The review process is always a critical link in the life cycle of a technical document. The process is prone to errors and riddled with frailties.

Especially when multiple reviewers are involved, it’s so easy to duplicate effort or override a change unknowingly. It’s a process that needs to be coordinated, with a built-in lock mechanism to prevent simultaneous reviewing by multiple reviewers.

To some extent a software like Microsoft SourceSafe accomplishes that by refusing to save a review if the document is checked out by someone else. However, SourceSafe does not automatically deny a review attempt if the document is checked out. It just denies a save after allowing the review to proceed, which means wasting precious time for nothing. So one needs to be careful when using SourceSafe.

Acrobat.com‘s collective review interface does a good job in organizing the review process and allowing multiple reviewers to read each other’s contributions and enabling the original author to consolidate all the reviews into one final copy. Yet Acrobat’s solution, just like SourceSafe, is not-integrated into the main editing software. You create your document on one platform and then submit it to the Acrobat’s server.

Author-it’s review functionality is built right into its single-sourcing platform. It’s integrated to the n-th degree, like all other Author-it functions. You can write and have your document reviewed by multiple authors all under the same “software roof,”so to speak, without ever leaving the program.

Here are some screenshots that illustrates some of the advanced review capabilities that Author-it offers.

It all starts with a clean list of all document in your document, listed by not only the name of the file but also the template it’s based on, late of last modification, version number, status, etc.

(Click to enlarge the images)

From that list, you can select a single or multiple files for a review.

You create the review by assigning mandatory and optional reviewers, plus authorized editors to the document. Notice the sophisticated review variables that can be assigned on the left side of the screen, like review start and end dates.

To insert a review comment is very straight forward, through the Suggested Replacement dialog box.

One of the really smart twists Author-it brings to the review process is the social-network like functionality through which the authors, reviewers and editors can comment back and forth about the proposed changes and carry on a lively dialog in real-time.

If you like, you can view all such review chat and comments in one screen.

In the final stage, an editor can accept or reject a review comment easily by clicking a button.

Author-it also provides a graphical representation of the review status of the document.

Reprinted by permission

Much has been said already about how great it is to work “in the cloud.” I don’t think there’s anyone left who hasn’t experienced the greatness of Dropbox or a shared Google Doc.

Author-it Cloud login page

So where does that leave the technical writer? We technical writers and documentation managers are long used to our love affair and possessive tendencies towards our “files” and our proprietary authoring software. A huge part of what gave us value was the relative obscurity of what we do. Transforming huge swaths of knowledge and information into books, with endless links and ToCs that update and indexes that contain links. One customer even went so far as to call what we do, “knowledge geek magic.”

What will happen if we take all of that away and author in simple tools that were built for everyone to use easily in the cloud? If anyone can log into our software, collaborate, review, comment and critique, will our processes fall apart? Will the magic be revealed as a fake? Will we be replaced by knowledge engineering robots?

I don’t think so.

A big hurdle in the last few years of technical writers adopting new and more modern documentation approaches has been adoption. Every new “tool” has been more complex, more IT heavy and less independently manageable than the last. There were resellers and customization consultants for every popular tool. Why? Because no one was selling a black box that would work like you wanted from day one, and everything seemed to require a level of sophistication to deploy that the average technical writer didn’t possess. On top of that, money was tight, deadlines were pressed and few companies had 3-6-9 months to implement and deploy a solution.

There are no more excuses. Cloud is here. It is fast, it is easy and it is affordable. It is also easy to deploy, requires no IT management, no infrastructure and allows you work with and collaborate with people from their hotel in San Jose, at home or on an overnight sales trip in Katmandu (assuming they have WiFi or an Ethernet connection). For all the same reasons enterprise applications are moving quickly to the cloud, so too are authoring tools and solutions. Author-it is the first traditional documentation authoring tool to make the move, and I applaud them for having the courage and vision to make it happen so early in the game. For small companies or those with limited budgets, Author-it Cloud is affordable and full of every feature previously thought unaffordable or out of reach. Say hello to enterprise level features at a fraction of the old costs.

So the next time someone comes and asks why you aren’t delivering your content like X or Y company, you are going to have to think a lot harder about why it can’t be done. It CAN be done, and for less than you think. The time for a move is now.

Reprinted by permission

Challenge #5: Fear of Obsolescence
Another people challenge is personality problems with individuals who’ve played crucial roles because of their expertise. The one person everyone comes to when they have a problem, for example.

