Full DITA compatibility

The call we had on Monday got me thinking about the DITA compatibility. Should it be possible to switch to the full DITA by just switching the doctype?
What is the goal of this subcommittee? To create the best possible subset of DITA? Or to create something that borrows the best concepts from DITA and puts it in a lightweight format? If it is the latter, it should be possible for us to drop direct compatibility to allow for a simpler solution. I feel that if we answer this now, it would set a better context for all following discussions.

Also when we're talking about simplicity, we need to think about what makes a document model simple. What are properties that make a model simple? Is simplicity something with the greatest amount of freedom? Or is simplicity a model that is as restrictive as possible, relieving the author from making certain choices? Or do we mean simplicity for processing the content?

Markdown is an example where simplicity is accomplished through offering freedom. As long as you know the vocabulary, you can write your content. No need to worry about if one element is allowed in another element - all types of content are generally allowed everywhere.
The exact opposite of Markdown, but what still could be considered simple, is a very restrictive xml schema. Because of the restrictions, it becomes clear what to do, and writing documents is almost like filling in a form.

The current full DITA standard is from an authoring perspective neither of above examples. It does not offer enough freedom to just "tag" your content as in Markdown, though it is not restrictive enough to give real clarity in how it should be used. Do we want to attempt to improve on this? And can we do something about that if we're keeping the full DITA compatibility?

Fredrik Geers | Product Owner SDL LiveContent Create/SDL Xopus | SDL | (t) +31 (0)20 201 0500 | (e) fgeers@sdl.com

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