Re: Single Sourcing and Hackos

[Mary Deaton <m_deaton -at- KWARE -dot- COM>]

Graham, I am curious about your reaction to Hackos' single-sourcing project.


I do think true single sourcing, done well, is complex and expensive to
implement. I think all of the efforts made to-date by help and document
authoring tools are an attempt to move in the right direction, but bring so
many limitations (and make it seem so simple) that they are far from being
useful in all but the most limited of circumstances.

I also think technical writers have to look beyond our traditional resources
and explore what other domains are doing, such as people in document
management, knowledge management, decision support, and high-volume
publishing. In particular, there are tools from the mainframe world that
have been single-sourcing with SGML for a decade or more. There is alot to
be learned from them. And I believe that XML is going to change the entire
ballgame.

What puzzles me is how slow the people who sell publishing tools to
technical writers are to address this issue and solve it!

Mary Deaton
President, KNOWware, LLC
(206) 682-6113
*       Smart User Assistance and Training http://www.kware.com
*       Microsoft MVP for HTML Help
*       Program Associate, Winwriters 2000 Online Conference
http://www.winwriters.com/ohc.htm
*       Speaker, Help Technology Conference,
http://www.winwriters.com/htc99.htm



-----Original Message-----
From: Graham Tillotson [mailto:Graham -at- MEGSINET -dot- NET]


Just read Mary Deaton's suggestion we go to JoAnn Hackos' seminar on
single sourcing. Warning, Will Robinson! I've read all of Hackos' books
and most of her articles. Does her venture into single sourcing and
databases scare anyone other than me?

I would add to Tim Altom's comments on *compromise* that single
sourcing is, in its pure form, very *complex*, and I'd hate to think
it's being tossed around as a "hey, anyone can do it" solution.

Graham

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