Joe Welinske
Mobile devices likely to be primary interface for most people. Not just for applications for mainstream consumers. many orgs are looking for ways to scale off parts of their enterprise applications. All ways for modules to be available for employees on the go.
Place for work we do in mobile. Independent software vendors (ISVs) have a place in mobile. Ripest place for UA people to get involved. 5000 people at Apple Developer Conference last June, almost everyone a programmer, huge need for the type of thing UA people do. Lot of opportunities to get involved. Many of these apps are robust and have the need for user assistance.
Complexity and minimal screen real estate don't mix. Multi-touch and mult-key controls are not easily discoverable. Conceptual and contextual information, work that carries over from desktop applications, is still important.
iPhone development environment easily accessible, low price to discover. Requires Mac with Leopard, and iPhone SDK, which is free. Need to know Interface Bulder, Objective-C, and WebKit.
The SDK ha Interface Builder, Xcode, WebKit, free from Apple with no-charge registration. If you want to distribute apps, only then is there a fee to Apple.
Interface Builder is interactive software kit, can drag-and-drop element, programmers can work from there to extend features of objects. The simulator is great for experimenting with UI text.
Hard editing to vitally think about what's important. Not a lot of room to make things fit. Joe showed a "Quick Start" page for the iPhone app Timewerks where he created Twitter-length instructions, short and direct.
Showing short procedures, without numbers in steps, without a lot of extra words in the sentences, really stripping out non-essential words to fit into the space. Example of early version.
Small changes can have a dramatic impact on the success of an application.
UI text opportunities
Enormous opportunities for wordsmiths to get involved. Many times, it is the first word or phrase that the developer thinks of. Unlike large-scale apps, it may be easier to make changes, and easier to do testing. iPhone UI text opportunities in places such as labels, placeholders, alerts, action sheets, segmented controllers, table and picker data, and tab bar text. Important to understand the iPhone vocabulary.
Server-based help
Advantages and disadvantages to sever-based help. Able to make good assumptions that people will be able to get info through their network. All of my work (server-based content) was totally outside the Apple approval process. Content pulled into the frame UI from the server. Can offer dynamic information. Easy for information to be updated.
Web pages use the Safari browser. Browser based on WebKit open standard. Supports HTML and CSS.
Needs the viewport metatag. Proprietary tag, exclusive to iPhone, doesn't mess up display with other devices. meta content="width=device-width" name="viewport" Makes it so content fits appropriately in the iPhone display space.
Apple Human Interface Guidelines is great fro everything to do with the iPhone UI--except user assistance. There's nothing in there about that.
Working in Android development environment is similar to working in iPhone SDK, but 10 times more confusing. Partly because so many more devices to support, not just phones, but tablets and more. Development environment most people use for Android is Eclipse.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Introduction to eBook Devices and Formats
Joshua Tallent, eBook Architects
No one present yet develops for eBooks.
3 sections of eBook world: devices, formats, and retailers.
eBooks formats
Kindle (Mobipocket), ePub (industry standard), PDF, LIT (Microsoft), eReader, and others.
Amazon selling 70-90% of eBooks.
Mobipocket, based on HTML 3, very little CSS, proprietary XML code, binary compiled format. .PRC, .MOBI, or .AZW extensions. .AZW created by Amazon for Kindle.
Strengths are its popularity, simple layout, and accessible to most non-techies. Weaknesses are it's proprietary format, simple layout, and limited distribution channels.
Mobipocket Creator or KindleGen (from Amazon site) to create a file, the latter command line from a source file. calibre is another, but not for production-quality work.
In addition to Kindle, can open with BeBook, Hanlin, iRex, but even they are moving to EPUB.
DRM (digital rights management) is proprietary to Amazon. Kindle uses same DRM as Mobipocket, but Mobipocket books can't be put on Kindle.
ePUB format
Open source, open standard, based on XHTML 1.1, CSS 2, XML, wrapped in a Zip file. No inherent DRM.
Strengths include it being open source, modern technology & standards, broad industry support, wide consumer acceptance, robust formatting, and active development.
