Revision of What is your DITA Quotient (D.Q.)? from Fri, 2008-04-18 01:19

The idea behind the DITA Quotient is a rough but quantitative numerical estimate of the applicabilty of DITA to your content. You simply answer ten questions and get an estimate of the value of DITA for your organization.

DITA News will publish the average numbers for everyone filling in the questionnaire, so you will be able to compare yourself to others. And we will track the average answers for the ten questions over time, to see how DITA is being adopted and how its various capabilities are being utilized.

Below is the questionnaire content. The questionnaire is anonymous. No information about your organization is collected.

To estimate your D.Q., fill in the online form at DITA News.

You will receive a printable list of your answers, which outline the main DITA capabilities and provide a checklist of your priorities for DITA.

Is content management important?

Do you manage your content using a content management system?

  • Yes
  • No

Is structure important?

Do you structure your content? Do you have an information architecture (e.g., a taxonomy)? Do you have a document architecture (e.g., content model)?

  • Information architecture and document architecture
  • Information architecture (e.g., taxonomy)
  • Document architecture (content models)
  • Unstructured content

Is content reuse important?

How much of your content gets reused in other contexts?

  • A lot
  • Some
  • A little
  • None

Is single-sourcing important?

Do you publish content to multiple output formats and channels (e.g., web/HTML and print/PDF)?

  • Yes
  • No

Is translation/localization important?

Is your content multi-lingual?

  • Yes
  • No

Do you markup your content?

Does your content have metadata?

  • Semantic, structural, and style tags
  • Structural and style tags
  • Style/format/presentation/layout tags only

Is your content modular?

Is your content created in small chunks/topics?

  • Yes. (content is readable in any order, like help topics)
  • No. (content is long linear narrative)

Is your content conditional?

Do you serve different content to different audiences?

  • Yes
  • No

Is your content task-oriented and minimalist?

Do you follow these documentation best practices?

  • Minimalist and task-oriented
  • Task-oriented
  • Minimalist
  • Neither

Is standardization important?

Do you want to use practices that are shared in your industry/profession?

  • Yes
  • No
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