OASIS Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) TC

Re: [dita] DITA Issue Proposal: Styling Options for Conditional Text

  • 1.  Re: [dita] DITA Issue Proposal: Styling Options for Conditional Text

    Posted 09-12-2005 13:16
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    Subject: Re: [dita] DITA Issue Proposal: Styling Options for Conditional Text


    Hi Paul - I realize this is a bit late to the discussion, but I thought I'd
    clarify the current DITA Open Toolkit behavior with regards to the DITAVAL
    file. Currently, the there are 16 suggested colors, but the file allows
    anything. The toolkit will pass any color value directly into the output,
    which means you can use any RGB value (or other recognized color); the 16
    given are just the most common ones.
    
    To further clarify the behavior - color values in the DITAVAL file
    currently only apply to revisions. It is not possible to associate a color
    with the attributes that are used for filtering and flagging. Along with
    the colors, there is a revision art option, which inserts start and end
    images around the revised section. These use the localized alternate text
    "Start of change" and "End of change", or a translation of those phrases,
    so that screen readers have an indication that the text is revised. The
    images themselves did not actually ship with the toolkit - this is a bug
    which will be fixed soon.
    
    For the other selection attributes in the DITAVAL file, there is currently
    no way to get any highlighting. The only way to mark them up is to use
    flags, which are only evaluated for block elements (this was done because
    on phrase elements there is no clear way to identify the end of a flagged
    section). For your requirements, I have one suggestion that might avoid the
    need to extend the DITAVAL file. Would it work if we added a way to pass
    the selection values through into the class attribute? So, the audience
    attribute value would optionally end up in the XHTML output. You could then
    use CSS to get any highlighting, without needing to set highlight values in
    the DITAVAL file.
    
    Robert D Anderson
    IBM Authoring Tools Development
    Chief Architect, DITA Open Toolkit
    
    
                                                                               
                 "Paul Prescod"                                                
                 <paul.prescod@bla                                             
                 stradius.com>                                              To 
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                 08/29/2005 03:03                                           cc 
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                                                                       Subject 
                                           [dita] DITA Issue Proposal: Styling 
                                           Options for Conditional Text        
                                                                               
                                                                               
                                                                               
                                                                               
                                                                               
                                                                               
    
    
    
    
    We propose that the DITAVAL file be standardized for interchange among
    applications.
    
    The DITAVAL file currently provides 16 colors for styling conditional
    elements. We propose that the styling options be extended for scalability,
    to support multiple output devices, and to incorporate current knowledge of
    human factors.
    
    Feedback from our customers indicates that it is important to be able to
    signal conditions without relying on color. Non-color formatting is
    important in monochrome printouts and for color-blind users.
    
    We propose allowing users to assign the following formats to conditions:
    underline, double underline, italics, overline, and bold.
    
    We propose allowing users to set background colors for conditional text.
    For the vast majority of users who work in black text on a white
    background, light highlight colors provide good contrast for legibility.
    
     Paul Prescod and Su-Laine Yeo
     Blast Radius XMetaL
    
    
    


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