From the Rockley Blog
That's Intelligent (use of) Content!
Posted on July 20th, 2010 by Charles Cooper
Penguin books have taken another step to broaden their reach from paper books to, well, everything. In addition to their line of children's books/apps for the iPad, they have just announced an eBook with a tie-in to an upcoming TV mini-series.
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Jill Nagle interview with Ann Rockley
Posted on July 13th, 2010 by Charles Cooper
On July 12th, Jill Nagle of ZENGAGE had a short discussion with Ann about content strategy and customer service.
Jill's been implementing content strategies for clients for a few years, and when she first started out, Ann was one of the people she looked to for guidance.
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Prediction comes true, SDL buys authoring tool (Xopus)
Posted on July 7, 2010 by Ann Rockley
In 2008 after SDL had purchased Idiom, and bought a stake in Trisoft I asked the question “could an XML-based authoring tool be in the offing for SDL as well?” Little did I know that that was in fact early days as they fully acquired Trisoft and a year later they acquired XyEnterprise and all their tools. Now they have bought an XML-based authoring tool, truly giving them end-to-end functionality in XML and structured content.
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In the Land of Ebook Readers, how low can you go?
Posted on June 21, 2010 by Charles Cooper
It’s an interesting time for those looking to purchase a device, any device, on which to read books.
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Webinar audio available – Exactly What NOT to Do When Making the Move from Print Publishing to New Media
Posted on June 21, 2010 by Charles Cooper
If you’d like to hear the webinar “Exactly What NOT to Do When Making the Move from Print Publishing to New Media” with Ann Rockley and Brett Freedman again, or if you were unable to listen in at the scheduled time, it’s now available online.
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Webinar: Exactly What NOT to Do When Making the Move from Print Publishing to New Media
Posted on June 7, 2010 by Charles Cooper
Are you considering converting your printed documentation to some form of an eBook? There are pitfalls and problems along the way, but it doesn’t have to be as hard or frightening as some make it out to be.
Join Ann Rockley and Brett Freeman as they explain what NOT to do when making the move from print publishing to new media.
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Praise for the Post Office
Posted on May 14, 2010 by Charles Cooper
It’s not something you hear too often, but I’m really impressed with the postal service.
I received a parcel at the office. It was from the US and of course, we’re here in Canada. OK, not that impressive, you’re thinking. I get parcels at the office all the time – even international ones.
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Yes, you do need a Controlled Vocabulary
Posted on May 10, 2010 by Charles Cooper
About a month ago I blogged about the question "Do you need a Controlled Vocabulary?"
The post was a response to a statement from a client who doubted that people in his section of his company needed a controlled vocabulary, because he was sure that everyone used terms and names consistently.
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STC 2010 Book Draw Results
Posted on May 6, 2010 by Ann Rockley
We're back from STC 2010 in Dallas. It was a very busy week, with two days of pre-conference workshops and then a session on the final day. We met lots of new people, and got a chance to reconnect with old friends.
And of course, we'd like to announce the winners of our draw for the new 101 Series books.
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New Books from The Rockley Group
Posted on May 2, 2010 by Charles Cooper
As part of our 101 Series, we’d like to announce three new books.
Following on the heels of the successful DITA 101: Fundamentals of DITA for Authors and Managers, we’re working on three new titles.
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STC 2010 in Dallas
Posted on May 2, 2010 by Charles Cooper
Come and meet us at the STC Conference in Dallas. We’ll be at booth 308 on the exhibition floor. Ann will also be presenting “Content Management in a Nutshell” as part of the Preconference Certificate Program on Saturday and Sunday, and “Developing a Structured Content Strategy” on Wednesday morning.
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SDL Delivers on Dynamic Publishing Vision
Posted on April 21, 2010 by Ann Rockley
For years we have talked about dynamic publishing, but frankly it has been hard to do and we have often had to cobble together a multi-product publishing solution to provide full functionality.
SDL has just announced the integration of SDL Trisoft (DITA-based Component Content Management System) and SDL LiveContent (a dynamic delivery engine) to provide dynamic publishing of technical documentation.
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Metadata is a funny thing
Posted on March 8, 2010 by Charles Cooper
Metadata is a funny thing. It can help you find information, or, if it’s not well chosen, hide it. And of course, we don’t want to hide information, we want to let people find it.
Why then do so many people use metadata so poorly?
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Do you need a Controlled Vocabulary?
Posted on March 5, 2010 by Charles Cooper
I was just asked “what’s so important about controlled vocabularies?” The person I was speaking to explained that he felt that he didn’t need one for his organisation, as everyone knew “what things were called”, and he was sure that everyone used terms consistently.
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