http://tc.eserver.org/publisher/tekom A listing of works published by tekom in the field of technical communication. en-us Copyright (c) 2005-08 by the EServer. All rights reserved. tclib-editorial@eserver.org (TC Library Editorial Board) webmaster@eserver.org (Geoffrey Sauer) http://tc.eserver.org/images/newlogo.gif http://tc.eserver.org/dir/tekom http://tc.eserver.org/33031.html http://tc.eserver.org/33031.html Information about objects on subjects - metadata describes objects. Purposes: Information management and discovery. Metadata enables content to be retreived, tracked, and assembled automatically. http://tc.eserver.org/31142.html http://tc.eserver.org/31142.html What is the current scenario for applications and systems in the area of technical communication? Who is using which editor? And how many companies are using a Content-Management-System? To answer these and other questions, tekom conducted a survey from July to November 2006, which was conceived as an online questionnaire and made available via the tekom web site. 547 participants took part in the survey. http://tc.eserver.org/31141.html http://tc.eserver.org/31141.html In all companies, the requirements of an editorial system are worked out individually from the analysis of existing functioning and the definition of editorial and publication processes required in the future. The first important criteria for analysis are change frequencies and degree of reuse of the published information. The description of the information types as well as translation sequences constitute another starting point for the definition of a modular work process (single-source principle) and publication options (cross-media publishing). http://tc.eserver.org/28414.html http://tc.eserver.org/28414.html Did you ever try to use a machine that has been programmed in a foreign language? Or perhaps, even with an unfamiliar character set? Suddenly everything seems to be different although only the language has changed. This is the situation faced by many foreign users that work with German machines. http://tc.eserver.org/28416.html http://tc.eserver.org/28416.html Global organizations, particularly those in regulated industries, have to juggle a wide range of competing priorities. They must have thorough documentation, clear internal and external communication, audience-appropriate marketing materials and many types of “fine print” carefully crafted. That means that many different departments, sometimes spread across geography, must be involved in all layers of the business. In a regulated field, multiple touchpoints mean multiple opportunities for triggering a regulatory error. http://tc.eserver.org/28417.html http://tc.eserver.org/28417.html More and more businesses are expanding into international markets. A critical success factor for this expansion is high-quality, cost-effective and timely translated written content. Responsibility for this typically falls on internal translation departments or localization partners. Translation comes at a high price, exceeding the cost of writing the original content after only a few languages. http://tc.eserver.org/28415.html http://tc.eserver.org/28415.html Italian belongs to the family of Romanic languages. The traditional Italian alphabet has just 21 letters, but since recent times, five new letters j, k, w, x, y, have been added, thanks to the use of several words of foreign origin. Typical features are the use of the apostrophe ('l'amore') and the accent. http://tc.eserver.org/27921.html http://tc.eserver.org/27921.html The natural language interface (NLI) is a module that allows the user to access the information stored in the underlying database by typing requests expressed in a natural language. http://tc.eserver.org/27917.html http://tc.eserver.org/27917.html There is something to be learnt from the way a good architect works: before beginning with the planning, he takes a look at the site and the future inhabitants of the building, and asks them for their requirements and desires. He takes the general conditions imposed by building regulations and the budget into consideration, and designs the construction in such a way that the inhabitants can use it optimally. And this is exactly how we as information architects should also go about our business. http://tc.eserver.org/27925.html http://tc.eserver.org/27925.html As globalization of business continues at a rapid pace, employees are increasingly being asked to absorb and learn from materials that are not written in their first language. These materials range from key corporate policies and procedures that all employees must follow to specific training on products, health, safety or compliance. Very often this is training content created in English at the American parent company and distributed to regional and global offices, where in many cases employees are expected to have a “working knowledgeâ€Ω of English as a second or third language. But there are serious problems with this approach that stem directly from poor reading comprehension and also from learners’ misperceptions of the level of language facility they have actually achieved. http://tc.eserver.org/27916.html http://tc.eserver.org/27916.html The abbreviation DITA stands for 'Darwin Information Typing Architecture', an