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Subject: RE: Notes from OU.xml to DITA


From today's call: 

It looks like the answer to my first issue is to use the navtitle attribute of learningGroup. This basically maps to <topicHead
navtitle="">.

e.g., <learningGroup navtitle="Rounding">

Thanks Troy and John.

Any other thoughts on content such as OU's "Activity" (see below) are appreciated.

--
Chuck Allen
-----Original Message-----
From: Chuck Allen [mailto:chucka@hrinterop.org] 
Sent: Thursday, June 04, 2009 10:05 AM
To: 'dita-learningspec@lists.oasis-open.org'
Cc: 'troy.klukewich@oracle.com'; 'john_hunt@us.ibm.com'
Subject: Notes from OU.xml to DITA 

Since the last learning samples call, I’ve spent a bit of time working on a transform from the Open University xml (OU xml) format
to the draft DITA learning specializations. I've attached a package with an OU xml instance.

Thanks to John Hunt and Eric Sirois for assistance with the issues I reported in an earlier email:
http://tinyurl.com/q7mymu
The new version of the xsd's that Eric provided fixes my previously reported issues.

I have one or two other issues I've encountered that may be valuable for the group to consider. Perhaps we can briefly discuss. 

The first issue arises in trying to handle the depth that is within the OU xml format. I've sketched the rough hierarchy below. In
theory, DITA should handle this very well. I'd imagine the usual conversion approach would be output the Section, Subsection, etc.
pieces to topics and to deal with the hierarchy in the learningMap. As I mentioned in my previous email, one way a learningMap
handles hierarchy by allowing "learningGroups" to nest within other learningGroups. ***The problem I'm having with the current
version of the learning specializations is that I'm winding up with a good number of "empty topics" (empty except for the title,
etc.) in cases where an OU Section doesn't contain any other content other than a SubSection. ***

*** What I find myself wanting is the <topichead> element available in regular DITA Topic Maps (or something equivalent), but this
doesn't seem to be available. ("<topichead> provides a title-only entry in a navigation map, as an alternative to the fully-linked
title provided by the <topicref> element.") ***

**OU Hierarchy**
Item
-Preface
--Introduction
---LearningOutcomes
-Unit
--Session
---Section (3 in my test instance)
----SubSection
-----SubSubSection
------Activity
-------Question
-------Answer
-BackMatter

The other issue I'm running into may simply be that "Activity" sections in the OU.xml may not have a exact equivalent in the
learning specialization. Conceptually, this stuff looks like assessment content (question and answer content), but the OU xml seems
to have more complex Q&A content than in the DITA specializations. If you take a look through the OU instance, you'll find things
like tables in Q&A content. 

One thought is that this stuff (Q&A content) isn't really semantically equivalent. Perhaps "Activity" content just maps out to
generic "topic" content. I'd welcome any other ideas on how to map the below.

<Activity id="ACT032">
<Question>
<Paragraph><b>6</b> Use your estimating skills and common sense to check the following calculation, line by line, for the cost of
papering an irregularly shaped room with simple non-patterned wallpaper.</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Height of walls = 275 cm</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Width of walls = 512 + 346 + 234 + 748 × 2 = 2588 cm</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Width of wallpaper = 50 cm</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Number of pieces of wallpaper needed = 2588 ÷ 50 = 51.76</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Total length of wallpaper needed = 51.76 × 275 = 14 234 cm</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Length of one roll = 10 m</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Cost of one roll = £4.00</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Number of rolls = 14 234 ÷ 10</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   Total cost = £4.00 × <InlineEquation shiftby="-4"><Image src="MU120_A_I177e.gif"/><Description/></InlineEquation> =
£5693.60</Paragraph></Question>
<Answer>

<Paragraph>The calculator calculations themselves are correct, but the total cost of over £5000 should suggest that something has
gone wrong. The problem is that the length of a wallpaper roll is in metres (m) but the height of the room is in centimetres (cm).
Hence the answer is out by a factor of 100. The correct answer for the total cost is therefore £5693.6 ÷ 100 = £56.94 (to the
nearest penny).</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>Also, the number of pieces probably needs to be a whole number, as does the number of rolls. So these answers need to be
rounded up:</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   number of pieces = 52</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>   number of rolls =  <InlineEquation shiftby="-4"><Image src="MU120_A_I178e.gif"/><Description/></InlineEquation>  =
14.3, rounded up to 15 rolls.</Paragraph>
<Paragraph>Therefore the total cost is £4.00 × 15 = £60 (rather than nearly £5000).</Paragraph>
</Answer></Activity>

Talk to you soon.

--
Chuck Allen,
Founder, HR-XML, HRInterop.org
+1 919 247 6881
-----------------------------------------------
http://www.hrinterop.org
A laser focus on HR services Interoperability
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