I have received a number of inquiries as to where to take a class on structured authoring.Neil Perlin, one of our local thought leaders and trainers in the industry has agreed to offer a half day Webinar to address this need.Neil has been providing online documentation training and consulting services for 15 years, is a popular speaker at various technical communication groups and conferences, organized and runs the “Beyond the Bleeding Edge” stem at the STC annual conference since1999, and is a columnist for the STC and IEEE/PCS.
Topic-Based Authoring? Structured Authoring?
- Topic-based authoring – not sure what it is or why to use it?
- Structured authoring – not sure what it is or why to use it? Whether you need DITA or structured Frame?
Topic-based and structured authoring arose out of technical communication’s changing needs in an age of online help, mobile apps, user-generated content, and new tools and technologies. They can be confusing. This tool-agnostic session will help clarify topic-based and structured authoring – what they are, whether you need them, and how to apply them without turning your company upside down. In a nutshell…
Topic-based authoring creates content in small, stand-alone chunks rather than books. Structured authoring creates content with a formal structure. They’re separate processes but are most useful together. The chunks provide flexibility needed for single sourcing and multi-channel publishing; the structure adds consistency that helps authors create the content, helps users understand it, and helps “future-proof” it in general.
How does this benefit technical communicators?
- Simplified maintenance and fewer errors and inconsistencies.
- Supports company strategy, increasing technical communicators’ value.
Sounds good. But implementation can also waste time and disrupt operations if the effort doesn’t fit your company’s strategic and operational context.
In this 3 ½ hour session you will learn:
- Business context – support for company strategy, organizational behavior, dealing with legacy material, and other business issues that determine whether topic-based and structured authoring become internalized or just another flash fad.
- Technical context – trends in technologies and tools and how they’ll affect your content development, maintenance, and distribution.
- Implementation issues – information type definition, template creation, cascading style sheets, and other implementation specifics.
At the end of this Webinar, you’ll have the conceptual background needed to decide whether topic-based and structured authoring is for you, to start evaluating your own material, and to begin the transition.
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