Getting Started with DITA

A brief overview for a couple of fellow Austin writers who have asked me recently how and where to get started with DITA.

Gentle, Anne. Just Write Click (2007). Articles>Information Design>XML>DITA

Review: What Excellence Looks Like

Comments on the magnificent Envisioning Information by Edward R. Tufte.

West, Mike. MBWest.com (2006). Articles>Reviews>Visual Rhetoric>Information Design

Structured Writing, Structured Documentation: What and Why?

A brief comparison of two often-confused concepts.

West, Mike. MBWest.com (2007). Articles>Documentation>Information Design

Path, Predicates, and XQuery

In this conclusion to a three-part series on path expressions, you'll learn about complex predicates, dynamic paths, and more. This article is excerpted from chapter four of the book XQuery.

Walmsley, Priscilla. Dev Articles (2008). Articles>Information Design>XML>XSL

Mapping Memory: Web Designer as Information Cartographer

The rise of the social web demands that we rethink our traditional role as builders of digital monuments, and turn our attention to the close observation of the spaces that our users are producing around us. It’s time for a new metaphor. Consider cartography.

Rester, Aaron. List Apart, A (2008). Articles>Web Design>Information Design

Potential Position Descriptions for Information Engineering Professionals

This article defines the tasks and responsibilities for up to seven levels of information engineers, plus two levels of management.

Capri, Steve. TechCom Manager (2007). Articles>Management>Information Design>Technical Writing

What Is A Controlled Vocabulary?

A controlled vocabulary is a way to insert an interpretive layer of semantics between the term entered by the user and the underlying database to better represent the original intention of the terms of the user.

Leise, Fred, Karl Fast and Mike Steckel. Boxes and Arrows (2002). Articles>Information Design>Metadata>Controlled Vocabulary

Look at it Another Way

Seeing the same thing from different perspectives is much praised but little practiced. We don’t often realize what we can gain by seeing another scene in the picture.

Young, Indi. List Apart, A (2008). Articles>Project Management>Collaboration>Information Design

An Introduction to RELAX NG

RELAX NG is not a capitalized misspelling of something you probably get to do all too rarely as a busy programmer and web designer. If you use XML to any great degree, you'll want to take a close look at it. It can help make your life as a web developer easier, allowing you to relax a little more.

McCullough, Peyton. Dev Articles (2008). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>XML

Providing Options in RELAX NG

XML schemas don't have to be rigid. Sometimes, it's best to provide flexibility and allow the author of XML documents to make choices. In this second part of a three-part article, we'll make some modifications to the schema we created in the first part, and learn how to make some things optional.

McCullough, Peyton. Dev Articles (2008). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>XML

Datatypes and More in RELAX NG

Welcome to the third part of a three-part series on RELAX NG. In this part, we will discuss datatypes, the grammar element, and creating named patterns.

McCullough, Peyton. Dev Articles (2008). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>XML

The Business Analyst in Model-Driven Architecture

From a software development viewpoint, model-driven architecture (MDA) encourages efficient use of system models. It also encourages reusing best practices as families of systems are produced. One of the main aims of MDA is to separate design from architecture, which places the business analyst in a unique and potentially powerful position within the organization. Learn how you as a business analyst can take an active role in this type of architecture.

Slack, S.E. IBM (2008). Articles>Information Design>Programming>Project Management

The Joint Czech and Slovak Digital Parliamentary Library    

After the split of the Czechoslovak Republic into two republics in 1993 the idea of creating a common digital parliamentary library originated. The Czech Parliamentary Library started this project in 1995 and Slovakia joined in 2002. According to the agreement between of the two parliaments the joint digital library should in its complete shape contain the complete full texts of parliamentary prints (proposals, interpolations, explanations, decisions, invitations) and stenographical documents (shorthand writings) from 1848 until the present, in electronic form. The aim is to create and operate an automatic system of current and historical parliamentary documents. In 2000, the project was awarded the prestigious `Czech @' prize by the International Conference on Internet Use in Public Administration and Self-Government. The Joint Czech and Slovak Digital Parliamentary Library is now widely used in both countries.

