Performing Information Requirements Analysis: A View from the Top  

Usability engineering, instructional design, technical communication, and business process re-engineering disciplines have long co-existed as distinct entities within the corporate computer world. As companies continue to understand and accept the important relationships among these fields, technical communicators and educators find themselves exposed to a myriad of powerful new techniques that can be adopted for performing information and training requirements analyses. Information and instructional designers can now take advantage of higher-level assessment methods for performing up-front information requirements analyses... Regardless of the method you currently employ, or methods that allow designers to work with clients from a plan to employ in the future, you’ll want to ensure top-down, business 'entetprise engineering' perspective that your resulting data will give you the as never before.

Murphy, Debra-Jo. STC Proceedings (1995). Articles>Information Design

Personal Identifiability in the Icelandic Health Sector Database  

Personal identifiability is a fundamental question in the ongoing debate about the Icelandic Bill and Act on the Health Sector Database (HSD). If the data are personally identifiable, Iceland's international legal commitments indicate that a priori consent must be obtained from patients for the use of their personal medical information. The HSD Act presumes that one-way coding of personal identifiers renders the data non-personally identifiable and that therefore a priori consent is not required. The history of the debate on the HSD shows that the concept of personal identifiability was initially based on a notion of 'considerable amount of time and manpower' as a criterion for defining personal identifiability. This definition comes from Recommendation R(97)5 of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe on Medical Data. As a result of the Icelandic Data Protection Commission's opinion on the HSD, that concept was rejected and the resulting Bill and HSD Act adopted a definition from the European Data Protection Directive (95/46). The rejected concept, however, reentered with the idea that one-way coding of personal identifiers means there is no key that can be used to trace the identity of a person in the database. The question of what constitutes a key in this context is of fundamental importance. The database will collect and link data from different sources on individuals over time and therefore the method of coding must remain stable. It is possible therefore to construct a look-up table, which constitutes a key. Keys can also be built from comparisons of patterns of family trees as well as by putting generally available information into context The information in the Health Sector Database is personal information. Therefore reason and justice require that a priori consent be obtained from patients for the transfer of their health data to the database as Iceland's international legal obligations stipulate. Anything less is unreasonable and unjust.

Arnason, Einar. JILT (2002). Articles>Information Design>Biomedical

Personas: Matching a Design to the Users' Goals

We hear all the time from designers that they're faced with the huge challenge of designing products and web sites for a large number of different users. Many designers tackle this problem by making the functionality of the web site or product as extensive as possible. To do this, they outline all of the goals of each user, identify any commonalities between these goals, and add all of the functionality needed to satisfy these common goals.

Perfetti, Christine. User Interface Engineering (2001). Articles>Information Design>Usability

Physical, Cognitive, and Affective: A Three-part Framework for Information Design    

This article first explores limitations of the prevailing concept of document design. Next, it offers a definition of information design—a framework meant to broaden the popular perspective on design in our field. The article then describes in detail the three types of design activities involved in technical communication: physical design, cognitive design, and affective design. Last, this article suggests the strengths and limitations of this framework. Appendixes describe implications of this framework to the teaching of technical communication to majors in the field, to the practice of technical communication in industry, and to research in the field.

Carliner, Saul. Technical Communication Online (2000). Articles>Human Computer Interaction>Information Design

Politexts, Hypertexts, and Other Cultural Formations in the Late Age of Print

I have twisted the language to contrive the title of this essay because I want to interrogate the future of literacy, both its electronic formations (if indeed these differ from its pre-electronic ones) and its social origins and effects. Hence: I am using the unpronounceable locution e-literacies in two different ways: first, to mean those reading and writing processes specific to electronic texts (by texts, I mean a whole range of digitally encoded materials -- words, sounds, pictures, video clips, simulations, etc.); second, to signify elite-racies as in those socio-economic elites whose interests might be served by electronic literacies of one sort or another, or who might come to be elites by virtue of their ability to shape electronic literacies.

