Re: Writing structured content

["Pro TechWriter" <pro -dot- techwriter -at- gmail -dot- com>]

To echo what Richard said about using "structured" and InfoMapping in the
same sentence......here's a quote from the Infomapping Web site:
QUOTE FROM INFOMAPPING.COM============ Structured Authoring Structured
authoring improves the management of information by creating a consistent
content structure that is used throughout your documents. This structure
helps to create smaller chunks of information that can be stored in a
content management system or in XML files. These chunks can easily be tagged
for XML.

To implement structured authoring you need to train content developers and
editors in a *structured writing technique*,* such as Information Mapping*.
New skills are required.

END QUOTE =============

And, there are quite a few references to "analysis" and how that is one of
the main themes in InfoMapping.

I also noticed a new module for DITA to work with Information Mapping, which
I will *definitely* check out, since we are an InfoMapping shop here!  So it
is possible to use DITA and Infomapping together (yay!).

To clarify, when I said that InfoMapping was "clunky," I was referring to
the software that is used with Microsoft Word to create the formatting used
in the documents. The method ITSELF is very good to learn, and has helped my
writing quite a bit.

After some reflection, I tthink my earlier post was too negative on the
methodology front. It is a good methodolgy; I just wanted to see it move
into the 21st century. It looks like they are attempting that by working
with DITA now.

PT



On 6/20/07, Richard Lewis <tech44writer -at- yahoo -dot- com> wrote:
>
> Evidently the guy has issues.  Anyways, it's true: The Info Mapping Web
> site says (or used to say) that structured writing is really all about
> analysis.   Ok, maybe grammatically, I should not have used the quote marks
> if I was absolutely, positively, 100% sure that they used those exact words
> (actually, I think they did).   I am a Tech Writer, but I often have a
> secretary to handle such itty-bitty details.
>
> Richard Lewis
> _________________________________________________________________
>
>
> --
> PT
> pro -dot- techwriter -at- gmail -dot- com
> I'm a Technical Technical Writer!
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