At CGI in Calgary, CGI and 4 sponsor companies are developing a new software program for production accountants in the oil and gas business. Along with the software, the writing team is developing the Help system using the DITA framework. We store information and reusable text in DITA topics and generate Eclipse Help. We have found the benefits of using DITA over the Help authoring tool we were using (RoboHelp) include DITA's reuse capability, link control via relationship tables and the output control through ditamaps. We anticipate using the content in DITA for multiple projects and products.

To begin our DITA project, we enlisted the help of Tiberon Information Architects to help us establish a suitable information framework and we've had a lot of success using the Q6 Information Architecture with DITA to generate a Help system that aids users accessing information from multiple starting points. Because of single-sourcing, users can find consistent information whether they use a top-down approach (accessing the entire help and navigating the tabs) or a bottom-up approach (coming from a field in the application and following relevant links). Our goal was to have users find the relevant information in the Help system within two clicks.

The application has embedded links on every field and screen that open reference, task or concept information in the Help system. From there, we added links to appropriate topics in DITA, multimedia training information, Excel spreadsheets, external Web links and PDFs. The Help system organizes concept topics (using noun-based titles) on the What Is tab and task topics (using verb-based titles) on the How Do I tab. We've included an Orientation tab for new users to find key concepts for the application and access to Training information and multimedia videos. The inclusion of different kinds of information resulted in the name change from 'Help' to 'Knowledge Base'. In fact, this system has become the repository for all end-user knowledge needed to run this new application.

For more information on this, please email me (karen.lowe@cgi.com).