Weaknesses include multiple rendering engines, not HTML5, development has been slow, no good development tools, lots of misinformation, and competing DRM standards.
Can create with InDesign CS4, calibre, epub-tools, RoboHelp/FrameMaker. Can buy from many stores.
DRM is the bane of the ePUB world. Two competing DRM standards: Fairplay (Apple only), and Adobe Content Server (Sony, nook, etc.)
Other formats include .LIT, from Microsoft, but not really maintained, and eReader (PDB), formerly Palm Digital Reader, now owned by Barnes & Noble, but it's difficult to format, and B&M moving to ePUB. Smashwords is another, but it's really just a Word document formatted by their style guide, but it's a good way to get work out there.
eBook devices
Kindle 1, decent hardware, SD card option, 4-color grayscale, no longer for sale.
Kindle 2, 16-color grayscale, better processor, no SD card storage.
Kindle DX, 9.7" E-ink screen (E-ink is a low-power, non-reflecting screen, allows for long battery life, only draws power when changing screen, but B&W only.)
Sony Pocket Edition, Sony's smallest and cheapest, only 200 MHz processor, less storage than Kindle.
Sony Touch Edition PRS-600, about the same as Kindle 2, but has a touch screen.
Sony Daily Edition, 3G access (via AT&T), 7.1 inch touchscreen.
Barnes & Noble nook, 6-inch E-ink screen, 16-color grayscale (but color section on bottom for navigation)
Plastic Logic QUE, 105-inch E-ink touchscreen, business device, reads PDF, WORD, PowerPoint, high price.
iPhone & iPod Touch, can read a variety of documents depending on the app installed.
iPad, 9.7-inch screen, ePUB, eReader/PDB, Mobi/Kindle, iBooks, Stanza, and more.
Android devices, ePUB, eReader/PDB, and more (Archos 5 is a 5-inch tablet that runs Android.)
DRM systems
Adobe Digital Editions Protection Technology (ADEPT)
Apple Fairplay
Pros: possibly protects content from piracy.
Cons: Makes purchasing and using content difficult, interoperability issues, ties consumer to single source, effectiveness against content privacy unproven.
eBook market is growing at 200% per year, but still too much fragmentation now to know what the eBook market is going to look like 3 or 4 years from now.
No one present yet develops for eBooks.
3 sections of eBook world: devices, formats, and retailers.
eBooks formats
Kindle (Mobipocket), ePub (industry standard), PDF, LIT (Microsoft), eReader, and others.
Amazon selling 70-90% of eBooks.
Mobipocket, based on HTML 3, very little CSS, proprietary XML code, binary compiled format. .PRC, .MOBI, or .AZW extensions. .AZW created by Amazon for Kindle.
Strengths are its popularity, simple layout, and accessible to most non-techies. Weaknesses are it's proprietary format, simple layout, and limited distribution channels.
Mobipocket Creator or KindleGen (from Amazon site) to create a file, the latter command line from a source file. calibre is another, but not for production-quality work.
In addition to Kindle, can open with BeBook, Hanlin, iRex, but even they are moving to EPUB.
DRM (digital rights management) is proprietary to Amazon. Kindle uses same DRM as Mobipocket, but Mobipocket books can't be put on Kindle.
ePUB format
Open source, open standard, based on XHTML 1.1, CSS 2, XML, wrapped in a Zip file. No inherent DRM.
Strengths include it being open source, modern technology & standards, broad industry support, wide consumer acceptance, robust formatting, and active development.
Weaknesses include multiple rendering engines, not HTML5, development has been slow, no good development tools, lots of misinformation, and competing DRM standards.
Can create with InDesign CS4, calibre, epub-tools, RoboHelp/FrameMaker. Can buy from many stores.
DRM is the bane of the ePUB world. Two competing DRM standards: Fairplay (Apple only), and Adobe Content Server (Sony, nook, etc.)
Other formats include .LIT, from Microsoft, but not really maintained, and eReader (PDB), formerly Palm Digital Reader, now owned by Barnes & Noble, but it's difficult to format, and B&M moving to ePUB. Smashwords is another, but it's really just a Word document formatted by their style guide, but it's a good way to get work out there.
eBook devices
Kindle 1, decent hardware, SD card option, 4-color grayscale, no longer for sale.