Malackova, Eva and Karel Sosna. IFLA Journal (2007). Articles>Information Design>Web Design>Case Studies

Filtering and Withdrawing: Strategies for Coping with Information Overload in Everyday Contexts    

The study investigates the ways in which people experience information overload in the context of monitoring everyday events through media such as newspapers and the internet. The findings are based on interviews with 20 environmental activists in Finland in 2005. The perceptions of the seriousness of problems caused by information overload varied among the participants. On the one hand, information overload was experienced as a real problem particularly in the networked information environments. On the other hand, information overload was perceived as an imagined problem with some mythical features. Two major strategies for coping with information overload were identified. The filtering strategy is based on the determined weeding out of material deemed useless. This strategy is favoured in networked information environments. The withdrawal strategy is more affectively oriented, emphasizing the need to protect oneself from excessive information supply by keeping the number of information sources to a minimum.

Savolainen, Reijo. Journal of Information Science (2007). Articles>Information Design>Audience Analysis>User Centered Design

The Folksonomy Tag Cloud: When is it Useful?    

The weighted list, known popularly as a `tag cloud', has appeared on many popular folksonomy-based web-sites. Flickr, Delicious, Technorati and many others have all featured a tag cloud at some point in their history. However, it is unclear whether the tag cloud is actually useful as an aid to finding information. We conducted an experiment, giving participants the option of using a tag cloud or a traditional search interface to answer various questions. We found that where the information-seeking task required specific information, participants preferred the search interface. Conversely, where the information-seeking task was more general, participants preferred the tag cloud. While the tag cloud is not without value, it is not sufficient as the sole means of navigation for a folksonomy-based dataset.

Sinclair, James and Michael Cardew-Hall. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>Metadata

IDEA 2008: An Interview with Elliott Malkin

Where the seams of information and public space overlap and intersect, Elliott Malkin creates projects that span genres from religion to natural science. In a preview of his upcoming IDEA conference talk, Malkin talks about home-movies, butterflies, and designing for unofficial signs in public space.

Danzico, Liz. Boxes and Arrows (2008). Articles>Interviews>Information Design>Scientific Communication

Cyberabstracts: A Portal on the Subject of Abstracting Designed to Improve Information Literacy Skills    

With the overall purpose of improving the information literacy skills of librarianship and information science students, an academic portal specifically centred on abstracts and abstracting resources is proposed. We take the existing literature, together with our knowledge and experience of abstract/abstracting topics and web-based technologies to conceive the research design. The research mainly consists of the selection, assessment and web-display of the most relevant abstracts on knowledge management, information representation, natural language processing, abstract/abstracting, modelling the scientific document, information retrieval and information evaluation. The resulting Cyberabstracts portal presents its products consistently and includes reference, abstract, keywords, assessment and access to the full document. Improvement opportunities for this unique subject-based gateway, representing much more than a mere subject catalogue, are uncovered as the starting point on a planned route towards excellence.

Pinto, Maria. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>Information Design>Databases>Metadata

The Information User: Past, Present and Future    

The emergence of research on various aspects of `information behaviour' is explored and its growth as a subject of academic research is documented. The origin of the field as a potential aid to the development of library and information services is noted, as is the transition from this status to that of a subject for research at PhD level and beyond. The development of the field has thus led to a division between the needs of academia for theoretically grounded work, and the needs of the field of practice for guidance for service development. There is, today, a disconnection between research and practice, to a significant extent: early research was undertaken by practitioners but today academic research dominates the scene. Suggestions are made as to how this disconnection can be repaired.

Wilson, Tom. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>User Centered Design>Information Design>Search

Information Policies: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow    

This article presents a brief history of the development of ideas about national and organizational information policies, from the first establishment of a UK Ministry of Information in the First World War to the present day. The issues and tensions that have characterized attempts to develop and implement policies on the national and organizational scale are discussed, with particular reference to: the power relations between the parties to them; the relative significance accorded to information technology and information content; the transition from formulating policy to acting on it; and the threats to the survival of those policies that get as far as implementation. In conclusion, the contribution to date of information science to the theory and practice of information policies is assessed, and suggestions are offered on directions for future efforts, in the light of the past of this interesting field.

