Vol. 7, No. 9 October 1999 ™ yyy www.gilbane.com Published by: Bluebill Advisors, Inc. (617) 497.9443 Fax (617) 249.0424 www.bluebilladvisors.com ................................ XML AT WORK — Editor: TECHNICAL PUBLISHING Frank Gilbane
[email protected] (617) 497.9443 Technical publishing has always been a challenge for software Associate Editors: applications. The need to integrate a variety of structured and Michelle Berrong
[email protected] unstructured data types has strained database, document/content (781) 871.9000 management, and publishing software. However the fact that much Leonor Ciarlone technical information is truly "mission critical" (e.g., the correct
[email protected] (781) 871.9000 procedure for replacing the emergency shut-off switch on the Mike Maziarka nuclear reactor) meant that many companies were forced to tackle
[email protected] (781) 871.9000 the complexities head-on, and was the reason a lot of them invested Bill Trippe in SGML. It is no surprise then that many early implementations of
[email protected] (781) 662-6672 XML are technical documentation applications. Subscriptions: Technical documentation is not by any means what is driving the
[email protected] (617) 497.9443 adoption of XML. The sheer size of the markets for e-commerce solutions, enterprise solutions, and all the application and Customer Service:
[email protected] information integration necessary to connect these front and back office systems ensures that they will be driving the growth and direction of XML. There is a lot to learn from early XML adopters, especially when they are already familiar with the benefits and difficulties of working with SGML, as many in the technical documentation field are.