The new release includes a number of exciting and improved features.

• The Author-it Live UI now available in French and German
• Support for Microsoft Office 2010 (32-bit and 64-bit)
• Support for Google Analytics in Web Help
• Ability to configure a default release state for your library
• Re-import functionality now includes support for Word documents
• New system heading variable can be used to display a book title or topic heading in HTML and Web Help
• Ability to filter the publishing console’s Book List by ‘Show All Books’ or ‘Show Recent Books’ options
• Ability to use a placeholder to control the word order for chapter numbering in Print outputs (especially for languages other than English)
• Updated word order for Japanese cross-references in Print outputs
• Information for working with SDL Trados Studio 2009 and Author-it XML is available in the Knowledge Center

Full release notes are available in the Author-it Knowledge Center.

(Disclaimer: While Char James-Tanny of JTF Associates is an Author-it Certified Consultant, she did not receive anything in return for posting this information.)

The Right Information, to the Right People, at the Right Time.

SAN JOSE and NEWPORT BEACH, CALIFORNIA – USA, SYDNEY – AUSTRALIA and AUCKLAND – NEW ZEALAND – MARCH 21, 2010.

Author-it Software Corporation (ASC), a world leader in software for enterprise authoring, content management, publishing, and localization, today announces the launch of Author-it Aspect – a web based application that dynamically delivers content to users based on their profiles. Author-it Aspect, which forms part of the Author-it Dynamic Assistance Platform will be officially launched to the public at the WritersUA Conference in Seattle, United States on March 21-24, 2010.

The volume of written content within the world’s enterprises continues to explode. As the volume of content increases, so to do issues associated with searching for and finding relevant information. Today it is not just a matter of getting information to people. It is about getting the right information, to the right people, at the right time.

To solve this problem, ASC developed Author-it Aspect, a web-based application that works in conjunction with Author-it. Content is written in the Author-it Enterprise Authoring Platform including any variations. Examples of variations could be that a process may differ based on the operating system used or a policy may differ by state or country.

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About Author-it Software Corporation

Author-it Software Corporation (ASC) is a world leader in enterprise software for authoring, content management, publishing, and localization. Its flagship product, Author-it, is an end-to-end content management solution capable of publishing content to multiple deliverables. Since its release in 1997, ASC has produced five major versions of Author-it, resulting in a robust product built on proven technologies. Author-it is used in over 50 countries, by over 3500 clients and chosen by Fortune 100 organizations for worldwide deployments, making it one of the world’s most popular content management tools. ASC has offices in San Jose and Newport Beach, California, Sydney, Australia and Auckland, New Zealand. More information is available at www.author-it.com.

For further comments, industry opinions or interview opportunities, please contact:

Steve Davis
President
Author-it Software Corporation
sdavis@author-it.com
+1 (408) 701 1408

In addition, Author-it has released a Best Practice Guide for embedded topics.

Read the press release.

They have created a survey to gain more insight in user-friendliness of functionality and overall user experiences. With the results, they plan to:

• Write an article.
• Create a matrix showing a clear overview of functionalities and associated user-friendliness score.
• Write a more practical report with recommendations.

It will take approximately 15 minutes to complete the one-page, 60-question survey. If you would like a copy of the results, you can enter your email address. You can also volunteer to participate in a short phone interview regarding the results.

The students are aware that the results are not scientific, but your help is appreciated in giving them solid data that they can analyze.

Take the survey.

If you have any comments or questions, post them here. We will do our best to get the answers.

Let us know if you think we missed something for Author-it 5.1 or for any other application.

The major tool announcement this week was MadCap’s DITA roadmap. Phase 1, due out in Q1 2009, will let users import and export DITA XML files. Phases 2 and 3 add more functionality, including support for the DITA schema. MadCap’s DITA support lets technical communicators create DITA XML files but saves them from having to use the DITA Toolkit to publish (transform) the output.

Author-it Software Corporation will release Author-it 5.2 in December, with support for structured authoring and DITA 1.1. Author-it was the first authoring tool to support DITA by means of custom topic templates that published DITA XML files.

Adobe demonstrated some of the new features in Acrobat 9 and, while very little could be announced, expect to see the next version of RoboHelp sometime around Q2 2009.

And with more DITA news, Robert Anderson from IBM said that DITA 1.2 is currently in review and should also be available during Q2 2009.

For more information (and to see the slide decks from the presentations), visit the DocTrain East 2008 website.