RE: Giving Up on XML

[eric -dot- dunn -at- ca -dot- transport -dot- bombardier -dot- com]

Klasovsky, Nick wrote: 
> We don't want to have stop what we're doing to get under the hood of 
> tools and write custom scripts to do what most commercial software does
> for us. We also work for employers who don't give us budgets and staff
> to do programming for something that we can do in Word or our publishing
> software. A lot of us out here work in industries other than IT, so the
> programmers we may have in house don't do publishing software and don't
> know what XML is. They are too busy writing controls software. Our
> employers don't think spending a lot of time and money fiddling with
> publishing software adds much value to what we do, and our users could
> care less if we use Word or XML to publish the information they need.

> Like other posters have said, when it is all reduced to an all-in-one
> program that costs no more than Framemaker and doesn't require outside
> consultants to set up and maintain, then it may be widely adopted. Until
> then it is still no more than a programmer's dream and a user's
> nightmare. 

Imagine for a moment that you had no publishing or editing software. How 
much time will it take to select a product, set it up, and then design 
your templates for it? How long will it take you to learn the TOC features 
and scripting possibilities? How much will it take to get the workflow 
right so that you produce consistent professional results?

Documentation done efficiently and right requires effort and a learning 
curve. We're just comfortably familiar with Word, FrameMaker, or whatever 
other tool(s) we use. Try to switch from one tool to another and get 
similar results. Try and impose a new template on legacy documents. Both 
are large projects that are no easier than getting a structured authoring 
environment up and running.

Don't use "focusing on our job and avoiding consultants" as an excuse to 
attack or put-down structured authoring. Many consultants specialize in 
Word, FrameMaker, and a host of HTML and help programs all of which are 
"commercial".


Eric L. Dunn
Senior Technical Writer

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