assistance community. The TC
anticipates maintaining a set of core information types of general
utility, implemented in schema languages (such as DTD or XML Schema)
selected by the TC. Recognized types may also be maintained by other
groups (including other OASIS TCs).
* To design a generic methodology for specialized extensions of the base
specification by user communities. This methodology may address issues
such as delivery of a reference implementation, operation of a public
registry for specializations, suggested guidelines for development of a
user community’s information types, and so forth. When the above tasks
are completed, the TC may reconsider further work, which will be defined
as allowed by the OASIS TC Process.
List of Deliverables
Within three months of the first meeting, the existing DITA
specification will be contributed to OASIS by its author, will be
further developed by the TC and approved as a Committee Draft, and then
submitted to OASIS for consideration as an OASIS Standard. The
specification consists of
* a formal definition of the rules for creating new information type and
domain specializations through specialization
* the DTDs and XML Schemas for the initial DITA information type,
domain, and map specializations
* a processing model description that defines standard usage of the DITA
specifications
Within six months of the first meeting, the TC will seek to encourage
specific specialized extensions of the DITA specification, as well as
these deliverables:
* guidelines and methodologies for the development of DITA
specializations by a user community
* a possible specification of a standards-based public registry or
repository for such DITA specializations or a method for creating or
federating such resources
The TC may consider the creation of subcommittees where there is an
immediate interest in developing specialized extensions, but it is also
anticipated that such extensions could be adopted locally and informally
within specific information exchange communities
One year after producing the first DITA Committee Draft, the TC will
produce a new major revision of DITA including
* evolution of the DITA architecture to address issues such as
namespaces, type unification, extension by addition, and extensible
enumerations
* formal specifications of all aspects of the DITA architecture with
primers, use cases, and scenarios
* maintenance of the earlier DITA types
* addition to the base specification of those new DITA information types
that appear from specialized uses to have general utility
* a continuing methodology for the harvesting and incorporation of
additional, useful types into the base specification
Anticipated Audience
* Writers of other specifications that could benefit from DITAs
specialization model or other aspects of its architecture;
* Vendors offering XML authoring or development products;
* XML architects and developers who design and write XML applications;
* Information developers and information architects
Language
English
------------
The following is non-normative text for the purpose of setting up the TC:
Identification of similar or applicable work
DITA is an enabling technology that has potential relationships with
many other activities. It is compatible with ISO topic maps, although
DITA’s use of the word “topic” is considerably more constrained than in
that standard, and DITA maps use structuring principles specifically
designed to support specialization. It supports semantic web
initiatives, inasmuch as DITA both enables rich semantic markup and
provides a taxonomy for semantics through its type and domain
hierarchies. It is compatible with ontological efforts in general,
inasmuch as DITA maps are a way of describing the relationships among
topics, and can be used to describe multiple ontologies across the same
topic sets.
Because DITA is a constrained architecture dealing specifically with
topics and relationships among topics, it does not directly impact more
general activities. However, DITA topics are ideal candidates for
participation in semantic web relationships, and DITA maps can be
excellent sources for the description of these relationships.
The work of the OASIS DocBook TC is similar or applicable.
The proposed work is different from DocBook in that DITA is
topic-oriented, which lends itself to different uses than DocBook. Topic
orientation allows the separation of content (specific topics) from
context (including links to other topics, context-specific metadata,
navigation, and print hierarchies.
The DITA TC will identify liaisons with other committees or groups doing
related work to investigate points of common interest. Additionally, the
TC may have some coordinated activities with the DocBook TC focusing on
interoperability of content in the two formats.
Optionally, a list of contributions of existing technical work
The proposers anticipate that IBM will contribute a starter set of
information types, formal definitions of four domains, five document
types, two maps, and several common modules.
See the table below for a list of the current DITA DTDs, schemas, and
related documentation. Additional information concerning these
materials, along with some IBM proprietary materials that are not being
contributed, can be found at
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-dita1/index.html .
Other contributions within the scope of the TC will also be considered.
The date and time of the first meeting
4 May 2004, 11am ET, a teleconference to be hosted by IBM
The projected on-going meeting schedule
11 EST each Tuesday for 1 hour, for the year following formation of the
TC; hosted by IBM
Proposers
Paul Grosso <pgrosso@arbortext.com>, Arbortext
Indi Liepa <indi.liepa@nokia.com>, Nokia
Eliot Kimber <ekimber@innodata-isogen.com>, Innodata-ISOGEN
Don Day <dond@us.ibm.com>, IBM
Michael Priestley <mpriestl@ca.ibm.com>, IBM
France Baril <France.Baril@ixiasoft.com>, individual
JoAnn Hackos <JoAnn.Hackos@Comtech-Serv.com>, individual
Debbie Aleyne Lapeyre <dalapeyre@mulberrytech.com>, individual
Dave Schell <dschell@us.ibm.com>, IBM
Paul Antonov <apg@syntext.com>, individual
TC Convener
Dave Schell
Proposed Chair
Don Day
Attachment: Table of current DITA DTDs, schemas, and related documentation
Unit DTDs Schemas
------------------- ----------------
Information types
topic topic.mod topic.mod
concept concept.mod concept.mod
task task.mod task.mod
reference reference.mod reference.mod
Domains
highlighting highlight-domain.mod highlight-domain.mod
highlight-domain.ent
programming programming-domain.mod programming-domain.mod
programming-domain.ent
software software-domain.mod software-domain.mod
software-domain.ent
user interfaces ui-domain.mod ui-domain.mod
ui-domain.mod
Document types
(integrate domains and information types)
topics topics.dtd topic.xsd
concepts concept.dtd concept.xsd
tasks tasks.dtd tasks.xsd
reference reference.dtd reference.xsd
mixed ditibase.dtd ditabase.xsd
Maps
base map.dtd
book-specialized book.dtd
Common modules
metadata meta_xml.mod meta_xml.mod
CALS tables tbl_xml.mod tbl_xml.mod
standard XML attributes xml.xsd
Related documentation:
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-dita1/index.html
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