RE: [dita-fa-edboard] Re: Posting the spec on DITA XML.org

["JoAnn Hackos" <joann.hackos@comtech-serv.com>]

See notes below.

JoAnn T. Hackos, PhD
President
Comtech Services, Inc.
710 Kipling Street, Suite 400
Denver, CO 80215
303-232-7586
joann.hackos@comtech-serv.com
joannhackos Skype
www.comtech-serv.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Robin Cover [mailto:robin@oasis-open.org] 
Sent: Wednesday, November 14, 2007 9:39 AM
To: Carol Geyer
Cc: 'DITA Editorial Board'; mary.mcrae@oasis-open.org; 'Neil Joseph
Schelly'; 'Greg Rundlett'; 'Robin Cover'; 'Jamie Clark'
Subject: [dita-fa-edboard] Re: Posting the spec on DITA XML.org

On Wed, 14 Nov 2007, Carol Geyer wrote:

> OASIS staff is discussing a few approaches to making the DITA spec
available
> for online comments from the community. Before we proceed, we should
be sure
> we're all in agreement on our goal and on our technical requirements.
What are
> we trying to solve that the current TC -comment list isn't doing?
>
> Goal: To enable people who are not members of the OASIS DITA TC to
more easily:
> - provide comments on specific portions of the specification
> - view and expand on comments provided by others
> - contribute comments that will be viewed by the TC and addressed as
> appropriate
> - Other goals?

Should TC Members be allowed to use this commenting facility to
provide comments, view and expand on comments... ?  Your statement
above specifies "people who are not members of the OASIS DITA TC"

JoAnn: I would encourage TC Members to comment in the same way if they
want to suggest clarifications of the specification for public
consumption. However, many of the editorial comments are made during the
development of the new specification (see 1.2) and would not be
appropriate for this public forum. 

>
> Requirements:
> - Solution must conform to the OASIS IPR Policy and TC Process.
> - Direct editing of the spec text should not be possible.
> - Comments should be appended to sections of the specification.

Is "appended" a hard requirement?  Versus, for example, "attached to"
or "associated with" target (lemma) text?  Some schemes might lend
themselves to annotation that is not based upon "appending".

JoAnn: I don't understand the distinctions. I think we don't want people
to change the specification text directly as you would with an ordinary
wiki. Then it would no longer be the "official" specification. I would
like to see comments associated with a particular text element, probably
at the paragraph or section level. For example, we have added comments
to the Translation wiki page of our new acronym proposal so that we know
who commented and what they have said. These comments differ from actual
wording changes.

Robin


> - Other requirements?
>
> Outstanding issues:
> - How do we determine section breaks? Are we talking about dividing
the spec
> into 10 wiki pages or 1000 wiki pages?
> - How will the TC track the comments and record their disposition?
> - Is this intended to replace the current -comment mailing list or
provide
> alternative mechanism for accepting feedback?
> - Other issues?
>
JoAnn: Each heading level in the specification is meaningful. If it's
written in DITA, we should divide it into DITA topics. That would
support our concept of standalone topics to the extent possible. Ask
Michael to provide info on the topics architecture of the spec.

I don't know that we need an official disposition of every comment since
I expect many of the comments to be informal discussions rather than
specific recommendations for change. Since each new specification
represents a significant change of the model itself, I don't think we
can record the disposition. The TC authors/editors should add relevant
comments here to the change plan for the specification for 1.2 and so
on.

I'd like this to be the official feedback mechanism to replace others.
Do we have a comment mailing list? I'm not aware of it? Using the site
as the feedback official mechanism would encourage people to visit. Can
we do an RSS feed for tracking for the TC and any others who want to
monitor the comments? 

This would not replace the work of the TC on improving the new
specification for 1.2, however.
> _________________________________
> Carol Geyer
> Director of Communications
> OASIS
> +1.978.667.5115 x209
>
>

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