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The Central Texas DITA Users Group (CTDUG) exists to share and advance knowledge and adoption of DITA in the central Texas region.

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May 2010 Meeting

Implementing Context-Sensitive Help - Technology isn't the only challenge

Creating a successful context-sensitive help solution requires the cooperation and respect of two groups which have a history of poor working relations: Development and Technical Publications. Each group has an established "best practice", i.e. "the way", that ensures a successful deliverable. Tension comes from an unwillingness to compromise on those established practices. Compromise means change, change that will either enable the creation of useful customer solutions or change that results in broken builds, failure, and finger pointing. Success is achieved by building trust and understanding between these groups before moving on to technical affairs.

Presenters

Stan Doherty and Ben Allums

Ben Allums is currently the Director of Engineering at WebWorks, a division of Quadralay Corporation. Ben started working with the company founders, Tony and Jeff, back in 1994 to create one of the earliest single-source publishing tools, WebWorks Publisher. Over the years, Ben has evolved both the tools and authoring practices necessary to deliver context-sensitive help solutions for technical documentation teams across industries and help technologies.

Stan Doherty (sdoherty@verivue.com) is currently Director of Technical Publications at Verivue Inc., a Massachusetts networking startup. Stan has been involved with OLH (online help) development for over 25 years:

• Character-based OLH for VAX/VMS, IBM System 390, and MS-DOS software applications
• Platform-specific OLH applications (WinHelp, OS/2 Help, JavaHelp)
• DocBook-based OLH authored in SGML and XML
• Web-based OLH

Stan has been working with DITA-authored OLH as a member of the OASIS DITA Technical Committee and OASIS DITA TC Help Subcommittee.

Meeting Details

When

• Wednesday May 26, 2010, 5:00 networking, program at 5:30 pm Central (to coincide with a 6:30 EST start with the Boston and Research-Triangle Park groups)

Where

• Freescale's Parmer campus
• Round Up conference room, Bldg B

Agenda

• 5:00-5:30 - Networking
• 5:30-7:00 - Presentation
• 7:00-7:30 - Discussion, more networking

BYOS

We sort of miss the snacks of old (back when hi-tech meant money for such things). Might we suggest that if you want, bring your own beverage and a box of snacks that you would like to share with others? (Apologies, but Freescale policy prohibits alcoholic beverages on-site, so leave your longnecks behind, please.)

Directions

• http://tinyurl.com/fsl-austin-parmer
• Enter building B, sign in at the guard desk, and proceed to the Round Up conference room (follow the signs)

Previous CTDUG Meeting Notes