Conference 2007 - The Technical Communication
Culture
The ISTC Conference for 2007 was held from Tuesday 2nd. October 2007 to Thursday 4th October 2007.
Click on one of the links in the following list for details on various aspects of the 2007 ISTC Conference.
The venue
Britannia Adelphi Hotel - Liverpool, about 5 minutes walk from Liverpool Lime Street railway station.
Ranelagh Place
Liverpool
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The theme
Because Liverpool has been chosen as the European City of Culture in 2008, the theme of our Conference was "The Technical Communication
Culture": what we do, how we do it, and how we interact with other professionals.
Keynote speaker
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Our keynote speaker was Scott Abel. Scott is well known in the worldwide technical communication industry as an expert and as an effective and stimulating speaker.
Scott is a content management strategist whose strength lies in helping organizations improve the way they author, maintain, and deliver their information assets.
Scott’s website, http://www.TheContentWrangler.com , is a popular resource for professional communicators who value content as a business asset, worthy of being managed.
You can see Scott's professional profile at http://www.linkedin.com/in/scottabel.
You can view his presentation here (Online slideshow) |
Presentations
- Global XML - Sophie Hurst, SDL AF
- Certification of Technical Authors - A Way to Success? - Michael Fritz and Daniella Straub, tekom SB
- Translation-Oriented Authoring - A Prerequisite for Efficient Translation - Urs Huechting
- Decision Support: How Does It Work? Making Knowledge Usable - Kees van Mansom
- Managing the Lifecycle of your Technical Information: Beyond Standard Content Management Systems - Mike Ingeldew, Inmedius UK
- Improving Slide Design for Technical Presentations - Peter Heath, Tampere Polytechnic University for Applied Sciences
- Writing Justifications and Comparative Analyses - Ron Blicq
- Developing a Communication-Across-the-Curriculum Culture: Process, Problems and Possibilities - Halcyon Lawrence, University of the West Indies
- A Good Edit Make all the Difference in the World - Kim Schrantz-Berquist
- DITA - It's not Rocket Science! - Bret Freeman, Just Systems
- CMS - How to Avoid a Content Mess System - Sacha Fédier, Star UK
- The Culture of Technical Communication - a European Perspective - Theresa Cameron
- A Dynamic Publishing and Translation Customer Story - Julia Clark, PTC
- Around the World in 80ms - Holdger Rath,
- Brainstorming Session, What do YOU want from the ISTC? - Simon Butler, ISTC
Presentation papers
The following presentation papers are available. More will be added as they become available.
Sponsors
Our thanks to:
- 3di Information Systems Ltd, for sponsoring the audio-visual equipment.
- AST, for sponsoring the UK Documentation Awards.
- Empolis, for sponsoring the conference folders.
- ITR, for sponsoring the Horace Hockley reception.
- JustSystems, for sponsoring the conference badges and the conference bags.
- Lloyd International Translations, for sponsoring the Gala Dinner wine.
- Mekon Ltd, for sponsoring the Wednesday drinks reception, the Gala Dinner menu cards and the UK documentation Awards.
- Ovidius, for sponsoring the conference programme.
- Plain Words, for sponsoring the UK Documentation Awards.
- TechScribe, for sponsoring the UK Documentation Awards.
Exhibitors
The following companies exhibited at Conference:
In Germany alone, expenditures for writing and translating technical documentation add up to approximately nine billion euros per year with a strong upward trend. Complete documentation in the language of the target country has become a requirement for opening up new markets, not only for marketing reasons, but also from the legal point of view.
across develops and markets a tool of the same name for Corporate Translation Management (CTM) which simplifies and accelerates the preparation and management of translations, improving the quality and lowering the costs.
Firstly, CTM provides immediate support for professional translators in the course of their daily work. A Translation Memory saves the complete pool of translations sentence by sentence and permits the convenient "recycling" of repetitive phrases. Other important components are a terminology system as well as an editor that can be used to edit all popular document formats.
Secondly, CTM means the administration of translation projects, which is often more than half the work. It's a matter of seamless workflow management, meeting deadlines and standards of quality as well as transparency of costs and work. In particular, across brings together agencies from the industry, specialized service providers and freelance translators in a common system.
Target groups for across range from freelance translators to medium-sized mechanical engineering companies to multi-national corporations and all those who either require professional translations themselves or offer them as services. The product options range from the standalone version for 400 euros up to the corporation license for 40,000 euros.
Now that Adobe and Macromedia are one company, Adobe is better positioned than ever to push the boundaries of the digital universe.
