SIGDOC is the Special Interest Group for Documentation of the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM), itself the oldest computing association in the U.S. SIGDOC is dedicated to the encouragement and development of the finest in technical communications, and in this vein we give awards to those who are at the forefront of the field, and we have offered several tutorials for those who can take advantage of them.Our Program Chair has provided a carefully crafted structure for the program, including keynote awards recipients and a special keynote speaker. This is an exciting program that is likely to be long remembered.We are delighted this year to give our prestigious Rigo Award to Dr. Stephen Doheny Farina for his outstanding life-time contributions to the field, and to award our institutional Diana Award to the World Wide Web Consortium for their extraordinary work that has brought the web to all of us. Michael Sperberg-McQueen and Liam Quinn from W3C will be accepting this award. We will also honor the winner of our Graduate Student Paper Award for the best graduate-level research paper submitted to our Competition and announce the recipient of our scholarship for this year. Our special keynote speaker is Katherine Corich.As for the preparation of these Proceedings, we have been fortunate to do this, as we have for several past proceedings, all electronically, from author proposals, submissions and the blind reviews, to final production of the printed document. The Proceedings will be available on the ACM Digital Library once submitted there.
Design of complex information
This paper addresses the issues surrounding analysis and design which supports developing web-based information for use in situations which require supporting multiple levels of audience knowledge and ability. Firmly focused on communicating information,...
Showing instead of telling
We propose the use of dynamic visual representations to augment traditional static text as documentation. In other words, we suggest using live demonstrations or moving pictures to show people how to do things, and not just using written or spoken words ...
Implementing DITA XML in a production environment
This paper describes one information development team's experience with implementing a prototype XML vocabulary in a production environment. This implementation included the migration of pre-existing content, the writing of XSLT and Perl scripts to ...
Rhetoric of present single-sourcing methodologies
In this paper, I detail what Bill Hart-Davidson describes as the "anxiety" that many technical communicators have about implementations of single source documentation. Specifically, I briefly explore what I see as some of the key potential rhetorical ...
Mis-usability: on the uses and misuses of usability testing
Usability has become so popular that its value is being threatened by misuse of the term and by misunderstandings about important distinctions between usability studies and empirical usability testing, between usability and verification tests, between ...
Educational models and open source: resisting the proprietary university
This paper presents an educational model derived from open source methods for computer programming. The article places this search for an alternative model within a framework of proprietary educational practices that are driven by a need for efficiency ...
Planning and information foraging theories and their value to the novice technical communicator
Two complementary cognitive theories help to explain how novice technical communicators learn effective search methods: information foraging theory, a model of information-seeking behavior that combines human-computer interaction with anthropological ...
Design of documentation for handheld ergonomics: presenting clinical evidence at the point of care
Medical doctors require high quality clinical evidence at the point of care in order to support their decision-making. Presentation of clinical evidence on handheld devices, and in a timely fashion, requires an integrated approach to documentation and ...
Eclipse help system: an open source user assistance offering
In this paper, we discuss the theoretical and practical elements of designing an open source User Assistance (UA) System. Specifically, we introduce UCD requirements, including those to accommodate different user modes for UA architectures and complex ...
Modeling document-mediated interaction
Current approaches to modeling texts create text structures based on semantic representations of authorial intention or a pre-determined information structure. This paper considers an alternative to these two approaches - modeling document-mediated ...
A multidisciplinary approach to improving the user experience: information development, test, and user experience design teams working together
In this paper we discuss how the combined efforts of three teams, Information Development (ID), Test, and User Experience Design (UED), improved the overall customer experience with store development in IBM® WebSphere® Commerce, a software package that ...
Open source basics: definitions, models, and questions
In this paper, I will provide a basic overview of issues related to the use of open source models for development and distribution of computer documentation. The first section of the paper defines the key relations among different "open" categories (...
Combining usability research with documentation development for improved user support
As a usability research and information design firm, Tec-Ed has noted the advantages of evaluating a product's usability in conjunction with developing its print and online documentation. Usability research identifies the problems with a user interface. ...
Practical guidelines for the readability of IT-architecture diagrams
This paper presents the work done to establish guidelines for the creation of readable IT-architecture diagrams and gives some examples of guidelines and some examples of improved diagrams. These guidelines are meant to assist practicing IT-architects ...