Kindle 2, 16-color grayscale, better processor, no SD card storage.
Kindle DX, 9.7" E-ink screen (E-ink is a low-power, non-reflecting screen, allows for long battery life, only draws power when changing screen, but B&W only.)
Sony Pocket Edition, Sony's smallest and cheapest, only 200 MHz processor, less storage than Kindle.
Sony Touch Edition PRS-600, about the same as Kindle 2, but has a touch screen.
Sony Daily Edition, 3G access (via AT&T), 7.1 inch touchscreen.
Barnes & Noble nook, 6-inch E-ink screen, 16-color grayscale (but color section on bottom for navigation)
Plastic Logic QUE, 105-inch E-ink touchscreen, business device, reads PDF, WORD, PowerPoint, high price.
iPhone & iPod Touch, can read a variety of documents depending on the app installed.
iPad, 9.7-inch screen, ePUB, eReader/PDB, Mobi/Kindle, iBooks, Stanza, and more.
Android devices, ePUB, eReader/PDB, and more (Archos 5 is a 5-inch tablet that runs Android.)
DRM systems
Adobe Digital Editions Protection Technology (ADEPT)
Apple Fairplay
Pros: possibly protects content from piracy.
Cons: Makes purchasing and using content difficult, interoperability issues, ties consumer to single source, effectiveness against content privacy unproven.
eBook market is growing at 200% per year, but still too much fragmentation now to know what the eBook market is going to look like 3 or 4 years from now.
Tuesday and Wednesday...
...already start too early (sessions kick off at 8:30am), but it feels like a really sluggish start today.
Monday, March 22, 2010
A WritersUA rogues gallery
Strategies for Web-based User Assistance
Scott DeLoach
This code-heavy session showed techniques for enhancing user assistance, such as sliding, fading, and expanding/collapsing text, pulling content from a database or another file, offering link previews, and allowing users to annotate, customize, and rate content.
So far, a lot of the slides have been lists of links to examples, at least for the sliding, fading, and expanding/collapsing text. And then Scott shows some of the effects at the linked locations.
Looking at link previews, Scott is showing lots of code samples in both AJAX and ASP.
Topic ratings are almost always with stars, seen often on MSDN. As you hover over starts, they light up. Useful to have text to explain what they are for, how to interact with them.
This code-heavy session showed techniques for enhancing user assistance, such as sliding, fading, and expanding/collapsing text, pulling content from a database or another file, offering link previews, and allowing users to annotate, customize, and rate content.
So far, a lot of the slides have been lists of links to examples, at least for the sliding, fading, and expanding/collapsing text. And then Scott shows some of the effects at the linked locations.
Looking at link previews, Scott is showing lots of code samples in both AJAX and ASP.
Topic ratings are almost always with stars, seen often on MSDN. As you hover over starts, they light up. Useful to have text to explain what they are for, how to interact with them.
Structures, Semantics, Controls, and More: HTML5 is Here!
Char James-Tanny
Problem getting started; Char's computer won't connect to the projector. A presenter's nightmare.
HTML5 development began June of 2004. The working draft was finished in January of 2008.
We've gone from tables for layout to DIV tags with IDs, to structured areas, semantically structured areas. First public working draft in 2008, W3C Candidate Recommendation due in 2012, and W3C Recommendation in 2022(!).
We don't have to wait until 2012 to use HTML5.
New doctype declaration is . That's it. Not guaranteeing page will be valid.
Structural (semantic) elements will include header, nav, article, section, aside, and footer. Doesn't define where they go on a page.
Other new elements include audio and video, canvas, command, database, figures and figure captions, mark, and time.
Browsers are backward compatible, so HTML5's audio and video capabilities won't kill off Flash and Silverlight.
The canvas tag is for drawing. Check out Sketchpad.
Validation is automatic with input field typing. The field types include date, email, file, number, range, text, and url. It means you don't have to use scripting to do a lot of form validation.
