MY GRADUATE PROJECT

This is my graduate project written in oXygen tool and uploaded to GitHub Pages. This is the link where you can find the repository of this project.https://github.com/madzka/docs-about-the-docs

The purpose of this documentation is to show for future students what they can achieve and learn during Technical Communication studies as well as the steps one has to take in order to produce techncial documentation. . It contains resources as well as information every student should have in order to complete their Graduate Project by applying the knowledge and skills gained in the program. This documentation shows the process of documentation development.

This is the final project which presents the result of Technical Communications studies at Vistula University in Warsaw. You can find more info about this postgraduate studies at https://www.vistula.edu.pl/kierunki-studiow/kontynuacja-edukacji/studia-podyplomowe/informatyka/komunikacja-techniczna

This documentation was created by Magdalena O.

WHY oXygen AND DITA IN MY PROCESS OF DOCUMENTATION

During my studies I have worked with oXygen XML Editor, MadCap Flare and Markdown as well as GitHub . Those are the main tools I should be able to know and work with. It must be stated that I have never worked as a technical writer and never used any tools regarding technical writing.

As you can find in the definiton taken from the official website Oxygen XML Editor is the complete XML editing solution, both for XML developers and content authors. It provides must have tools for XML editing, covering most XML standards and technologies. Oxygen XML Editor includes all the features of Oxygen XML Developer and Authorhttps://www.oxygenxml.com/xml_editor.html it ia an XML tool that supports all of the XML schema languages and provides a large variety of powerful tools for editing and publishing XML documents. I have used this tool because it has been a very easy tool to understand and it took me 2 weeks to understand it. I have generated PDF file and HTML output with oXygen XML Editor. I have also used DITA which is an XML standard/an architecture. Shortly speaking, it is a type of XML for technical writing that helps to structure, develop , manage and publish content, and oXygen XML Editor makes it easy to create and edit.

I feel very comfortable while writing the documentation in oXygen and DITA. The most important fact for me is the WYSIWYG method. On the left side I see all topic I generated and it is easy to open, edit and manage. Additionally, DITA is divided into two main units of authoring: topics and maps so it simplify the structure of writing. I know what write in which place. Below there is a table presenting the structure of DITA Topics I have followed.

Table 1. DITA TOPICS
DITA TOPICS TYPES What are they good for?
Concept Topic Good for background information, explaining about something , product description, instructions and definitions
Task Topic Good for step-by-step instructions, any procedural instructions
Reference Topic Good for specifications about the subjects, tables, bulleted list.
Glossentry Topic: Good for defining tems
Notice: Below I present the outputs you are expected to create after reading this User guide.