FYI: Summary Communications Between the OASIS DITA Adoption TC and ACM SIGDOC

["Dr. Stanley Doherty" <stan@modularwriting.com>]

Greetings Â

OASIS requires that all its technical committees revisit their charters and leadership periodically to assess whether the current actions of a TC conform to the spirit and specifics of their charters. My words. 

As the members of the Adoption TC attending meetings reviewed its performance and charter, it became clear that the prospects of our succeeding without adequate support from within OASIS was not likely. The attending members of the Adoption TC then approached organizations such as ISO, CIDM, IEEE, and ACM to determine whether those organizations might provide a better fit. 

Of the organizations we approached, the SCM SIGDOC organization seemed most receptive. The following two emails capture the exchange of information between the Secretary of the OASIS Adoption TC and the ACM SIGDOC chair. 

PLEASE Â if you wish to participate in the ongoing discussions about the future of the OASIS DITA Adoption TC, consider attending an upcoming ATC meeting. 

Stan Doherty
Secretary, OASIS DITA Adoption Technical Committee 

======= 07-13-2021 email from ACM SIGDOC Chair (Dan Richards) to Stan  =========
Thanks for circling back! There is interest in pursuing this relationship further. I have pasted the official language in our bylaws below regarding the nature of technical committees. The language in there is flexible (e.g., we need not have a dues payment for members right away).

Some ideas we have for what the relationship might look are:

    provide a workshop slot at each yearly conference for the TC
    provide ample web space to house any and all resources on the sigdoc.acm.org website
    provide a pedagogy-focused workshop in the spring to help build up our organization beyond just the conference; this would be focused on teaching folks how they might integrate DITA into their teaching/curricula; this workshop might bring in an industry practitioner who is using DITA for their structured authoring, and provide them with a modest stipend for participating
    SIGDOC uses social media channels to share new developments in structured authoring

So yes, there is interestÂjust looking at nailing down some logistics, starting with what you'd all need from us in terms of support!

Here are the bylaws, which have not been revised since the 1980s and are therefore flexible as we're revising all our bylaws as we speak:

Article 15. Technical Committees 

    Technical Committees (TCs) are subunits of SIGDOC, established to facilitate management of activities in a subspecialty of SIGDOC. The activities of a TC may include (but are not limited to) the following: 
        Providing information or guidance for the official ACM (or SIGDOC) representatives to any development groups or standardization committees involved with the subspecialty. 
        Developing tutorial papers. 
        Holding meetings to share and exchange information about the subspecialty. 
    Membership. Membership in a TC is open to anyone. TC membership does not confer any form of SIG membership or any of the privileges of SIG membership. 
    Formation. A majority of the SIGDOC EC may petition the SIGDOC Board for approval of a TC. A proposal for a TC must include:  
        a petition from at least 20 persons, 10 of whom must be voting Members of ACM and also members of SIGDOC; 
        a budget for the first yearÂs operation; 
        a set of approved bylaws (see Article 15.D.i); and 
        nominations of two persons who consent to be the TC's Chair. The petition will include a statement of the technical scope and objectives of the proposed TC. 
    Structure of a Technical Committee. 
        Bylaws. Each TC shall have a set of bylaws. These bylaws and all amendments proposed thereto must be approved by the Chair and the majority of the Board of SIGDOC. 
        Officers. A Technical Committee may have elected or appointed officers, as specified in its Bylaws. If the officers are to be appointed, the SIGDOC Chair appoints the TC Chair who in turn appoints the other officers subject to the approval of SIGDOC's Chair. Only a person who is both a voting Member of ACM and a full member of SIGDOC may be a candidate for, or hold office in, a TC. 
        Finances. Members of the Technical Committee will pay dues, as determined by SIGDOC's EC with the approval of the Chair of the SIG Board. Finances of each TC are supervised by SIGDOC in accordance with the financial accountability policy. Each TC is required to prepare an annual budget, which must be approved by the Chair and Secretary-Treasurer of SIGDOC. This budget will be incorporated in a composite budget for the SIG. Final approval of the TC budget is contingent upon approval of the composite SIGDOC budget by the SIG Board. Expenditures and handling of money outside the approved TC budget must be approved by the TC's Chair and be approved by SIGDOCÂs Chair and Secretary-Treasurer. 
    Dissolution of a Technical Committee. 
        Dissolution of a TC is covered by Article 13. In the case of dissolution, the assets and liabilities of the TC are combined with those of SIGDOC. 


Thanks!
Dan
======= 06-25-2021 email from Stan to some ATC members =========
Hi --

I had a constructive conversation this past Tuesday with Dan Richards, chair of the ACM SIGDOC group.

I provided him with a brief history of the Adoption TC and a tour of our OASIS Adoption web pages and repos.

His feedback was generally positive about our joining SIGDOC in some capacity:

    The vast majority of SIGDOC members are academics or researchers, so incorporating industry practitioners would be complementary.
    Many SIGDOC activities revolve around their annual conference, so developing a cadence for delivering more numerous workshops or presentations would be different.
    SIGDOC has not invested in many of the areas for which we have depth -- industry experience, structured authoring, content management, open-source repos, collaborative development, et al.. 
    Relative to the size of other ACM SIGs, SIGDOC is small -- perhaps the smallest with 200-300 members. To become  larger, SIGDOC may need to expand its focus and reach to include industry-focused topics.
    An exclusive focus on "DITA" may be a bit narrow -- perhaps something like "structured authoring" or "technical content design and management" would open things up.  

Bottom line -- our Adoption TC activities do not align with the current activities of SIGDOC. That said, perhaps what we are offering is exactly what SIGDOC needs to expand and reshape its mission.

Next steps:

    Stan -- send you all a summary of the discussion.
    Stan -- add this to the ATC agenda for our 08-13 meeting.
    Dan -- consult with some longtime SIGDOC members like Carlos Evia and Rebekka Andersen about "charter expansion" idea.
    Dan -- consult with the SIGDOC board in the next week or two about the conversation and the "charter expansion" idea.
    Dan -get back to us with questions and updates.

Stan