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Subject: Re: [dita-machine-industry] Status of the DITA Machine Industry subcommittee


Hi, Jang.

If there is not sufficient energy to revive the subcommittee, then it should be closed. But I'd like to hear a general consensus from the current subcommittee members.

Yes, I agree that few (if any) companies in the machine-industry space are OASIS members.

However, I do need to disagree with you about the use of DITA in the machine industry. I've seen medical device companies move to DITA and use the machine industry task without further specialization or only very minor specialization. Several European companies are using SDL Trisoft and the machine industry task also.

I want to applaud the subcommittee for the work that it did to add the machine-industry task to DITA 1.2.
Best,
 
Kris
 
Kristen James Eberlein
Principal consultant, Eberlein Consulting
Co-chair, OASIS DITA Technical Committee
Charter member, OASIS DITA Adoption Committee
www.eberleinconsulting.com
+1 919 682-2290; kriseberlein (skype)


On 7/24/2012 3:35 PM, Jang F.M. Graat wrote:
Hello Kris,

I totally agree that inactive SCs should be officially declared dead and I think the Machine Industry SC is a good candidate to kill off. A Dutch _expression_ states that it is useless to pull on a dead horse. I must state right away that this is my personal view, after having tried to revitalise and revive the SC for 2 years with no tangible result. We have been in a coma too long and it is time to pull the plug.

As everyone on the committee was involved in daily business and nobody from machinery businesses joined the committee to discuss their requirements for DITA, there was not enough energy available for the few active members to revive the SC. At the few occasions where we could meet face to face there seemed to be a renewed interest, but the follow-up proved us wrong each and every time. The last informal meeting I had was with my co-chair Jonathan Lundin when I was flying into Stockholm for a non-machinery related project. We imagined how the world of machinery documentation could be a much better place if only some of the important industries would consider using DITA and becoming active in our SC.

It might be useful for the DITA TC to understand why the Machine Industry SC is not working, and I do have a view on that. Fact is that true machinery businesses (and I am not talking about the Caterpillars or Siemens or any other large company but about the hundreds of thousands of small and medium-sized machinery businesses around the globe) were never involved in the SC. Some of us consultants were working for - amongst others - machinery companies but there was no immediate input from those companies into the discussions we had in the SC. In my projects with real-world machinery businesses there was no chance to talk about XML or DITA, as this is seen as a totally different type of work and something they do not want or dare to think about.

If I imagine myself in the position of someone who does work in a large machinery company and interested in discussing possible additions to the DITA standard, there is one enormous hurdle to take: my company will NOT become a member of OASIS just so that I, the manager of a small company that deals with the necessary evil of producing manuals, can have a say in a standard that might materialize in a couple of years and that has no connection whatsoever to any work anyone else in the entire company is doing.

I have tried to sollicit input from non-OASIS members who were in fact working in the machinery business but the LinkedIn group that was setup for this goal is only used for advertisement of software tools and hiring consultants. We simply fail to find the network where machinery businesses have their focus of attention. And as long as OASIS keeps focusing on software and networking and does not change their look and feel into something a business from another domain might even be willing to spend a couple of minutes on, we are not going to get people from those other domains on board in any kind of committee.

OK, my rant has gotten long enough. I have no solution for the problem I see with DITA and its too strong embeddedness in the realm of the software geeks. I tried and tried but I am giving up on the idea of introducing DITA into the machine industry. DITA is not at all ready for it, not in terms of the required elements, not in the required user-friendly tools and not in the marketing that is required to 'sell' the standard. Maybe in a decade. If a new Machine Industry SC is started at that time, I might consider re-joining it.

Kind regards from tropical Amsterdam

Jang

JANG Communication
Coaching - Copywriting - Consulting
Amsterdam - Netherlands
Tel.  +31 20 755 8466
Cell +31 6 5478 1632
http://www.jang.nl

On 24 jul. 2012, at 20:31, Kristen James Eberlein wrote:

OASIS has asked us to be more rigorous about ensuring that our subcommittees are active:
	• Meeting regularly
	• Having a minimum membership
	• Having strong, active leadership
	• Making demonstrated progress on defined deliverables
Accordingly, I am reaching out to ask about the status of the Machine Industry subcommittee. 
Is it time to close the subcommittee? Closing a subcommittee means that the SC Web page will be frozen and this e-mail list deactivated; the subcommittee can be relaunched later if there is interest in resuming the work.
Looking at Kavi, I see the following data points:
	• The subcommittee has not had a formally-scheduled meeting since 2010, although in-person meetings were held at both DITA Europe 2010 and DITA Europe 2011. Minutes from the DITA Europe 2011 meeting were posted to the SC mailing list.
	• The subcommittee does not have a chair.
	• There has been no e-mail on the list during 2012 and few posts in 2010.
I'd like to see discussion on the list about either reviving or closing the subcommittee.
If folks are interested in reviving the subcommittee, please let me if there are ways that Don or I or the larger DITA TC could help.

-- 

Best,
 
Kris
 
Kristen James Eberlein
Principal consultant, Eberlein Consulting
Co-chair, OASIS DITA Technical Committee
Charter member, OASIS DITA Adoption Committee

www.eberleinconsulting.com

+1 919 682-2290; kriseberlein (skype)


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-- 
Best,
 
Kris
 
Kristen James Eberlein
Principal consultant, Eberlein Consulting
Co-chair, OASIS DITA Technical Committee
Charter member, OASIS DITA Adoption Committee
www.eberleinconsulting.com
+1 919 682-2290; kriseberlein (skype)


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