Structured authoring from Word to Web

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Structured authoring from Word to Web

• sam marshall

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Contents

• What are we talking about?
• Structured authoring
• OU (Open University) model of structured
  authoring
• Problems with this approach
• Two possible solutions
• OU VLE implementation (Virtual Learning
  Environment fancy name for course websites,
  done in Moodle)

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What are we talking about?

• Primarily text-based content
• Documents (from one page to many pages)
• Lets take a quick look
• Not a finished system you can use
• But you might want to do something similar
• If you do want the code for the Moodle bit, ask

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Structured authoring

• Authors (academic/editing/design staff) create
  content (course material)
• Previous
• Authors style content and control its appearance
• Structured
• Authors define the structure, not appearance
• From 20pt bold Arial to Activity heading
• OU has always done this to an extent, but

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Relationship with web standards

• Separate style from structure may sound
  familiar
• XHTML provides some of these facilities
• Can mark up headings as heading lth1gt
• But not others
• No Activity or Learning outcomes or Section
  or Case study or
• Use XML format including pedagogic elements
• Not familiar with XML?

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Key advantages

• Consistency
• Authors control structure, not style
• Multiple output renderings
• Print, web
• Cost
• Automatic output
• No DTP (print) or by-hand HTML editing (web)

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Key problems

• Rigidity
• Authors cannot control style
• Not a problem for students
• But internal politics
• Every faculty has its own conventions
• Big problem for print, less for web (yay!)
• Authoring
• Authors hate XML

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OU structured authoring
Input
Rendering
Content
Word 2003
XML
PDF for print
Hand-editing
VLE (Moodle)
Several others
OU schema
Design template
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The authoring problem

• Authors hate XML
• But they love Word!
• Word 2003 supports XML tags
• XML spell check, Track Changes, etc.
• OU customisations
• Apply tags with single click
• Get a PDF or Web rendering directly
• Enough to appease authors?

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The schema problem

• Schema definition of our XML format (allowed
  tags)
• Every faculty course author wants different
  one
• Cant allow that because it negates benefits
• Analysis of existing printed texts
• Long negotiation
• Wasnt my problem (yay!)
• So we have a custom OU format

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The Moodle problem ?

• Material in custom XML format
• Standard Moodle obviously provides no way to
  display it
• Need to build custom extension
• Different approaches
• Publisher software that creates standard Moodle
  course based on xml (OpenLearn)
• Moodle activity that displays a single document
  within a course (OU VLE)

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Publisher

• Publisher tool understands our XML format
• Creates Moodle course
• Transforms XML into separate XHTML web pages
• Embeds navigation into these pages
• Saves these pages into course as standard Moodle
  web page resources
• Arranges resources on course page using indent
  etc.
• Want more info on this approach? Ask Jenny Gray

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Activity

• Custom activity understands our XML format
• Creates Moodle activity for each document
• Transforms XML into separate XHTML web pages
• Provides navigation around these
• Each document has single link from course page
• Preview facility
• Want more info on this approach? Ask sam

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Publisher
Activity

• Once published, course is standard Moodle
• Can restore elsewhere
• Whole course in one document
• Quizzes etc. are separate (at present)
• No server-side processing after creation

• Can only display if activity is installed
• Not as usable by others
• Document intended as only part of a course
• Quizzes etc. are separate
• Can do server-side processing during display

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Word to Web demo

• The system in action

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Multiple media

• I showed the PDF integration
• Wed like to produce and integrate other
  renderings
• DAISY digital talking book standard
• Mobile device versions?

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Future enhancements

• Mathematical content
• Not really supported now (bitmaps or LaTeX
  filter)
• VLE strategy is to use MathML
• Word 2007 equation editor supports MathML
• Result Happiness! (Maybe)
• Interaction
• User comments (private or public) on any page?

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Conclusion

• OU academic authors (in theory) can write content
  in Word and have it generated for the Web
• Follows existing institutional norms and TLAs
• Supports consistency
• Allows multiple media options
• XML approach is industry-standard
• Similar route might be followed at other
  institutions