Handing On

Signing Off

I have been writing this blog on and off for quite a few years, actually from when I joined Mekon. More relcenly it has been more intermittent mainly due to the nature of the specification changes in a lot of cases not being quite so earth shattering. In all this time I have very rarely pushed Mekon products because I believed that this was not the place to do that.

For many years I worked as an electronics technical author and then as a project consultant working on what were then cutting edge projects. In with SGML in 1987 when this was brand new, later involved with S1000D even authoring the Crew Module for Issue 1.7, and then conversion of documentation from unstructured to structured form.

When I retired from full time working. Mekon kindly allowed  me to continue on a Part Time basis which I have also enjoyed. But now, in the late 70's age range I am about to retire completely. So for me this is a sort of signing off time.

Over time, in S1000D terms from 1.7 to 5, we have seen editing software go from cludgy to really polished, from bare bones to full of useful extra functioniality. And what do you do with the output, well that has moved from complicated and expensive applications to convert the modules into something that the end user can actually use - to software which takes data modules and allows you to produce hard copy handbooks which are almost indistinguishable from the time honoured books of yore. Also controlling software from very expensive very coplicated CSDB type applications to slick and easy to use applicatitons. And checking your modules against the Business Rules and getting something sensible in a report that makes it easy to see any deviation.

At Mekon the range of applications has grown. Over the years Mekon has prided itself on the support that it provides for its clients always bending over backwards to really help (not something that can be said about some other software houses).

So thank you to those who have provided feedback. Thank you to those who have engaged in mainly interesting discussions about S1000D. May S1000D go from strength to strength.