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Everybody I've talked with that's using DITA in the kind of
environments where it really pays off (multiple products with
overlapping features, docs translated into multiple languages) did a
significant amount of custom development. Often they have developers
on the docs team who do nothing else.
Oxygen XML works like a HAT, but as soon as you dig into the inner
workings to customize things much of what's there is straight
open-source code. Tweaking output means editing code, not just
fiddling with settings in a GUI the way you can in Flare, WebWorks, et
al.
On Mon, Oct 27, 2014 at 11:54 AM, Janoff, Steven
<Steven -dot- Janoff -at- hologic -dot- com> wrote:
> "...but the reality seems to be more like you're committing to an open-ended custom software development project."
>
> Could you elaborate on that last part a little bit? I'm not sure I understand.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Steve
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: robert -dot- lauriston -at- gmail -dot- com [mailto:robert -dot- lauriston -at- gmail -dot- com] On Behalf Of Robert Lauriston
> Sent: Monday, October 27, 2014 9:43 AM
> To: Janoff, Steven
> Cc: Techwr-l
> Subject: Re: Resources for learning Structured Writing?
>
> On Mon, Oct 27, 2014 at 9:23 AM, Janoff, Steven <Steven -dot- Janoff -at- hologic -dot- com> wrote:
>> Couple of questions, if you don't mind.
>>
>> What made you decide the migration would not be cost-effective?
>
> We couldn't identify any benefits. The docs were distributed only in English and there was very little need / opportunity for topic reuse.
>
>> How many such investigations have you been involved in?
>
> I've considered it at two other companies but the situations were similar.
>
> I love the idea of using standard source that's compatible with multiple off-the-shelf tools but the reality seems to be more like you're committing to an open-ended custom software development project.
>
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