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Opportunity to connect with the larger conversation

Open MarciaRieferJohnston opened this issue 2 years ago • 1 comments

I appreciate the Diátaxis framework and the beautiful job your website does of laying out the four quadrants. As a long-time tech writer, naturally I kept thinking of related terms. For example, three of your quadrants directly map onto DITA information types. I see that you've thoughtfully compared Diátaxis with DITA in a Reddit conversation, where I found your replies insightful. Why leave this comparison out of your website, where knowledgeable people could most benefit from it?

Another term that came to mind is "modular writing," especially where you talk about organic growth taking place at the cellular level. Modular writing also applies when you talk about section headings that indicate the type of info within a module (such as "About ..." in an explanation heading). Much of what you say echoes Kurt Ament's seminal book "Single Sourcing: Building Modular Documentation" and other sources.

It would add depth to your website to acknowledge related terms and resources and share some perspective on them.

P.S. With 19 open PRs going back two years and 8 open issues going back to a year ago, it seems that you aren't into your website much any more. I hope that's not the case. It's a wonderful resource. Reading it has enriched my sense of the difference we tech writers can make for people.

MarciaRieferJohnston avatar Jun 07 '23 02:06 MarciaRieferJohnston

I wish your comment had some hyperlinks to the concept you have mentioned, like, for example, to a Diátaxis, a pragmatic system for technical documentation writing Reddit thread.

I think Diátaxis favours being easy to the user over efficiency of documentation maintenance - being easy to the writer. In the tutorial section, for example, it promises nothing but blood, sweat and tears. I do not see much about re-use and modularity. This means, that if needed, the same information needs to be repeated in a slightly different way over and over. The core tenant of DITA seems to be trying manage this repetition.

I think nothing prevents someone to demonstrate how the toolkit provided by DITA is able to provide the documentation that is built according to the Diátaxis principles. if so desired. Personally I do not see any need to change this very repository with respect to that, though.

saper avatar Mar 27 '24 09:03 saper