XML

JustSystem's new XML community forums

Ron Miller — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 09:27:20 -0500

XML is a complex technology to understand and implement, so JustSystems, the makers of the XMetaL XML authoring tool, has set up a new community forum where XMetaL users can discuss XML and XMetaL issues. In addition, the forum will act as a searchable knowledge base where users can access technical articles written by JustSystems staff. These forums can be extremely useful for users to share ideas and help one another. Press release

MadCap unveils DITA roadmap

Ron Miller — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 07:31:14 -0500

MadCap, the documentation development and delivery tool company, has announced a roadmap to add Darwin Information Typing Architecture support to its products. The announcement came during the DocTrain East conference last week.

The DITA standard was originally developed by IBM and now is an OASIS XML standard for creating technical documentation. XML content management enables you to produce modular documentation where you can write once and use many times and because you are using XML, can programatically move content through a workflow system. Mike Hamilton, MadCap vice president of product management, spoke about how this approach could help companies produce documentation more efficiently.

“DITA holds incredible promise for facilitating data consistency and reuse, but for many companies, it remains far too unwieldy to implement. Documentation professionals have had to become XML experts, obtain help from developers, or rely on third-party toolkits, which often cannot fully automate the required transforms,” he said.

MadCap hopes its approach will simplify the use of XML and DITA in enterprise settings. In the first phase, users will be able to import DITA projects, edit them and publish as DITA content. Down the road, authors can use MadCap tools to generate native DITA content.

For more information:
- see the MadCap press release

SPOTLIGHT ON...MarkLogic releases MarkLogic Server 4.0

Ron Miller — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 17:18:25 -0400

MarkLogic, the XML search vendor, released MarkLogic Server 4.0. Key new features include geospatial support to build location-based applications that search and analyze content enhanced with geospatial markup, and support for 18 different types of entities including credit card numbers, longitude/latitude and email addresses. The new version also introduces alerts so that users receive a notice whenever content matching the query is updated. This saves the user from having to manually conduct the search on an ongoing basis. Press Release

For more information:
- see the Geospatial demo and the Co-occurrence demo

Future web: Understanding the semantic web

Ron Miller — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 10:25:43 -0400

A lot of people are just beginning to wrap their arms around Web 2.0 and what it means for the Enterprise, but there is yet another huge web wave about wash over you known as the semantic web. Paul Wlodarczyk, VP of Solutions Consulting at Just Systems (makers of among other things the XML editor, XMetaL) recently wrote about it on the Just Systems website, describing how semantic tagging and metadata (and tools to help you do that) will help move us forward in the semantic web evolution. In a world with the semantic web, machines can communicate with machines, not just to dump data, but in a way that allows for a semantic understanding of the data they are handling. The tags and metadata Wlodarczyk writes about help facilitate this communication. It's all far too complex to explain in a couple of paragraphs, but we will be watching this as the semantic web evolves.

To learn more about semantic web:
- read the full column