Igniting a (DITA) pilot!DITA L&T Specializations at Gaz Métro
Presented by
Raymond BissonnetteSenior Training Advisor
Revision: 2016-03-16
CMS / DITA North AmericaReston, Virginia | April 4 – April 6
About Gaz Métro
Largest Natural Gas distributor in Québec
The only French speaking company in the CGA-AGA
Faced with
information management issues
some legally mandated authoring issues
increasing expectations from all consumers
training and engineering working closer
limited budget and man power
About our Training Center
In operation for more than 40 years
Part of the HR branch of the company
Three teams (corporate, internal an external)
Public offering under the trade name
École de technologie gazière
Lab containing over 250 appliances
Large workshop equipped for distribution training
Recently started writing work instructions with engineering
With the internal team (Gaz Métro’s employees technical training)
Total of 15 authors/trainers across the three teams
About Me
Working at Gaz Métro for 32 years
As a draftsman and service technician
As a technical trainer since 1989
As a senior training advisor for the last 10 years
Started scripting VBA when it came available (early ‘90)
Built a first web site in '94
Learned about DITA around 2004 *
Have been reading the [DITA User] Yahoo list since
* Through France Baril’s article (The mechanics of a single sourcing project)
Table Based Word Templates
Course Plan
Work Instruction
Hands-On Workshop
Custom Ribbons and VBA
Plan de cours
Évaluation théorique et pratique
Cartable électronique
…
Existing IA
Links Management Issues
Content Client/Curriculum/Courses
?lead to the creation of the “electronic binder”
The Electronic Binder
was replacing the
hard cover students
and trainer’s binders
from the ‘90s
Document Management Challenges
More job roles are continuously integrated into our
training programs and courses, lot’s of content is
shared between courses
Competency based grading (used for automated
dispatching) and unionized workers require a specific
exam by job roles
Keeping the electronic binder and the course plan in
sync is a challenge
Manually capturing the objectives and agenda table
outside of the content map is problematic
Profiling Exams in Word
was an unsustainable solution
Igniting a DITA Pilot
After looking for a while at products that could replace
our current toolset, a new management team decided
to start working on the information model and common
deliverables between our three business units
A representative Pilot Team was created and met with
Comtech in spring/summer 2015 to develop the I.M.
The first pilot, with the objective to validate the
proposed I.M. was conducted during autumn 2015
The Pilot Team
• Raymond• Senior advisor
• Pilot lead• Josée• Corporate training team
• Map author (OJT focus)
Josée
Manager Dawn
Consultant
• Simon• Internal team
• Map and Topic author
• Serge• External team
• Topic author
Devy Christian Normand
Senior
advisors
Information Model Overview
Using Custom Attributes
Is an easy specialization to implement
Recommended as a best practice in most implementation
To filter and flag content (for specific requirements)
To trigger Schematron rules against templates
The following attributes were added
ccms – explicit tagging (learningMap vs 1.3 new map types)
region – regional offices (for filtering regional content)
strategie – main learning strategy (mostly for lessons)
tag – generic attribute (leaving outputclass available)
unite – business unit (for specific team requirements)
Doc Types and Templates
Templates and Schematron
While Schematron does not provide the same
functionality as other schema types, it is quite flexible
and much easier to develop
Limiting specializations as much as possible
To a few custom attributes
And some basic constraints
Schematron also represents a possible foundation to
address our legal (gender related) authoring issues
While this approach might not scale to a large
distributed organization, it does fit our smaller team
context well enough
The Anatomy of a Template
Improving The Authoring Experience
Without the Editor CSS With the Editor CSS
mapref {display: none !important;}
Igniting the Main Burner
The modeling phase pilot was a success (autumn 2015)
We’ve been able to demonstrate interesting options
Applicability of the L&T specializations
Different reuse strategies
Using Subject Schemes
Schematron and Quick Fixes
Handling the pilot files to selected cCMS suppliers
RFP prepared with Comtech
Preparing for a Second Pilot
After the RFP winners are selected
With new users in a “sand box”
Creating Document Shells and Plugin
A best practice is to package customised document
types and transformation targets as a plugin
A doctypes plugin was created along with the pilot
update to the DITA 1.3 vocabulary
The plugin contains custom attribute specialization and
some basic constraints (mostly removing domains we don’t use)
Custom transformation types will be added later on
com.gazmetro.etg sets the stage to have more
Gaz Métro doctypes/transtypes in the future…
Engineering is probably next on the list!
Why DITA 1.3?
To better support learning content (assessments)
Richer markup in learning interactions
New learningGroup and learningObject maps
Integrated MathML and SVG domains
We still link to SVG files though
Investigating usage of MathML…
The deliveryTarget attribute
Frees the product attribute for another usage
The new troubleshooting topic type
Branch filtering
Outputs vs doc types
Preparing a RFP for a CCMS
Workshops were held with Comtech and RFPs were
sent to a few selected suppliers at the end of February
Proposals were opened last week and requests for
demonstrations were sent to selected vendors
A copy of our pilot was sent along to be used in the
vendors’ demos, which are scheduled for next week
A sandboxed installation will be used to develop and test
our custom transformations once a product is selected
Change Management
Involving HR and other collaborating departments
Progressive implementation
With three different teams
Progressive training
Structured writing
DITA, XML and Web Standards
The ETG Information Model
Working with an XML Editor
Working with the ETG cCMS
Coaching and support
Which is often more important than initial training
Changing Mindset
Old period/time driven map New module/lesson driven map
Matching People to Work on Smaller Tasks
Understanding How the Pieces Fit Together?
Communicating the Publishing Process
Autumn 2015 Spring 2016
Pilot 1 Pilot 2
The Conversion and Migration Processes
Conversion to DITA
Could be semi-automated
With manual cleanup and completion
Now needs to match the information types
Investigating Stylo Migrate to help with the conversion
Migration to a cCMS
Will we migrate every files?
The migration plan still needs to be worked on
It depends on the final products that will be selected
Vendor and third party will most likely take part in the process
What’s next?
Vendors demos and purchasing
Installation and configuration
Integration (development)
Plugin (development)
Testing (sand box)
Training (users)
Deployment
Conversion
Migration
Management (and Long Term Support)
Questions?
?