Copyright © Joe Gollner 2012

XML

without

Tears

Joe Gollner, M.Phil.

Gnostyx Research Inc.

jag@gnostyx.com

www.gnostyx.com

www.gollner.ca

@joegollner

Intelligent

Content

2012

Background

Regulatory Agency for the Energy Sector managing:

• Regulations

• Process Documentation

• Submissions

• Public Consultation Outcomes

• Judgments

Pressures:

• Growing volume & complexity of regulations & submissions

• Growing complexity of the consultation process

• To bring costs under control or even reduce them

• Maintain or even shorten the process cycle times

Case Study: Regulatory Structured Content

Three Key Ingredients

Top Tier Management Consulting Firm

• Conducted a comprehensive process review

• Collaborated with stakeholders to re-envision the future

Content Management Consulting Firm

• Facilitated a wide-ranging analysis & modeling activity

• Developed target content models with rich semantics

Content Management & Publishing Technology Vendors

• Engaged to tailor their tools to support

• The re-envisioned business process

• Fully customized authoring environments

• Sophisticated management & publishing services

Case Study: Regulatory Structured Content

Case Study: Outcome

How do you think

this turned out?

Case Study: Outcome

Disaster

Over-indulgence in meaningful [semantic] markup

Insanely complex authoring experience

Insanely complex authoring tool customizations

Insanely complex authoring support tools

• Auto-complete

• Validation

• Packaging

Insanely complex processing scenarios [publishing]

Target vision disconnected from reality in key ways

Naively transgressed obvious legal boundaries

• Attempted to automate formatting submission after receipt

Generated unsustainable maintenance costs

What Went Wrong?

Lessons Learned

<$ Element element-name >

Semantics come at a price and

must be associated with a concrete use

Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML)

defined a Document Type Definition (DTD) as

[organizing] “rules defined by an application”

Markup Considered Harmful

Theodor (Ted) Holm Nelson

Is there any value in using meaningful [semantic] markup?

Infrastructures for Information, Inc. and

But You Said XML without Tears

Copyright © Joe Gollner 2012

XML

without

Tears

Take Two

Intelligent

Content

2012

+$

-$Formatting

Content Models Processing & Results

XHTML Web Pages

Formatting

Markup

Expedites

online delivery

Shouldn’t

have cost

much but did

Minimum

investment

Didn’t get in

the way…

Basic Markup: HTML

Different story

Cost of

processing

semantic

markup is real

Benefits

mainly seen in

more filtered

formatting

The outcome

is debateable

Inline Semantic Markup

+$

-$Formatting

Content Models Processing & Results

+$

-$Semantics

XML / DITA Multiple Products

-$Formatting

Semantic Models Content Models Processing & Results

+$

-$Semantics

+$

Balanced Markup: Just Enough Semantics

Semantic models provide semantic markup with the rigor needed to become really useful

Advanced Markup: Progression from Balanced

+$

-$Formatting

Semantic Models Content Models Processing & Results

+$

-$Semantics

More comprehensive semantic models co-evolve with inline semantic markup

Can we have Intelligent Content sans XML?

Two Answers

Even when you are trying to

not use XML, you are

probably using XML

• MS Office / SharePoint

Any application larger than

an eggcup will need to

interoperate with other

applications

• Exchanging information

• Permitting extensibility to

support interoperability

Intelligent Content in a Normal Office

Frankenstein goes mobile

So Explain to Me Again Why We Need XML?

Real Content Resists Definitive Categorization

Real Content Demands Special

attention

The Web & XML united

Browser-based collaborative authoring

Strong object metadata

supporting discovery & selection

Container elements providing

semantic guidance

Content input as XHTML

using common widgets

Minimal inline semantic markup

Attractive benefits profile

Easily extensible over time

The Human Face of Intelligent Content

Asking Questions & Raising Objections

or just making connections…

Joe Gollner

Gnostyx Research Inc.

www.gnostyx.com

jag@gnostyx.com

The Content Philosopher Blog

www.gollner.ca