Kaplan, Nancy. Computer-Mediated Communication (1995). Articles>Information Design>Hypertext

PostgreSQL vs. MySQL vs. Commercial Databases: It's All About What You Need

Can you trust the leading open-source database engines, PostgreSQL and MySQL, to deliver the performance and features that the Oracles, SQL Servers, and DB2s of the world do? Not just yet, but they could offer enough to meet your needs. Find out how they stack up against each other, as well as against the commercial alternatives.

Conrad, Tim. DevX.com (2004). Articles>Information Design>Databases>Open Source

The Power of Syndication at the Click of a Button

Have you ever wanted to bring the technical know-how of developerWorks straight to your workspace or personalized iGoogle, Netvibes, or My Yahoo page? Now you can with developer gizmos. It's the power of syndication at the click of the mouse: no programming, training, or registration required. Add any developerWorks custom feeds, or a developerWorks spaces portlet as a Google Gadget, Netvibes Module, or Yahoo Widget directly to your preferred syndication mashup, keep up with developerWorks feeds on your Apple iPhone, or download a developerWorks Gadget for Google Desktop with the content you select from developerWorks.

Pfeiffer, Melinda. IBM (2007). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>RSS

Powering Pipelines with JAXP  

The JAXP API allows Java programmers easy access to the power and flexibility of XML parsing and filtering and XSLT transformation. However, while many programmers utilize JAXP for simple XML parsing or single-shot XSLT transformation, going further to construct processing pipelines often proves difficult.

Nichols, Thomas. IDEAlliance (2005). Articles>Information Design>Programming>XML

Pretty-Print XML Using a Generic Identity Stylesheet and Xalan

Sometimes your XML output from various programs is less than attractive. Spruce it up in a hurry with Xalan C++ and an identity transform.

O'Reilly and Associates (2005). Articles>Information Design>Style Sheets>XML

Prioritize: Good Content Bubbles to the Top

If everything is equally prominent, then nothing is prominent. It is the job of the designer to advise the user and guide them to the most important or most promising choices (while ensuring their freedom to go anywhere they please). On today's Web, the most common mistake is to make everything too prominent: over-use of colors, animation, blinking, and graphics. Every element of the page screams 'look at me' (while all the other design elements scream 'no, look at me'). When everything is emphasized, nothing is emphasized.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (1999). Articles>Usability>Information Design

The Problem of Ingesting and Delivering Complex Objects from Digital Repositories  

The recent emergence of online digital archives has brought educators a major step closer to bringing original, reusable digital objects into undergraduate classrooms. Yet having to search multiple archives through mind-numbing search-and-browse routines can make it extremely difficult for educators to use the repositories successfully in their curriculum. What educators need is a suite of tools that allow them to reduce the search for relevance, expand the metadata with user-specific annotation, and tie the digital libraries' content directly to course materials. The keys to creating these resources are to build distributed networks of users and repositories. Cost containment often severely limits the amount of descriptive metadata that can be catalogued. Students and instructors create topical annotated bibliographies or lists of media clips (or segments of media clips) and 'publish' these for class, work group, or more general use. Allowing teachers and students to annotate and segment media as well as build their own galleries greatly enhance the educational value of digital objects by augmenting the minimal descriptive metadata and facilitating the building of complex digital objects tailored to the needs of specific education standards and curricula. The project uses a METS XML schema that provides an encoding format for administrative, descriptive, and structural metadata that is fully compliant with OAIS, and open source applications to facilitate ingestion and delivery (as well as help to control costs).

Kornbluh, Mark, Jerry Goldman and Dean Rehberger. Michigan State University (2005). Articles>Information Design>Metadata>XML

Publishing XML Content with XSL    

How do you convert your application-neutral, vendor-neutral, unformatted XML content into paginated content (such as PDF) or HTML? O'Keefe introduces one solution: the Extensible Stylesheet Language, a programming language for processing XML.

O'Keefe, Sarah S. Intercom (2008). Articles>Information Design>XML>XSL

Putting the "Technical" in "Technical Writer"  

Owens explains how technical writers can bolster their credentials as technically knowledgeable employees. He provides brief introductions to technologies that technical writers are most likely to encounter on the job: programming languages, databases, and Web server technologies.