Under the leadership of CEO Bruce Chizen, we're driving even greater innovation with powerful, compelling software solutions that meet the needs of customers and markets ranging from designers and filmmakers, to enterprises and governments , to developers and home users.
Adobe was represented at the 2007 ISTC Conference by Mekon Ltd.
Idiom Technologies was founded in January 1998 with a mission to offer large global enterprises world-class software for simplifying complex globalization efforts. Idiom introduced WorldServer later that year.
Today, WorldServer is the market-leading globalization management system. used by over 60 companies worldwide, it is the preferred solution for a globalization supply chain that includes global enterprises, independent language service providers (LSPs) and translators.
To global enterprises, such as Adobe, Baxter Healthcare, eBay, Motorola, Oracle, and Travelocity, WorldServer is the solution of choice for driving large-scale translation and localization processes.
WorldServer also serves the needs of the more than 30 LSP partners in our fast-growing LSP Partner Program including VistaTEC, hiSoft, LUZ, Moravia and Localize Technology companies we count among our partners, Idiom can support your unique infrastructure and resource requirements.
Idiom is headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts. With offices throughout North America and Europe and a partner network that spans the globe, Idiom is ideally positioned to accelerate and optimize your globalization efforts.
Headquartered in Pittsburgh, PA, with offices in Germany, the United Kingdom and Canada, Inmedius is a global leader in delivering performance-oriented applications that capture, create, manage and deploy technical information.
Integrating those information assets within business processes, using proven and innovative techniques, is an Inmedius hallmark.
Providing lifecycle solutions to aerospace, defence and technical publications departments worldwide, Inmedius enables its clients to share an unprecedented level of productivity and efficiency - empowering every corner of the organization.
Easy to implement, maintain and use, the Inmedius S1000D Publishing Suite - a set of fully-integrated COTS software tools - makes every facet of an ASD S1000D project possible throughout its lifecycle. Advisor, a revolutionary new Quality Assurance tool from Inmedius, ensures SGML and XML data conforms to business rules and document standards.
JustSystems solutions enable the agile enterprise by reducing the cost and risk involved in the delivery of information services.
JustSystems supports the rapid development of new services and the refresh of legacy interfaces by orchestrating and automating the unification and visualization of information described by all forms of XML.
JustSystems solutions are driven from a repository based framework that allows the full lifecycle of development and re-use of components and enables business users to develop, deploy, interact and enhance the information and services available to them.
Lightning Source is the leader in demand-driven book manufacturing and distribution solutions to the publishing industry. We are a customer-focused organization that manufactures superior quality books for publishers, in any quantity, and ships them all over the world. We have production and customer-support facilities in the US and the UK.
Print-on-demand is an innovative printing process that makes it possible to print books one at a time. Books are digitized and stored in the Lightning Source library to be printed in small quantities as required to fill orders. This takes the risk out of setting a print quantity and improves cash flow.
Print-on-demand also offers publishers a unique way to import and export titles (particularly into North America and Europe) with virtually no risk and a greatly reduced cost.
Lloyd International has been a leading provider of technical translations for over 17 years and can help you reach new customers in multiple markets, quickly and cost-effectively.
Specializing in the translation and localization of user manuals, marketing material, web content and software- Lloyd International provides language and technology solutions to support your business needs:
- We cover all commercial language combinations
- Your projects are translated and independently proofread by mother-tongue subject matter specialists
- All major software and graphics formats are supported on both PC and MAC platforms
- We provide a complete page layout service and can output print-ready files to your exact specifications
- Our localization services include the translation of XML files, CMS content, resource bundles, as well as recompiling Help files and GUI resizing
- Using Translation Memory tools we store and reuse your existing translations to reduce your costs and improve time-to-market, accuracy and consistency
- Lloyd International is ISO 9001:2000 accredited and a certified Investor In People
Lloyd International has proven expertise within many major high-tech industries including:
- Automotive
- Control & Instrumentation
- Engineering - Process, Marine, Electrical & Mechanical
- Finance
- Healthcare
- Information Technology
- Telecommunications
MadCap Software is committed to creating the strongest suite of tools available for content authoring, single-sourcing, and multi-channel publishing.
With our years of experience in the content authoring and publishing industries we can focus on providing a full work-flow solution - not just a collection of tools. From the leveraging of your legacy content in various formats, to the creation of new content, to the use of modem media assets, to a powerful publishing system, MadCap Software can support your process.
In our new suite, MadPak, the MadCap Flare, Mimic, Capture and Echo products are very tightly integrated thereby making the authoring process, capturing of screen images and creation of software simulations easy and seamless for all your online, web and print needs.
