Looking for a writer-friendly way to capture two-column data
Posted: Fri Mar 12, 2021 11:31 pm
Hi everyone,
We have legacy ASCII content with "Data Type" sections like this:
This data type content is always two columns, with the second column being a "one-of-N" value of allowed data types.
I would like to convert this content to DITA. Since our writers are used to seeing this information in table form, I tried inserting a <simpletable> by pressing Enter, but interestingly the <strow> elements appear to be invisible in the Oxygen editor by default:
This seems to maybe be a bug or limitation. If I insert a <simpletable> via the Insert Table context action, then it is prepopulated with rows and entries, and everything is there.
But then I decided that maybe the editing mechanics of tables, even <simpletable>s, is too complicated for such a simple case. For example, now the insertion or deletion of terms requires row manipulation.
Then I thought about making specializations of <dl>, <dlentry>, <dt>, and <dd>:
where I could constrain the allowed values of <dt-type> elements, and use CSS to show the names and types side-by-side as a pseudotable. But even this element structure seems overly complicated. And now I'm thinking maybe a specialization of <simpletable> is the better answer again...
Is there some other DITA element that lends itself well to two-column data entry that I should be considering here?
We have legacy ASCII content with "Data Type" sections like this:
Code: Select all
"Data Types"
from_list list
rise_from_list list
fall_from_list list
to_list list
rise_to_list list
fall_to_list list
minimum_slack float
maximum_slack float
group_name list
delay_type string
max_path_count integer
path_collection collection
I would like to convert this content to DITA. Since our writers are used to seeing this information in table form, I tried inserting a <simpletable> by pressing Enter, but interestingly the <strow> elements appear to be invisible in the Oxygen editor by default:
This seems to maybe be a bug or limitation. If I insert a <simpletable> via the Insert Table context action, then it is prepopulated with rows and entries, and everything is there.
But then I decided that maybe the editing mechanics of tables, even <simpletable>s, is too complicated for such a simple case. For example, now the insertion or deletion of terms requires row manipulation.
Then I thought about making specializations of <dl>, <dlentry>, <dt>, and <dd>:
Code: Select all
<dt-list>
<dt-entry>
<dt-name>from_list</dt-name>
<dt-type>list</dt-type>
</dt-entry>
...
</dt-list>
Is there some other DITA element that lends itself well to two-column data entry that I should be considering here?