information architecture based on XML. DITA is not a mere reinvention of the wheel: rather, it sets the standards for known structuring requirements. The most striking feature of this architecture is the clear orientation towards a technology for structuring, which has already proved its worth in online documentation. http://tc.eserver.org/27919.html http://tc.eserver.org/27919.html Today technical communication departments are facing the challenge of producing a continuously increasing volume of technical documentation. Indeed, as companies accelerate the pace of new product launches in response to changing markets and competitive forces, so must the technical authors produce more, and faster, the accompanying documentation for these new products. We also recognize that information users are not a uniform group; they have different product knowledge, different backgrounds and may have different reasons for using a product. As such, they need specific, personalized documentation rather than a standard one-size-fits-all document. http://tc.eserver.org/27912.html http://tc.eserver.org/27912.html In the city of Konstanz on the shores of Lake Constance, Siemens AG manufactures equipment for sorting post. Also at the same location, a team of 16 experts create the corresponding technical documentation. But their work is not restricted to handbooks and CDs. Since ten years, this department, called 'Technical Media', has also been taking care of multimedia and training. http://tc.eserver.org/27922.html http://tc.eserver.org/27922.html The increasing number of languages that companies need to translate into requires careful planning when preparing translation projects. Thus, choosing appropriate tools, finding qualified project teams, and applying suitable concepts to avoid additional work become crucial tasks for the project manager. If all these issues are considered beforehand, a perfect balance can be achieved within the magic triangle of time, cost and quality. http://tc.eserver.org/27913.html http://tc.eserver.org/27913.html According to experts, the Semantic Web, an enhancement of the conventional web, is paving the way for new functionalities in future, web-based applications. The possible scenarios that we could face are reminiscent of fiction and cinema, where you just need to think of the question for which we are seeking answers. An invisible assistant would then perform the search. http://tc.eserver.org/27911.html http://tc.eserver.org/27911.html Digitalisation has revolutionised the creation and editing of graphics, and ushered in new forms of technical communication on the visual plane. In online documentation, interactive illustrations and animations play an important role, but creating them is definitely time consuming and expensive. But is all the effort really worthwhile? Are animated and interactive images automatically also self-explanatory? Or what are their didactic benefits? http://tc.eserver.org/27918.html http://tc.eserver.org/27918.html How many modules can an authoring system take? Or, more importantly, how many can the user stomach? What is the ideal size for a module? These are questions that are commonly encountered while using an authoring system. The finer the granularity of modules in the Content Management System, the greater the number of modules, and greater the administration effort involved in technical writing. Is there any way out of this quandary? http://tc.eserver.org/27915.html http://tc.eserver.org/27915.html About ten years ago, a handful of highly specialised consultants were trying with missionary zeal to establish SGML as the basic format in technical communication; today, the XML-standard is no longer something that can be dispensed with, and is, in fact, even mandatory in many projects. This article takes a look in hindsight at the beginnings of SGML and XML, and the current developments and standards around XML, and also hazards a guess at what the years to come might hold in store. http://tc.eserver.org/27914.html http://tc.eserver.org/27914.html XML, the Extensible Markup Language recommendation by the W3C, separates content from processing. When you author XML, you describe your information semantically using a computer readable and human readable syntax. The syntax of XML is elements and attributes. We call this semantic markup. http://tc.eserver.org/27923.html http://tc.eserver.org/27923.html Belgians do not have a language of their own. But the country has three equivalent languages instead: the partition of the Dutch language zones has been the result of a question of faith: With the freedom of Munster (1648), the first partition of the Netherlands took place, and, in 1830, Belgium was first founded as the catholic counterpart to the protestant Netherlands. http://tc.eserver.org/27924.html http://tc.eserver.org/27924.html After the enlargement in May 2004, the EU has now 25 member states and 20 official languages (not taking into account 48 minority languages). What does the enlargement of the EU mean in the context of Technical Communication and what are the challenges of the on-going internationalisation in general? The industry has to find a way to make linguistic diversity compatible with efficiency within the set parameters of time, cost and human