Once a CMS has been implemented, that person is generally not relied upon so much anymore because work isn’t performed in the same fashion.  So there can be issues from people who feel a growing obsolescence as their power base erodes.

How is this obstacle overcome? The fact is, many times it’s not.  Often, these people must be left behind in order for a better system to take hold.  Other times, however, it is possible to make the person ‘indispensable’ in a different area.

Posted by Paul Trotter, CEO, Author-it Software Corporation

Challenge #4: The People Factor
In our experience, the main competitor for a CMS is not really another vendor, it’s apathy.   Often, people who use MS Word to create their documents are comfortable using it and don’t care enough to try anything else – even if another program is more suitable for managing content.

The only areas of the company for which change is desirable are those where the pain of creating and managing content is particularly strong, such as product documentation – driven by deadlines, quality and other factors which typically don’t affect many other departments. Sometimes the opposite is true.

Executives frequently ask how the CMS can help on a more companywide basis, while writers wonder how it can help them specifically.  Often the true benefits of a CMS are realised downstream from the actual writing (workers from different departments drawing on each other’s work, greater consistency and efficiency).  Getting writers to alter the way they work purely for the sake of others can be a hard road to hoe.  In the end, the CMS is a two-part sell: the CMS vendor must demonstrate value to the organisation at large and to the individual as well.  It’s critical that every person in the process sees some improvement in the way they work.

Posted by Paul Trotter, CEO, Author-it Software Corporation

Challenge #3: Gaining Approval
The approval process for a CMS is an all-too-familiar barrier. While budget concerns might be raised the real obstacle is convincing people that there’s a good business case for a CMS.

Often it’s a generational issue: many older executives simply don’t see the value of managing information and the only types of arguments that are considered involve hard ROI.

Sometimes this is readily evident (where there is a high volume of customer-facing content), but if the issue is just making life easier, gaining internal approval can be difficult.

The answer?  Obviously, where there is a good deal of customer facing content or translation, the case can be made easily. But where neither item is a factor, the case should be made through the value of producing content that is consistent, graphically uniform, and ultimately quicker to create.

Posted by Paul Trotter, CEO, Author-it Software Corporation

Challenge #2: Migration
Migrating an enterprise’s existing information into this new format, requires a big investment in time and labour as the sheer volume of content is overwhelming in comparison to what it would have been 20 years ago at the time financial information was being converted.

And as this content represents 80% of an organisation’s data, the importance of the migration phase cannot be overestimated. In the end, migration requires a technology solution with some CMS’s more adept at allowing people to import content quickly, and in popular formats. Unfortunately, successful migration involves other factors, specifically the formatting of the original document. The less structured a document, the more difficult it is to import it into the CMS.For example, a manual created by a writer in the technical publications department will be relatively straightforward, since most technical writers are meticulous about style and formatting. But a manual written by a different department may present a different set of issues. We’ve seen documents created by HR, for instance, in which the writer came to the end of a line, hit the Return key, and then used the spacebar to line up the next paragraph.

Importing a manual with this lack of style involves much more labour and effort. CMS vendors without advanced migration capabilities may well propose that a company simply create all new content. But having already invested millions of dollars in their content, organisations cannot be expected to give it up lightly.

Of course, many of the same vendors are willing to provide migration assistance at a substantial cost – sometimes as much as $15 a page. One way around this is to migrate only the content that is absolutely necessary. Ie: don’t migrate manuals for products that are no longer manufactured or for procedures that have been discarded. The amount of content that can be left on the side of the road is often quite voluminous.

Posted by Paul Trotter, CEO, Author-it Software Corporation.

Challenge #1: Control & Management
Perhaps the primary challenge with managing content (which, for the purposes of this article, is defined as an organisation’s ‘human readable’ information, representing about 80% of a company’s total information base), is that there’s little or no control around creating it in the first place. Content is produced by a range of people at every level of an organisation, with usually no control mechanisms over it.

Another issue is the way content has been managed over the years. A good example is financial information. Years ago people wrote their financials longhand on paper, then in ledgers. This was followed by spreadsheet software, which simulated the written ledger in the way it looked.

Soon thereafter, the 2nd generation of software arrived which allowed users to manipulate the information more creatively, followed by sophisticated financial management software. This evolution of systems for financial information, which took place some 15-20 years ago, has not taken place for other content. In fact the majority of common tools to create content (e.g., Word, Frame, etc.) have never moved from the paper simulation stage.

