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1. Put your reusable content in one or more DITA XML topics which you
save on a central location on your file server. I call these files my
"conref library".
2. Include these reusable content items ("elements") in your manuals by
inserting "conrefs" (content references).
3. Update the content in your conref library to your heart's content. It
will automatically be updated in all the DITA XML topics which have a
reference to this library. Before you change something, you can even check
where a specific element is used.
Small budget: $185 for a single license. For this price, you even get
advanced (sometimes CMS-like) features, such as:
- Build a ditamap from an outline
- Generate a report of all the references you have used in your topics
- Create a ZIP archive of your ditamap, including all referenced graphics
and conrefs
- Use a Ditaval Manager to manage your "conditional publishing"
- Search for any text, element or attribute name or value in a ditamap or
folder
- Select any element and generate a list of where it's been used
- Automatically assign a dpi attribute to your imported graphics
- Use very advanced indexing features
- And much much more
With DITA-FMx, you can also use FM's powerful pagination features to
generate professional-quality PDFs (using your corporate house style) and
the free DITA Open Toolkit for HTML-based output. You can, of course, also
use the Open Toolkit to generate your PDFs, but then I'd advise you to ask
around how much it would cost to have XSL-FO stylesheets developed for your
corporate house style.
If you need help or training, feel free to contact me off-list. The fastest
way to get you up and running (within a week) is as follows:
1. You send me a small sample of your manuals which share content.
2. I set up a small prototype with conrefs.
3. I teach you how to author, publish and reuse the content with FM8 and
DITA-FMx.
Kind regards
--
Yves Barbion â Managing Director â Adobe-Certified FrameMaker Instructor
www.scripto.nu â skype: yves.barbion â T: +32 494 12 01 89
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