3. 3
Experience the DCL Difference
DCL blends years of conversion experience with cutting-edge
technology and the infrastructure to make the process easy and
efficient.
Valuable Content Transformed
• Document Digitization
• XML and HTML
Conversion
• eBook Production
• Hosted Solutions
• Big Data Automation
• Conversion
Management
• Editorial Services
• Harmonizer™
9. Time
Global Authoring System (Workshop and Operator manuals)
Plan, Improve, Consolidate
Beauvais
Suolahti
Marktoberdorf
Jackson/Beloit
Hesston
Canoas
Mogi
Others
Custom Topic Based DTD
DITA
Randers
Global Reuse
Today
15. Linda Cassola
SVP of Sales and Marketing, DCL
LCassola@dclab.com
15
Charles Dowdell
Manager, Global Technical Service Information, AGCO
Charls.Dowdell@agcocorp.com
Q&A
Hinweis der Redaktion
Management of large-scale conversions with multiple vendors
High-speed automated data and forms extraction
Validated Quality Methodology
Multi-facility tracking and reporting processes and systems
Independent QA, process review, & sustainment services
Content Reuse Tools
Simultaneous conversion to multiple DTDs & Schemas
Proprietary & non-proprietary electronic source data formats to XML
Extensive experience with all key DTDs and schemas, both content and structure-based:
AGCO is made up of many legacy corps. Technology from all divisions exists to day in all products.
- Legacy content
- Legacy formats
- Legacy practices in content creation
Reuse potential is high.
We sell very old manuals… early 1900s. 1980s product is still common.
- Dealers & Customers
- Paper is very common
Why do an analysis phase?
Graph: Amount of rewriting vs. cost
Much in between
Amount of rewriting has a price association
Automated solution will get them most of the way
Revision cost is minimal
Algorithmic ways to move text
Automation preserves cross referencing
- depending on the amount of rewriting you do, the more you have to modify or revise = more of a cost
- As long as we can find an automated solution, the rewriting/revision cost would be smaller
- Copy-and-paste is inefficient, prone to human error; DITA automation drives down those costs, algorithmic ways of moving text around lowers costs
- You need something that parses in DITA
- Many times there is a point somewhere in between the two
- We define the happy medium
- Goal is to get the data to parse well in DITA
- If it doesn't parse at all, cleanup will take a lot more time
- Trying to patch things together
- Automated conversion preserves cross-referencing that's already in the XML
- Rewriting involves redoing the cross-referencing
- "Hairpick" slide
- Preserving libraries so in the XML, reusable text is carried over
- Plan, improve, consolidate: compliment AGCO
- AGCO had already done a lot of the preliminary work
- Harmonizer? To refine the process
This was a team effort.
It wasn't a AGCO effort or DCL effort.
We brought the automation, they brought the information model.
Howard filled in what may not have been covered.
Contradiction between tutorial and model. So they (AGCO) had to resolve that.
- Analysis
- 1st step: Review information model, see what mappings AGCO’s already envisioned
- 2nd step: Analyze PDF together with existing XML
- 3rd step: Envision how the existing XML maps to DITA, clarify discrepancies between the information model and tutorial document
- Example of mapping issue: AGCO had a structure to associate image(s) with a group of steps
- DITA = you associate image(s) with one step
- AGCO had already come up with a resolution, used existing DITA attribute to mark beginning and end of group of steps to which image(s) belonged
- Evaluate as DITA
- Consulting team
- Manages current system, looking at DITA, trying to adapt DITA
- - Tagging fit in pretty well
- 4th step: write up conversion specification, prepare small sample
- 5th step: convert complete manual
- Going back and forth with AGCO at the beginning
- Discrepancy between samples and training document
- Dealing with mapping assumptions
- Howard provided very small hand-tagged sample
- Software coding begins after tagging is approved
- Original sample 5 pages
- Broad enough to get the basics for tags
- AGCO not totally DITA
- AGCO modified it
- Use of tag was not consistent
<para> tag used to group the two pieces of text that appear to be two separate paragraphs
Each contained within <ptxt> tags
-<p> and <ph> are DITA paragraph tags
- Only way to approve mapping approach was to provide sample and have it render