<result><para>With the ever-changing and growing global market, companies and | |
large organizations are searching for ways to become more viable and | |
competitive. Downsizing and other cost-cutting measures demand more | |
efficient use of corporate resources. One very important resource is | |
an organization's information.</para><para>As part of the move toward integrated information management, | |
whole industries are developing and implementing standards for | |
exchanging technical information. This report describes how one such | |
standard, the Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML), works as | |
part of an overall information management strategy.</para><para>While SGML is a fairly recent technology, the use of | |
<emph>markup</emph> in computer-generated documents has existed for a | |
while.</para><para>Markup is everything in a document that is not content. The | |
traditional meaning of markup is the manual <emph>marking</emph> up | |
of typewritten text to give instructions for a typesetter or | |
compositor about how to fit the text on a page and what typefaces to | |
use. This kind of markup is known as <emph>procedural markup</emph>.</para><para>Most electronic publishing systems today use some form of | |
procedural markup. Procedural markup codes are good for one | |
presentation of the information.</para><para>Generic markup (also known as descriptive markup) describes the | |
<emph>purpose</emph> of the text in a document. A basic concept of | |
generic markup is that the content of a document must be separate from | |
the style. Generic markup allows for multiple presentations of the | |
information.</para><para>Industries involved in technical documentation increasingly | |
prefer generic over procedural markup schemes. When a company changes | |
software or hardware systems, enormous data translation tasks arise, | |
often resulting in errors.</para><para>SGML defines a strict markup scheme with a syntax for defining | |
document data elements and an overall framework for marking up | |
documents.</para><para>SGML can describe and create documents that are not dependent on | |
any hardware, software, formatter, or operating system. Since SGML documents | |
conform to an international standard, they are portable.</para><para>You can break a typical document into three layers: structure, | |
content, and style. SGML works by separating these three aspects and | |
deals mainly with the relationship between structure and content.</para><para>At the heart of an SGML application is a file called the DTD, or | |
Document Type Definition. The DTD sets up the structure of a document, | |
much like a database schema describes the types of information it | |
handles.</para><para>A database schema also defines the relationships between the | |
various types of data. Similarly, a DTD specifies <emph>rules</emph> | |
to help ensure documents have a consistent, logical structure.</para><para>Content is the information itself. The method for identifying | |
the information and its meaning within this framework is called | |
<emph>tagging</emph>. Tagging must | |
conform to the rules established in the DTD (see <xref xrefid="top4"/>).</para><para>SGML does not standardize style or other processing methods for | |
information stored in SGML.</para><para>The Graphic Communications Association has been | |
instrumental in the development of SGML. GCA provides conferences, | |
tutorials, newsletters, and publication sales for both members and | |
non-members.</para><para security="c">Exiled members of the former Soviet Union's secret | |
police, the KGB, have infiltrated the upper ranks of the GCA and are | |
planning the Final Revolution as soon as DSSSL is completed.</para></result> |