By offering these products as a tightly integrated bundle of a single discounted price, MadCap software has created the Ultimate Authoring Suite. The industry's very first, true single-sourcing suite of Help and documentation products called the MadPak.
Mekon has been deliberately structured in to key business units to offer you a flexible and bespoke range of services, giving you as much or as little help that you need to get your information published - from providing outsourced services through our Document Conversion unit to actually teaching you to use the tolls yourself via Mekon Learning and advising you on the best purchasing plan for your choice of product via our Enterprise Solutions unit.
At another level, our Structured Publishing unit can advise on and implement a tailor-made publishing system, using a mixture of our own products, bespoke plug-ins and cutting edge technologies from some of the leading vendors - we even cater for the highly specialized Civil Aviation needs through MekonAIS offering the full range of services necessary.
Whatever your need, all our services are backed up by full support a the level you need: we are equally comfortable with 'hand holding' as we are with solving highly involved and complex inquiries.
Mekon is also exhibiting on behalf of Adobe Systems Europe Ltd.
Ovidius is based in Berlin, Germany, with offices in the UK and specializes in XML and SGML software solutions for creating, managing, and publishing of technical and scientific information. We help companies with complex documentation requirements, e.g. automotive, mechanical engineering, software "manufacturers", aviation and defence, medical engineering and IT companies.
TCToolbox is a tried and tested powerful SGML/XML Content Management System (CMS) designed by Ovidius and focusing on technical documentation (manuals, help files) allowing for:
Efficient authoring of content
seamless integration into any other parts of a document lifecycle system
complete content management in XML
Your business is building superior products.
At PTC, our business is product development and our objective is to provide you with the best Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) and Enterprise Content Management (ECM) solutions.
For more than two decades, PTC has delivered industry-leading software solutions to enterprise and small business customers spanning multiple industries.
Our ever-expanding product families and customer base are a testament to our commitment to product development excellence.
Operating from offices in the UK and North America, Stilo International (LSE:STL) provides leading solutions for advanced content migration, technical information publishing and product lifecycle management.
Stilo’s OmniMark provides an application development and high performance run-time environment for XML content processing applications, meting the most demanding requirements for content conversion, content transformation and content interchange.
Stilo’s interactive Technical Information Publisher (iTIP) provides an integrated, browser-based environment for organizations that create, manage and deliver technical information across the full product lifecycle, including mission-critical equipment systems in the aerospace, defense, automotive, transportation, manufacturing and engineering sectors.
At the ISTC Conference 2007, we presented the upcoming release of Stilo’s ground-breaking online content migration service, set to dramatically simplify the migration of legacy documents to DITA or other publishing environments.
Mike Austin Award
This year, the Council of the ISTC has unanimously agreed to present the Mike Austin Award for Services to the ISTC to John Young for his services on Council and his commitment to the training and development of technical communicators. This award is only presented occasionally and to a recipient who has performed particular and valuable service to the ISTC and, with 27 years’ service on Council,
John has certainly done this. He has also been a strong advocate for the development of technical communicators and technical communication in general, from lecturing C&G courses through to the strategic development and management of ISTC training initiatives. This role involved him in the development of occupational standards
in technical communication and he has played a key role
in keeping the technical communication
qualifications alive. Although he retired from Council
at the 2007 AGM, he remains involved
in course and examination development.
His legacy will be the ISTC’s first provision
of education and qualifications.
UK Technical Communication Awards
The winners of the UK Technical Communication awards for 2007
will be announced during the gala evening.
Instructional class: sponsored by AST
- Winners: Steve Whalley and Brian Morgan from Intervoice for “Media Exchange Release 2.0
System Guide”.
- Runner-up: Heather Oliver of Nu-Heat
Underfloor for “Nu-Heat Warm Water Underfloor
Heating Installation Manual”.
Descriptive class: sponsored by Plain Words
- Winner: Marian Newell of Newell-Porter for
the “Commonwealth War Graves Commission's
Technical Services Structural Manual”.
- Runner up: Pascal Kesselmark of Geberit for
“Geberit Product Catalogue”.
Horace Hockley award
The 2007 Horace Hockley award winner is Michael Fritz from the German association of technical communicators, tekom. The Horace Hockley award is presented to
someone who, in the opinion of the ISTC
Council, has made a considerable contribution
to the technical publications industry over a
period of time. The award recognises
promotion of the industry across other
industries and boundaries as well as
promotion of quality in the industry, whether it
be in training or within the workplace.
Brainstorming session
There was a brainstorming session held immediately before the AGM. The purpose of this session was to gather ideas for raising awareness of Technical Communication in general and the ISTC in particular. Results of this will be posted once the analysis has been completed.
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