Connecting learners with content: a unified content strategy for learning materials
A unified content strategy is a repeatable method of creating content for reuse, managing content in a definitive source, and assembling it to meet diverse needs. This paper describes:
A unified content strategy and its benefits
Applying a unified content ...
Using Javadoc and XML to produce API reference documentation
The creation of API reference documentation and its integration into larger documentation sets present a number of challenges. This paper explores a strategy for using Javadoc, the primary mechanism for generating Java API documentation, in conjunction ...
Designing information for dynamic delivery with XML
If you review the current technology trends for the web, you'll notice that the words "Dynamic Delivery" figure prominently. Industry pundits have identified "personalization" as one of the key characteristics of leading edge information sites. XML ...
aTool: creating validated XML documents on the fly using MS word
This paper describes aTool, an extension to Microsoft's Word to create XML documents. aTool has been developed in a joint project of the publisher Springer Verlag, Technical University of Munich (TUM), and Technical University of Aachen (RWTH). It has ...
Integrating interactive 3-D diagrams into hypermedia documentation
'Virtual Reality', or interactive 3-D graphics has been the subject of much hype with regard to its promise in the field of engineering. If virtual reality provides a uniquely effective means of conveying information about 3-D forms, as its proponents ...
Extending direct manipulation in a text editor
This paper describes the implementation of a prototype text editor that incorporates conversation-like features through the direct-manipulation modality. In this way, traditional direct-manipulation interaction techniques such as direct reference via ...
What programmers really want: results of a needs assessment for SDK documentation
This paper steps the reader through a needs assessment of programmers that was conducted by instructional designers. The assessment's purpose was to identify what learning support programmers need and want to successfully use a new software development ...
Automated knowledge acquisition for instructional text generation
Language generation systems have often been advocated for use in the generation of user documentation, but in practice, it is hard to use them because of the amount of knowledge they require as input. Without a readily available source of input, the ...
An empirical study of factors impacting the size of object-oriented component code documentation
In this paper, we identify a set of factors that may be used to forecast source code documentation for object oriented software components. Using field data on 152 object oriented (OO) software components and the multiple regression model, we ...
Automatically connecting documentation to code with rose
One of the most common problems with program documentation is keeping it synchronized with the source code it purports to explain. One solution to this problem is to automate the documentation process using reverse engineering technology. Reverse ...
Specialization in DITA: technology, process, & policy
DITA is an architecture for creating topic-oriented, information-typed content that can be reused and single-sourced in a variety of ways. It is also an architecture for creating new information types and describing new information domains, allowing ...
Information modeling for single sourcing
Information modeling is one of the most critical phases of designing your reuse strategy. Information models specify how information is reused and how it must be written and structured to support reuse. Information models are the framework that guide ...
Find what I mean: exploring new kinds of search results
This paper discusses various scenarios encountered by visitors using search for a large documentation library. It identifies potential problems arising from the users' level of understanding of the documentation and the search system. It proposes ...
Creating a massive master index for HTML and print
An index connects readers with information. Creating an index for a single book is a time-honored craft. Creating an index for a massive library of HTML topics is a modern craft that has largely been discarded in favor of robust search engines. The ...
Documentation, participatory citizenship, and the web: the potential of open systems
Technical communicators have become increasingly interested in how to "open up" the documentation process - to encourage workers to participate in developing documentation that closely fits their needs. This goal has led technical communicators to ...
Modeling genre ecologies
The genre ecology framework is an analytical framework for studying how people use multiple artifacts - such as documentation, interfaces, and annotations - to mediate their work activities. Unlike other analytical frameworks, the genre ecology ...
Recommendations
Acceptance Rates
Year | Submitted | Accepted | Rate |
---|---|---|---|
SIGDOC '19 | 105 | 85 | 81% |
SIGDOC '18 | 65 | 44 | 68% |
SIGDOC '17 | 77 | 61 | 79% |
SIGDOC '16 | 102 | 36 | 35% |
SIGDOC '15 | 82 | 49 | 60% |
SIGDOC '14 | 38 | 23 | 61% |
SIGDOC '13 | 38 | 21 | 55% |
SIGDOC '11 | 75 | 36 | 48% |
Overall | 582 | 355 | 61% |