Orna, Elizabeth. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>Information Design>Policies and Procedures>History

On the History of Evaluation in Information Retrieval    

This paper is a personal take on the history of evaluation experiments in information retrieval. It describes some of the early experiments that were formative in our understanding, and goes on to discuss the current dominance of TREC (the Text REtrieval Conference) and to assess its impact.

Robertson, Stephen. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>Information Design>Assessment>Search

Developing an Information Management Strategy: The Foundation Stone for an EDRMS    

All too often organizations have a fragmented approach to Information Management Documents/data is duplicated in many places and users are expected to enter the same information many times. Developing an Information Management Strategy is the foundation stone that should be in place before considering cost justifying or implementing Electronic Document and Records Management System (EDRMS).

Waldron, Martin. Business Information Review (2008). Articles>Knowledge Management>Information Design>Databases

Developing Trends and Challenges for the Information Industry Examined in the Context of the Online Information Conference    

This paper examines emerging trends in the information industry that are likely to be of interest to information professionals during 2008. These include web 2.0, enterprise 2.0, social networking, semantic web, risk management, user-generated content, universal search, crowdsourcing and new roles for information professionals.

Allen, Katherine. Business Information Review (2008). Articles>Information Design>Web Design>Planning

Novel Fuzzy Information Proximity Measures    

As a measure of information shared between two fuzzy pattern vectors, the fuzzy information proximity measure (FIPM) plays an important part in fuzzy pattern recognition, fuzzy clustering analysis and fuzzy approximate reasoning. In this paper, two novel FIPMs are set up. Firstly, an axiom theory about the FIPM is given, and different expressions of the FIPM are discussed. A new FIPM is then proposed based on the axiom theory of the FIPM and the concept of fuzzy subsethood function. Two concepts based on the idea of Shannon information entropy, fuzzy joint entropy (FJE) and fuzzy conditional entropy (FCE), are proposed and the basic properties of FJE and FCE are given and proved. Finally, classical similarity measures such as dissimilarity measure (DM) and similarity measure (SM) are studied, and two new measures, fuzzy absolute information measure (FAIM) and fuzzy relative information measure (FRIM), are set up, which can be used as measures of the proximity between fuzzy sets A and B.

Ding, Shi-Fei, Shi-Xiong Xia, Feng-Xiang Jin and Zhong-Zhi Shi. Journal of Information Science (2007). Articles>Information Design>Databases>Search

Judgments During Information Seeking: A Naturalistic Approach to Understanding the Assessment of Enough Information    

In this article, theories of human judgement and decision making are reviewed and their use by library and information science researchers examined. A different perspective on judgement and decision making is offered by the field of naturalistic decision making (NDM) and the implications of this approach are considered for an expanded understanding of how judgements and decisions are made during information seeking. This discussion is illustrated by a case from a recent empirical investigation into how judgements of enough information are made in the workplace. The article concludes with a critical evaluation of the NDM approach. It is argued that NDM, a recent development in decision theory, offers a new perspective from which to investigate judgements and decisions during information seeking.

Berryman, Jennifer M. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>Information Design>Search>User Centered Design

Design and Development of a Concept-Based Multi-Document Summarization System for Research Abstracts    

This paper describes a new concept-based multi-document summarization system that employs discourse parsing, information extraction and information integration. Dissertation abstracts in the field of sociology were selected as sample documents for this study. The summarization process includes four major steps — (1) parsing dissertation abstracts into five standard sections; (2) extracting research concepts (often operationalized as research variables) and their relationships, the research methods used and the contextual relations from specific sections of the text; (3) integrating similar concepts and relationships across different abstracts; and (4) combining and organizing the different kinds of information using a variable-based framework, and presenting them in an interactive web-based interface. The accuracy of each summarization step was evaluated by comparing the system-generated output against human coding. The user evaluation carried out in the study indicated that the majority of subjects (70%) preferred the concept-based summaries generated using the system to the sentence-based summaries generated using traditional sentence extraction techniques.

Ou, Shiyan, Christopher Soo-Guan and Dion H. Goh. Journal of Information Science (2008). Articles>Information Design>Assessment>Metadata