Owens, David. Intercom (2003). Articles>Writing>Information Design>Technical Writing

Python and XML

Python and XML are two very different animals, each with a rich history. Python is a full-scale programming language that has grown from scripting world roots in a very organic way, through the vision and guidance of Python's inventor, Guido van Rossum. Guido continues to take into account the needs of Python developers as Python matures. XML, on the other hand, though strongly impacted by the ideas of a small cadre of visionaries, has grown from standards-committee roots. It has seen both quiet adoption and wrenching battles over its future. Why bother putting the two technologies together?

Jones, Christopher A. and Fred L. Drake. O'Reilly and Associates (2001). Articles>Information Design>Programming>XML

Quality and Information Product Development  

Quality is defined as customer satisfaction, and an information product can be online or paper. With this in mind, basic steps in developing one kind of quality information product – online help – include: determine contents in terms of resources and user needs, develop a style guide, develop a prototype, test and redesign, and be open to change. It is easy to adapt these steps to apply to any information product. Quality is even further assured by placing these steps into a quality improvement process model context that includes identifying outputs, determining customers and customer requirements, converting requirements into processes, measuring outputs, and evaluating results.

Evans, Jeanette P. STC Proceedings (1996). Articles>Information Design>Quality

Quality Criteria for Indexes, Website Navigation and Search    

When users find the answers they are looking for, the investment in technical documentation gets a chance to pay off. In large volumes of technical information, just finding the answer can be half the battle. Microsoft found that users of its intranet were spending an average of 2.5 hours per day online - 50% of that being searching. This article was written as part of an experimental online workshop with the MITWA (Mentors, Indexers, Technical Writers & Associates) discussion group(http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MITWA/). The article retains the workshop format including learning assignments.

Brown, Fred. International Journal for Technical Communication (2006). Articles>Information Design>Web Design>Technical Writing

Quality Resources on the Web  

Karl Smart highlights several Web sites about quality and quality issues that technical communicators may want to browse.

Smart, Karl L. Intercom (2000). Articles>Information Design>Quality>Assessment

Qué es la Arquitectura de la Información

El estudio de la organización de la información con el objetivo de permitir al usuario encontrar su vía de navegación hacia el conocimiento y la comprensión de la información.

Fernandez, Francisco Jesus Martin and Yusef Hassan Montero. Nosolousabilidad.com (2002). (Spanish) Articles>Information Design

Querying Databases in Microsoft SQL Server 2005

This hands-on tutorial should help you in understanding the interface available for querying MS SQL Server 2005 databases. Some of the major features will be discussed as related to their use rather than going into a lot of details. Querying the database is one of the most basic activities that is routinely and frequently performed.

Krishnaswamy, Jayaram. ASP Free (2006). Articles>Information Design>Databases>SQL

Question and Answer Method of Generating Manuals  

Several Texas Instruments writing groups are using a new manual publication method that emphasizes more customer interaction early in the manual development process. This emphasis brings project teams and customers together to accurately define their expectations for the documentation. Writers chunk information as they create the manuals, which allows reviewers to look at the small pieces one at a time and to focus only on those chunks containing information pertinent to their particular expertise. This method defines manual parameters early in the process, which simplifies usability testing.

Lang, Darice. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>Documentation>Information Design

Ranganathan for Information Architects

S.R. Ranganathan was the greatest librarian of the 20th Century. His ideas influenced every aspect of library science, yet, as impressive as his accomplishments were, Ranganathan didn't start out with the intention of becoming a librarian at all.

Steckel, Mike. Boxes and Arrows (2002). Articles>Information Design>History

RELAX NG

RELAX NG is a simple schema language for XML, based on RELAX and TREX. A RELAX NG schema specifies a pattern for the structure and content of an XML document. A RELAX NG schema thus identifies a class of XML documents consisting of those documents that match the pattern. A RELAX NG schema is itself an XML document.

RELAX NG (1997). Articles>Information Design>Standards>XML

RELAX NG: Complex Patterns  

One of the key differentiations between compositors and simple patterns is that compositors are patterns that don’t directly map to any individual element withinthe schema. I emphasize this distinction because it can be easy to forget when focusing on a schema instead of the instance document.

van der Vlist, Eric. O'Reilly and Associates (2003). Articles>Information Design>XML