Tom Johnson interviews Carlos Evia; lots of DITA discussion

[Kristen James Eberlein <kris@eberleinconsulting.com>]

http://idratherbewriting.com/2018/07/23/adventures-of-techie-academic-conversation-with-carlos-evia/

And the questions hint at "interesting" perceptions about DITA, OASIS, standards, and more. Do check out Carlos's excellent answers ...

TJ:ÂI think itâs great that youâre on an OASIS committee. To be honest, I donât know much about OASIS. I have in mind about 8-9 people sitting around a table giving a thumbs up or down, kind of like an aristocracy or some other elite ruling class. How does a committee like OASIS arrive at a standard? Are there âstandardsâ that these standards committees follow in order to arrive at a âdeclarationâ about the way something should be?

...

TJ:ÂThe LwDITA spec is developed very differently from the grassroots model that other Markdown formats follow (e.g., the original Gruber Markdown, GitHub-flavored Markdown, kramdown Markdown, MultiMarkdown, CommonMark, and more). Do you think the top-down model (decision by committee) has as much momentum as the bottom-up model (grassroots promotion) has for adoption? Are there other standards that have originated from OASIS in a top-down way that have taken off?

...

TJ:ÂA lot of people point the blame on tool vendors for the stagnancy of DITA. Iâve heard people say that DITA didnât live up to its hype in part because the tools around DITA didnât deliver. Are you depending on tool vendors to deliver on integration and transformation of LwDITA? Will they let us down again?

...

TJ:ÂI find that people are polarized around DITA, either drinking its koolaid or spitting it out like poison? In your interactions with others around DITA, do you encounter a lot of similar polarized attitudes? I try not to present myself as anti-DITA, but it seems like youâre either for it or against it in the minds of many people. Why is DITA so polarizing? Canât we refer to it with the same nonchalance as a tool like Flare?

...

--
Best,
Kris

Kristen James Eberlein
Chair, OASIS DITA Technical Committee
Principal consultant, Eberlein Consulting
www.eberleinconsulting.com
+1 919 622-1501; kriseberlein (skype)