Not only can you use the new figure element for graphics, you can use the figcaption element, places within the fig element, for captions.
As far as element and attribute syntax, there are no rules. You can mix case, use double, single, or no quotes, closing tags aren't required for void elements. It allows for easier conversion from older specs. Just be consistent.
Other new controls include drag & drop, editable areas, geolocation, and client-side storage.
Important changes. No attributes on body tag. Can link block level elements of content. You can create anchors (for link targets) with an id tag, which means you don't have to add an a tag.
Problem getting started; Char's computer won't connect to the projector. A presenter's nightmare.
HTML5 development began June of 2004. The working draft was finished in January of 2008.
We've gone from tables for layout to DIV tags with IDs, to structured areas, semantically structured areas. First public working draft in 2008, W3C Candidate Recommendation due in 2012, and W3C Recommendation in 2022(!).
We don't have to wait until 2012 to use HTML5.
New doctype declaration is . That's it. Not guaranteeing page will be valid.
Structural (semantic) elements will include header, nav, article, section, aside, and footer. Doesn't define where they go on a page.
Other new elements include audio and video, canvas, command, database, figures and figure captions, mark, and time.
Browsers are backward compatible, so HTML5's audio and video capabilities won't kill off Flash and Silverlight.
The canvas tag is for drawing. Check out Sketchpad.
Validation is automatic with input field typing. The field types include date, email, file, number, range, text, and url. It means you don't have to use scripting to do a lot of form validation.
Not only can you use the new figure element for graphics, you can use the figcaption element, places within the fig element, for captions.
As far as element and attribute syntax, there are no rules. You can mix case, use double, single, or no quotes, closing tags aren't required for void elements. It allows for easier conversion from older specs. Just be consistent.
Other new controls include drag & drop, editable areas, geolocation, and client-side storage.
Important changes. No attributes on body tag. Can link block level elements of content. You can create anchors (for link targets) with an id tag, which means you don't have to add an a tag.
An Update on DITA Features, Tools, and Best Practices
Tony Self
Tools
Tools include Arbortext, FrameMaker, xMetaL, oXygen, and others, but not the DITA Open Toolkit.
Content Management includes Bluestream XDocs, SDL Trisoft, Vasont, and others, but not Author-IT.
Publishing tools include MadCap Flare, Adobe RoboHelp, Antenna House, DITA Open Toolkit, WebWorks ePublisher, and others.
For DITA and HATs, "DITA support' means different things to different vendors. Not clear what "full support" means. Does it mean you can export? Import? Edit in a native DITA environment? None are DITA editors. Some are good DITA publishing tools.
"Haphazard" HATs provide capability to do hybrid publishing. For example, with Adobe Technical Communication Suite, have FrameMaker/RoboHelp integration, and you can import DITA and export to WebHelp.
Delivery formats, the changing landscape
DITA is a storage and authoring format, not a delivery format. DITA Open Toolkit can turn DITA into HTML, HTML Help. Eclipse Help. Commercial tools can turn DITA into WebHelp and just about anything else.
In theory, you can do anything with DITA content. If the DITA Open Toolkit doesn't do what you want, in theory, you can program it to do anything else. (Not easy for a lot of people; you may have to write your own DITA tools.) With "tinkering," using open-source plug-ins you can produce HTML Help, WebHelp, AIR Help.
There's more to life than traditional help formats. Help content may be delivered on phones, tablets, eBooks, GPS displays, heads-up displays, and more. A DITA transform exists for the EPUB (electronic book) format.
DITA Open Toolkit
Many tools use the DITA Open Toolkit (DOT) for publishing. No tools do help better than DOT (with plug-ins). Generic output is "bland," but you can specify CSS, scripting, and more.
With the DOT, DITA to "tri-pane" help is possible. With a bit more effort, you can make it better looking. With a lot of effort, you can get some level on context sensitivity. But pop-ups, drop-downs, and so on are not possible (yet).
DITA 1.2
Coming soon, with more improvements useful for technical communicators. (Remember, DITA is a standard, not a tool.)
Major changes include keyref, improvements in the content reference (conref) mechanisms, glossary and terminology, and learning specifications.
