In this webcast recording, Alan Pringle discusses the challenges of ebook distribution and how Scriptorium has addressed them when selling EPUB and Kindle editions. Topics covered include:
Every department has its resident tech wizard: the maintainer of the templates, the DITA Open Toolkit, the wiki, and so on. What happens when that wizard flies off to a new kingdom?
In the world of superheroes, technical writers could just slide down a pole or do a clandestine spin to transform themselves into DITA technologists. Of course, nothing is that easy, so what does the transformation from tech writer to DITA superhero really require?
HTML5! Mobile! Responsive design!
It’s easy to get distracted by sparkly buzzwords when you investigate distributing your technical content as HTML. Instead, focus on a few basic but essential questions:
Being cognizant of your environment and adapting accordingly is a good survival technique for any being (as Darwin recognized), and it’s particularly true in the professional world. And that’s why I’m puzzled by how much time tech writers spend agonizing over style and word choices in tech comm forums, on Twitter, and elsewhere.
Your mission, should you decide to accept it: distribute content as ebooks.
When it comes to a line of text, how long is too long? And do the rules for text column width change when content is rendered on different devices?
In which we uncover some unpleasant realities about distributing ebook editions.
In which we are boxed in by the limitations of DITA indexing support.
In reality, collaborative authoring is little more than a euphemism for the idea that “anyone can write.”
That’s Tom Johnson’s take on collaborative authoring in his latest blog post. The writer in me sympathizes deeply because the “anyone can write” attitude is a direct challenge to the careers of professional writers.
