DITA possible for start-up/lone writer?

[Joe Malin]

Definitely interested! I can do good beta testing for you, since I'm a
former software engineer.

I will warn you in advance that you might have to wait a while before my
company invested actual money in anything. Our motto is definitely "free
is better". You can understand that a small startup relies on more hours
from each employee than on any productivity enhancement that is "an
expense."

Joe


Joe Malin
Technical Writer
(408)625-1623
jmalin at tuvox.com 
www.tuvox.com
The views expressed in this document are those of the sender, and do not
necessarily reflect those of TuVox, Inc.	

-----Original Message-----
From: Bernard Aschwanden [mailto:bernard at publishingsmarter.com] 
Sent: Friday, March 03, 2006 6:32 PM
To: HATT at yahoogroups.com; framers at lists.frameusers.com;
techwr-l at lists.techwr-l.com
Subject: RE: DITA possible for start-up/lone writer?

Hi all:

I've just finished the first solid draft of our FrameDITA-lite
application for use with FrameMaker and DITA. It is built to work with
Frame 7.2, but the bulk of it should also work with 7.0 and 7.1.

It's not the most stunning tool ever, but it is a pretty solid XML and
FrameMaker utility that has about 40 pages of documentation that walks
you through installation, tutorials, testing and more.

It may be something that a single writer can consider as a solid
starting point for single sourcing. The price on it is perfect for the
lone writer (or the mega corporation) as it's free. I'm giving it away.

With this application and some very cool (and affordable) tools by West
Street Consulting (http://www.weststreetconsulting.com) a lot of the
ideas for single sourcing are addressed that can help the smaller
company as well as the largest. It allows for granular reuse of
paragraphs, sections, topics, tasks and so on. It also provides the
ability to export to DITA compliant XML. The formatting and layout can
be tweaked with relative ease if you know FrameMaker and the EDD
environment. If not, I also provide some online support and consulting
on it.

I've sent the file to a few people on the various lists already and will
continue to do so over the weekend, but if you are interested in being a
part of the beta team to test it, please let me know.

My goal is to have this ready for general use before the big DITA
conference this month (http://conf.travelthepath.com if you are
interested in more info) so that I can show it to anyone who asks while
we are there.

Again, if you are interested in beta testing, please email me off list
and let me know. I'd love to have input on this and get it solid enough
that everyone can take advantage of a working file set for use with
FrameMaker and DITA.

Thanks,

Bernard



Bernard Aschwanden
Publishing Technologies Expert
Publishing Smarter

bernard at publishingsmarter.com 

www.publishingsmarter.com 


-----Original Message-----
From: framers-bounces+bernard=publishingsmarter.com at lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+bernard=publishingsmarter.com at lists.frameusers.c
om] On Behalf Of Joe Malin
Sent: Thursday, March 02, 2006 3:58 PM
To: HATT at yahoogroups.com; framers at lists.frameusers.com;
techwr-l at lists.techwr-l.com
Subject: DITA possible for start-up/lone writer?

Hi!
 
I am looking for experiences and advice about using DITA from tech
writers who are familiar with real success stories.
 
I'm the only tech writer here at TuVox, a 70-person startup. I am
seriously considering using DITA as the basis of a single-source
structured documentation environment. The reasons I want single-source
and structure are 

*	re-use, to avoid duplication
*	multi-channel delivery: ability to re-structure help systems
into documents
*	localization/customization: ability to tailor documentation to
individual customers
*	quick, iterative delivery: respond quickly to emerging needs