atw: SEC: UNCLASS Decreasingly meaningful authoring (WAS: Product of choice)
- From: "Silcock, Howard DR" <Howard.Silcock@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Austechwriter (austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx)" <austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 7 Jun 2005 11:01:46 +1000
> As the years roll by, the actual authoring experience is decreasingly
> meaningful. We are seeing the integration of products by way of XML data,
> so that some documents are never actually authored - they are produced on
> demand as a sophisticated report.
Steve, could I get you to clarify this statement? When a product is to be
integrated into a new environment, I can see that the new environment needs
information about it, and that that information could be supplied in XML
format. Is this what you mean by "integration of products by way of XML
data"? If so, I'm still unclear where the "documents that are never actually
authored" come in. Amd how do the "sophisticated reports" come in, if they
aren't designed and implemented in code by someone who has made the
decisions as to what to include and how to set it out? Doesn't that, in
effect, mean that the 'coder' has taken on the role of author? Isn't it
dependent on him whether the reports are "sophisticated" or not?
I've heard that the literary theorist Roland Barthes argued for the 'Death
of the Author' (though I never attempted to understand what he was saying).
Are you trying to argue that technology is murdering authors (maybe even
technical writers)?
Howard
-------------------------------
Howard L. Silcock
Technical Writer
Project Office - Infrastructure
Department of Defence
(02) 626 58828
-------------------------------
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