Word processors essentially replicated the function of typewriters, and while they have become more visual and feature-rich they’re fundamentally still doing the same thing: storing information as linear documents. CMS’s have been instrumental in moving content creation out of the paper simulation phase into the database stage, which can’t be duplicated in a paper format. Basically, it’s a revolution in the way content is managed and mirrors the evolution of financial software.

Posted by Paul Trotter, CEO, Author-it Software Corporation

Another twist to this is is that even within the content management community, there isn’t always agreement. Here is my humble attempt at bringing some clarity to the subject.  My thanks go to Wikipedia and Peter Halgopan of Information Week for help with definitions.

CM or CMS – Content Management  or Content Management System.  This a computer application used to create, edit, manage, and publish content in a consistently organized fashion.  CMSs are frequently used for storing, controlling, versioning, and publishing industry-specific documentation such as news articles, operators’ manuals, technical manuals, sales guides, and marketing brochures. The content managed may include computer files, image media, audio files, video files, electronic documents, and Web content.

CCMS – Component Content Management System.  Content Management applications which break down authored content into granular components (‘topics’).  Core components of such content, can then be reused in many content products.  Research shows that as much as half of product support content is redundant and could be reused. For a large organization, reuse can yield significant savings, efficiencies, and quality improvements over time.  A core component can be something as small as a legal copyright statement, the first steps in a process that are shared by many processes, or an key branding message like a product name or tagline. Reuse allows the core component to be edited and maintained from a single source, and then be easily assembled into thousands of documents where it is needed.

WCM or WCMS – Web Content Management or Web Content Management System.  Content management system software, usually implemented as a Web application, for creating and managing HTML content. It is used to manage and control a large, dynamic collection of Web material (HTML documents and their associated images). A WCMS facilitates content creation, content control, editing, and many essential Web maintenance functions. Usually the software provides authoring (and other) tools designed to allow users with little or no knowledge of programming languages to create and manage content with relative ease.. Blogging tools such as WordPress, Blogger and Movable Type are examples of WCM tools.

DM or DMS – Document Management or Document Management System. A computer system (or set of computer programs) used to track and store electronic documents and/or images of paper documents. Some DM systems also have tools to help support workflow. The term has some overlap with the concepts of Content Management Systems and is often viewed as a component of Enterprise Content Management Systems (ECM) and related to Digital Asset Management, Document imaging, Workflow systems and Records Management systems. Contract Management and Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) can be viewed as either components or implementations of ECM. DM systems are particularly good for organizations with a high volume of documentation that needs to be easily searchable, as well as organizations that have to comply with regulatory restrictions.

DAM – Digital Asset Management covers content and files of every type, including images, video and audio files, MS Office files, in fact just about anything that can be digitized. DAM usually refers to a hardware/software system that helps to store and manage these digitized files. The term “Digital Asset Management” also refers to the protocol for downloading, renaming, backing up, rating, grouping, archiving, optimizing, maintaining, thinning, and exporting files.  Occasionally the term “Visual Asset Management” (VAM) is used, especially in the FMCG space.

MAM – The term “Media Asset Management” is sometimes used as a sub-category of “Digital Asset Management”, mainly for audio or video content.

ECM – Enterprise Content Management tends to be a bit of a all-encompassing concept but generally refers to systems that include content management and digital asset management components. ECM systems are usually fairly expensive and hardware intensive, and often require a significant level of IT experience to set up and run. The “official” definitions as set by AIIM (Association for Information and Image Management) is “Enterprise Content Management is the technologies used to Capture, Manage, Store, Preserve, and Deliver content and documents related to organizational processes. ECM tools and strategies allow the management of an organization’s unstructured information, wherever that information exists.”

The major differences between CMS and ECM? The CMS definition specifically mentions software; it’s a software system (or systems) for a the specific use of managing and publishing content, whereas the ECM definition refers to both tools and strategies.

I’m sure we are just scratching the surface here, so I’d be grateful if anyone can give deeper meaning to any of the above, or indeed add to the list.

Posted by Dunken Francis,  Web Consultant, Author-it Software Corporation

Welcome to the Author-it Blog.