resources. http://tc.eserver.org/27926.html http://tc.eserver.org/27926.html Sophie Hurst explains how, rather than leaving it all to the translators, authors can influence how their texts appear in other languages. http://tc.eserver.org/27920.html http://tc.eserver.org/27920.html Many Israeli companies maintain websites that support both Hebrew and English; some also support Russian, Arabic, and several European languages. As we worked with clients to help them improve website usability, we discovered that no one had analyzed the problem of bidirectional website usability. We assumed that the visual hotspot area on the screen is influenced by the user's mother-tongue language; that is, we assumed that a native speaker of any left-to-right language would view the upper-left quadrant of the screen as the dominant visual area, while a native speaker of a right-to-left language (Hebrew or Arabic) would be drawn to the upper-right quadrant. We further assumed that this difference would affect the success of navigation elements, such as menus and internal links. Because no viable data in this area existed, we decided to launch our own research in November 2004. http://tc.eserver.org/27905.html http://tc.eserver.org/27905.html Safety and warning notices form the most important elements of user information wherever safety and [product liability are concerned. A carefully thought out and systematic process is required in developing safety-relevant information, in order to increase the completeness and comprehensibility of product safety. This will also disarm any suspicion of gross negligence in internal documentation in case of missing safety notices and it will ensure traceability. http://tc.eserver.org/27901.html http://tc.eserver.org/27901.html For some time now, machines have been constructed and built using modules. i.e. encapsulated and reusable standard components. In manuals, the modular approach has only slowly been gaining acceptance. With XML and a wide variety of editing tools, the technical prerequisites for the change are by now only a matter of the individual requirements – a right solution can be found for virtually every purpose. But for technical communicators the question arises what needs to be considered when texting under these changed conditions. This language tip is intended to be a basic aspect: how can one determine whether a text component is suited as a module? http://tc.eserver.org/27904.html http://tc.eserver.org/27904.html The DIN committee NA 152-06-01-05 UA, formerly called the NATG-F 1.5, has published a guideline for compiling information from component manuals, in its technical report 146. This report is a supplement to DIN EN 62079 and is meant to ensure that the requirements from the Machine Guidelines 98/37/EG Appendix I Ch. 1.7.4 are practically feasible. Plans are afoot to introduce the technical report at the international level (CEN). http://tc.eserver.org/27909.html http://tc.eserver.org/27909.html The EU directive 92/58/EWG of 24th June 1992 clearly defines the notification on occupational Safety and Health Safeguards. In Germany, this has been enforced through the regulations for trade associations BGV A 8 (formerly VBG 125) which regulate indication of occupational safety and health safeguards through prohibition signs, warnings, instructions or signs for action, rescue, fire protection and so on. At present there is no European standard that discusses the topic of 'Drafting Safety Instructions in Operating Manuals' adequately and in detail. Nonetheless, there are several sources but often containing only imprecise or too generalized requirements. Moreover, many judicial verdicts in various individual cases point to the manner of formulations in Safety Instructions. http://tc.eserver.org/27906.html http://tc.eserver.org/27906.html The state and the government, as we understand, are responsible for the safety security of the citizens. The state and its organs understand this as a mandate and this also means realising the lofty goal of safety and health for all in every walk of life. http://tc.eserver.org/27903.html http://tc.eserver.org/27903.html Inter-operability is defined as the ability of two or more systems or components to exchange information and to use the information that has been exchanged (source: IEEE Standard Computer Dictionary). Achieving inter-operability of computer-systems and software can consume a significant fraction of the Information Technology budgets of large corporations, so it is an important problem. http://tc.eserver.org/27902.html http://tc.eserver.org/27902.html The efficient and automatic structuring of large document collections can be of great importance in various contexts: many problems in information retrieval, knowledge and content management arise from lack of structure. Document clustering is therefore widely applied in IR (cf., for instance, www.clusty.com) and knowledge management systems. It allows a quick overview of which documents belong together and how many important topics are contained in a given collection. http://tc.eserver.org/27908.html http://tc.eserver.org/27908.html TCeurope, the umbrella organization of European associations for technical communication, is helping with the development of a European guideline on user education for mobile