Is universal document exchange in our future?
Louis M. Gomez, Donald F. Pratt, Mark R. Buckley · 1988
Wii there come a day when we wilI all work in a common document production environment so that if you gave me a tile or I gave you one, either of us could print it immediately, using the equipment we have, or edit it immediately, using a markup language that is straightforward, easy to use, and familiar to both of us?That summa&es the goal we've labeled universal document interchange.We do not see that day coming.Although much effort is being put toward the goal of universal exchange, it appears to us that it can go only so far.What we do expect to happen is a flourishing of translation products and services as the interchange problems become more manageable but do not go away.From now on for as far as we can see, editors are going to be tinkering with different varieties of markup to accomplish the wide variety of tasks associated with technical documentation.