It’s been an interesting journey working with our team to conceive, create and now deliver the Author-it Blog.  I previously thought of Blogs as the ramblings of people who ‘didn’t have a life’. They filled this void through endless hours of musing on subjects of great interest to themselves but of little interest to anyone else. So I did a bit of research; I looked at some blogs both within and outside our industry and ended up at the ‘source of all knowledge’… Wikipedia.

A few things stood out to me in the Wikipedia definition… commentary, online diary, network, and community. The ‘community’ aspect in particular tweaked my interest.

For many years the Author-it User Group has formed a fabulous part of what we are to the marketplace.  It provides an invaluable link between users. A place where they could share ideas, ask questions, provide tips to users and feedback to us.  It really is a community.

I see the Author-it Blog extending this community aspect by providing a medium for greater participation by our Author-it team.

The vision is a vehicle to open the doors of the company. To allow our clients, partners and prospects the chance to look inside Author-it, to meet us, ask questions and share ideas.

Commercial reality dictates that some of the amazing ideas and creativity that flows through Author-it sometimes have to be restrained, but I’d like the Author-it Blog to be a place where we can post our opinions, ask questions, solicit feedback and share our perspective with you.

While we are obviously biased, our perspective is born of more than a decade in the industry, tens of thousands of prospect meetings and over 3,500 client implementations all around the world.

I expect that we will challenge some of the general thinking out there.  Author-it has never been afraid to be different where we believe we are right.  We seek to solve business problems, not the symptoms.  To us the solution is always more important than specific technology fads or standards purported to be the only way to solve the problem.  In this, I hope we are able to stimulate debate and debunk some of the myths we believe exist in the market.

A blog is nothing if not read, thought about and responded to.  Your feedback is important to us and will help us improve this blog and its value to all.  Please comment on our posts, and if you feel the need, contact me personally with any additional thoughts.

Thanks and best regards,

Sure, but technology and the internet waits for no man.

Web 3.0 describes the evolutionary stage of the Web that follows Web 2.0. and was coined by John Markoff of the New York Times in 2006, referring to a supposed third generation of Internet-based services that make up what might be called ‘the intelligent Web’ – such as those using semantic web, microformats, natural language search, data-mining, machine learning, recommendation agents, and artificial intelligence technologies – which emphasize system-facilitated understanding of information in order to provide a more productive and intuitive user experience.

Nova Spivack defines Web 3.0 as the third decade of the Web (2010-2020) during which he suggests several major complementary technology trends will reach new levels of maturity simultaneously including:

• transformation of the Web from a network of separately siloed applications and content repositories to a more seamless and interoperable whole.
• ubiquitous connectivity, broadband adoption, mobile Internet access and mobile devices
• network computing, software-as-a-service business models, Web services interoperability, distributed computing, grid computing and cloud computing;
• open technologies, open APIs and protocols, open data formats, open-source software platforms and open data (e.g. Creative Commons, Open Data License);
• open identity, OpenID, open reputation, roaming portable identity and personal data;
• the intelligent web, Semantic Web technologies such as RDF, OWL, SWRL, SPARQL, GRDDL, semantic application platforms, and statement-based datastores;
• distributed databases, the “World Wide Database” (enabled by Semantic Web technologies); and
• intelligent applications, natural language processing, machine learning, machine reasoning, autonomous agents.

So, in a nutshell, what will Web 3.0 mean to the average user?
First, we simply have to assume universal adoption of broadband to enable delivery (sounds easy if you say it fast ..).  Once this is in place, my belief is that the online experience will become much more personalized when it comes to content. There is no doubt that we will see emerging technology dramatically change our interaction with the web at a base level.

For example Artificial Intelligence systems in development will soon have the capability to provide a “virtual” online assistant, providing human-machine interaction at far greater levels than ever before and the new generation of ’3D’ sites will be similarly enhancing gaming and related environments like “Second Life”.

At the moment, Web 2.0 allows for collaboration, discussion, and in most cases distribution; however the user still has to put effort into tracking down their areas of interest and has to actively pursue the content whether it be via groups, forums Feeds etc.

Web 3.0 promises a world where each user’s profile, preferences, likes, dislikes, wants and needs are so widely available via open data streams (for some, a scary thought in itself) that when surfing the ‘net, you will no longer just see “a page” created for the masses, but will receive specifically delivered content, personalized for you at a granular or component level.
Needless to say, the implications of Web 3.0 for the development of the CMS industry worldwide is huge.

Posted by Dunken Francis – Web Consultant Author-it Software Corporation (with thanks to Wikipedia for Nova Spivack references)