terminals and e-services. The European Telecommunications Standards Institute invited TCeurope to a joint workshop in French Sophia Antipolis, where the draft was discussed intensely. http://tc.eserver.org/27831.html http://tc.eserver.org/27831.html In projects like 'Wikipedia', collaborative work also necessitates a common language. This was one of the reasons why a 'Wiktionary' or a 'Wikiwoerterbuch' came into being. Thus, the open source community has already set out to develop ideas for the management of terminology and its implementation. http://tc.eserver.org/27829.html http://tc.eserver.org/27829.html In recent years, the subject of terminology and its significance to technical documentation has gained importance. Training and education are paying more and more attention to this area, and an increasing number of software companies are offering sophisticated solutions to give companies a technological tool for handling terms efficiently. http://tc.eserver.org/27830.html http://tc.eserver.org/27830.html We the Technical Editors are spared of one worry which our colleagues from journalism generally have: In our work we need not pay 'so much' attention to 'as much as possible' large number of editions. But the situation is different, if we--as is always the case--are to also look after the company's web presence. What is an edition in the context of printing is here the so-called 'page ranking' among the major search engines like Google and Yahoo. Many imagine that a listing in the hits lists depends on chance or, that it is mainly due to some technical means. That is all wrong: by employing some clever textual work the chances of web pages being found can be significantly increased. In reality, even elaborate techniques can lower the chances of hits: Frames, JavaScript and Flash Intros often derail the search engines. And the results may look all right, but regrettably the page will no longer be found. http://tc.eserver.org/26769.html http://tc.eserver.org/26769.html tekom is the German society for technical communication. Nearly all contents of tekom's website have been translated into English. A lot of contents are free, others are for members only. http://tc.eserver.org/26357.html http://tc.eserver.org/26357.html Firms that export to the USA are faced with the challenge of having to deliver accompanying TD that meets the requirements of that country. This is true not only in legal or safety-relevant terms, but also in terms of the language used. Production and translation of multi-lingual documentation are part of an overall process. Even while creating the source text, the technical writer must keep in mind the translation into the target language. Unambiguous rendering, consistency in the terminology, wording that is appropriate for the target group and reader-friendliness are some of the highest criteria which would justify the use of a controlled language. http://tc.eserver.org/26358.html http://tc.eserver.org/26358.html Without a doubt, delivering translation and localization services for the game and toy industries is more than child’s play. These days, with billions of dollars in revenue from international sales at stake, companies are becoming more and more aware of the importance of delivering quality localized products to specific markets. With incredible growth rates in segments such as computer and video games (which make more money than the US film industry these days), but also with learning toys, board games and many other products trying to find their ways into playrooms worldwide, the industry is a strong player that demands to receive quality services from translation and localization vendors. While many of the same questions that affect any translation and localization project are also valid for these markets, there are a variety of issues unique to the game and toy industry that need to be addressed. http://tc.eserver.org/21590.html http://tc.eserver.org/21590.html A guide to help technical writers in all countries who have to write English-language technical documentation for products that will be sold worldwide. http://tc.eserver.org/18178.html http://tc.eserver.org/18178.html Det caddade föremålet skall bestå av minst tre delar, components. Vid framställningen av delarna skall både extrude och revolve ha använts. Hål, rundning eller fasning skall ingå. http://tc.eserver.org/14117.html http://tc.eserver.org/14117.html Diese Mailingliste entstand im Dezember 1996 als Abspaltung von t-allgem: Einige Kollegen entwickelten massive Abneigung gegen die Erörterung von Vereinsangelegenheiten. Um Diskussionen über die damals fälligen Satzungsänderungen der tekom in Ruhe führen zu können, kopierte ich den Verteiler von t-allgem und forderte die Kollegen auf, sich ggf. abzumelden. http://tc.eserver.org/14109.html http://tc.eserver.org/14109.html Die tekom Gesellschaft fï¿r technische Kommunikation e.V. ist ein europï¿ischer Fachverband fï¿r Technische Kommunikation. Sie versteht sich als Plattform fï¿r Informations- und Erfahrungsaustausch im Bereich der Technischen Kommunikation, und sie fï¿rdert die Aus- und Weiterbildung sowie die Professionalisierung ihrer Mitglieder. Im Mittelpunkt ihrer Bemï¿hungen stehen die Benutzer der Informationsprodukte, die von den Mitgliedern der tekom erstellt werden.