Keyref supports a concept called indirection, which is linking. You define key values in a ditamap, and then use a keyref attribute to redirect links to targets, which is useful for, for example, translation. A flexible way of linking, so it creates new ways to set up and use contextual linking. Removes context from the topic to the ditamap. When the topic is reused, you can have different links.
Conref push forces an element into another topic.
For glossaries, terms can be associated with definitions, and definitions include parts of speech, short forms, and alternative forms. They can result in automatic acronym expansion.
Subject schemes allow you to label items in the ditamap to classify items by subject and relationship. It's a full taxonomy of information. It's also useful for dynamic custom content.
Learning specializations will offer specialized information types for different industries, and they will be "packaged" with the DITA standard. The Help Subcommittee is working to provide user assistance specialization for DITA 1.3.
Summary tip: trust the separation of content and form.
You will need to use more than one too. You may need specialized assisstance, such as programmers and graphic designers.
Don't try to abuse the semantics of DITA.
Tools
Tools include Arbortext, FrameMaker, xMetaL, oXygen, and others, but not the DITA Open Toolkit.
Content Management includes Bluestream XDocs, SDL Trisoft, Vasont, and others, but not Author-IT.
Publishing tools include MadCap Flare, Adobe RoboHelp, Antenna House, DITA Open Toolkit, WebWorks ePublisher, and others.
For DITA and HATs, "DITA support' means different things to different vendors. Not clear what "full support" means. Does it mean you can export? Import? Edit in a native DITA environment? None are DITA editors. Some are good DITA publishing tools.
"Haphazard" HATs provide capability to do hybrid publishing. For example, with Adobe Technical Communication Suite, have FrameMaker/RoboHelp integration, and you can import DITA and export to WebHelp.
Delivery formats, the changing landscape
DITA is a storage and authoring format, not a delivery format. DITA Open Toolkit can turn DITA into HTML, HTML Help. Eclipse Help. Commercial tools can turn DITA into WebHelp and just about anything else.
In theory, you can do anything with DITA content. If the DITA Open Toolkit doesn't do what you want, in theory, you can program it to do anything else. (Not easy for a lot of people; you may have to write your own DITA tools.) With "tinkering," using open-source plug-ins you can produce HTML Help, WebHelp, AIR Help.
There's more to life than traditional help formats. Help content may be delivered on phones, tablets, eBooks, GPS displays, heads-up displays, and more. A DITA transform exists for the EPUB (electronic book) format.
DITA Open Toolkit
Many tools use the DITA Open Toolkit (DOT) for publishing. No tools do help better than DOT (with plug-ins). Generic output is "bland," but you can specify CSS, scripting, and more.
With the DOT, DITA to "tri-pane" help is possible. With a bit more effort, you can make it better looking. With a lot of effort, you can get some level on context sensitivity. But pop-ups, drop-downs, and so on are not possible (yet).
DITA 1.2
Coming soon, with more improvements useful for technical communicators. (Remember, DITA is a standard, not a tool.)
Major changes include keyref, improvements in the content reference (conref) mechanisms, glossary and terminology, and learning specifications.
Keyref supports a concept called indirection, which is linking. You define key values in a ditamap, and then use a keyref attribute to redirect links to targets, which is useful for, for example, translation. A flexible way of linking, so it creates new ways to set up and use contextual linking. Removes context from the topic to the ditamap. When the topic is reused, you can have different links.
Conref push forces an element into another topic.
For glossaries, terms can be associated with definitions, and definitions include parts of speech, short forms, and alternative forms. They can result in automatic acronym expansion.
Subject schemes allow you to label items in the ditamap to classify items by subject and relationship. It's a full taxonomy of information. It's also useful for dynamic custom content.
Learning specializations will offer specialized information types for different industries, and they will be "packaged" with the DITA standard. The Help Subcommittee is working to provide user assistance specialization for DITA 1.3.
Summary tip: trust the separation of content and form.
You will need to use more than one too. You may need specialized assisstance, such as programmers and graphic designers.
Don't try to abuse the semantics of DITA.
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