RE: Single-sourcing = myth? (and other topics) LONG

["Bill Swallow" <wswallow@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

::: The main point she's making is that print and online are 
::: such completely
::: different mediums, how can one source document serve both? 

Very easily. You're thinking "print to online" or "online to print".
That is not single-sourcing. That is repurposing, and yes, it can be
quite an ugly process if not approached correctly. But I and I'm sure
many others create multiple deliverables from one source set of
information. I do so with FrameMaker, Acrobat, and Webworks Publisher
Professional (sorry Jeremy *g*). FrameMaker's conditional text,
variables, inset capability, book functionality, and hypertext
capabilities, combined with Acrobat and its various job options and
WebWorks Publisher and its various project types and flexibility all
make it quite easy to produce deliverables not only of different
formats, but for different audiences as well. Once everything's set up
and ready to go, I just pick a FM template, assemble a book, toggle the
conditions and variables as needed, pick a job option to churn out a
PDF, and then pump the book through WWP to get my online Help.

::: Printed docs are
::: organized in linear progression; online help is disparate 
::: information chunks linked by hypertext.

Sean Brierley addressed this best:

<quote>
2) In what way does organizing online help in a linear
way affect the use of online help? I submit, it is
common to organize even traditional, multi-sourced
(non-single-sourced) online help in a linear way, for
ease of authoring, editing, updating, organization,
and sanity.

For example, when authoring online help, do you
randomly choose topics to write about and write about
them in that random order? I expect that would make it
easy to miss a topic or two. Or, do you assign topics
a random number, and then order them by number to
create the non-linear content; do you add the links
before or after you randomize the order? If you
randomize the topics first, say 1,700 topics in a
random, non-linear order, how do you easily identify
the source and destination of hypertext links? 

Instead, I submit it is more efficient and your
writing is more accurate if you organize your online
help, in RoboHelp or wherever, in a linear way, based
on the order features are accessed in the software or
the way you expect the user to use the product. I
further submit that writing your online help in a
linear way in RoboHelp, or as part of a
single-sourcing project, has little to no affect on
how the reader uses the help.

Use of online help is determined by use of hypertext,
visual clues, content, accuracy of index, and search
functions. Single-sourced online help can accommodate
this kind of random access just as well as
multi-sourced online help.

Certainly, drawing from a single-source database is
less linear than writing online help using a
traditional HAT (help authoring tool). But, even if
you draw your online help from good ol' linear
FrameMaker, the hypertext, chunking, index, search,
and so forth can easily promote non-linear use of the
resulting online help file.
</quote>

::: Printed docs read best with serif fonts; online help
::: reads best with san serif. 

That all depends on the characters being used, the size, actual type of
(sans) serif font being used, special formatting applied to it, etc.

::: Printed docs are mostly B&W; online help uses
::: color as part of its structure. 

Color is not used for structure, but for visual identiication of
functional elements (e.g. hypertext). Too much color can be a bad thing
though, as about 1 in 20 people suffer from at least some level of
colorblindness.

::: And online help provides much more
::: flexibility in organization and presentation.

Oh I think that's extremely debatable. ;)

::: Her conclusion is that true single sourcing, that meets the 
::: unique criteria
::: for each medium, would have to come from a "tag-enriched 
::: repository of raw data." Like SGML?

I read this conclusion and the opening few paragraphs over and over.
Nowhere in the beginning (when the single-source downplay began) did the
author mention that her examples used to downplay single-sourcing were
not examples of "true" single-sourcing. In fact, they weren't even
examples *of* single-sourcing.

::: I copy&paste chunks of information from a
::: print-document file, change the font, add some color, and 
::: link to other chunks. Maybe some of you more experienced online
writers 
::: can point out the error of our ways.

There is nothing wrong with the act of repurposing as long as it works
for you. In my case, I wouldn't have the time to do that - the doc
requirements have always been too big for repurposing or stand-alone
projects, at least not without at least doubling the doc staff.

My greatest achievement with single-sourcing:

* 11 writers, 1 editor, 2 managers, 1 director
* Roughly 17,000 pages of printed documentation
* x-platform/x-browser Help (WebWorks Help)
* offset, spiral bound, monochrome (7"x9" and 8.5"x11")
* PDF (print and online optimization) - 8.5"x11" color with color
hypertext
* Training and trainer guides

It works. It's nothing like what Ms. Hemmi describes.

B I L L   S W A L L O W
Information Design & Development Professional
tel/fax: 518.371.1867    wswallow@nycap.rr.com
List Owner: HATT, WWP-Users, InFrame
Co-Moderator: SingleSourcing-Mgmt
WebWorks Wizard     Editor of InFrame Magazine



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