Topic-based SGML? Really?
Ari Nordström · Balisage series on markup technologies · 2021
Topic-based technical documentation is all the rage these days, made popular by DITA and others. Topics can be integrated with the engineering data for the products both describe using nifty Product Life Management (PLM) tools that make this easier than ever. But what if you're stuck with SGML, voluntarily or involuntarily? Can you, too, bring your content into the topic-based paradigm or should you rather not? This paper explores your options and the state of SGML in the PLM world today. It nose-dives into the ATA iSpec 2200 SGML, discusses some of the pains to implement it, and finally converts the ATA to DITA.