[oXygen-user] IDs for new DITA topics

[Oxygen XML Editor Support (Radu Coravu)]

Hello Frank,


Please see some answers below:


> I understand that a topic ID must be unique within the scope of the 
> root ditamap used for publishing the content. 
Your understanding is incorrect, the topic ID must be unique inside the 
same topic file. So for example if in the "topic.dita" you have two 
inner topics, all topics existing inside the "topic.dita" must not have 
duplicate IDs. But if you have "topic1.dita" and "topic2.dita", the 
<topic> elements in both files can have the same ID, the DITA standard 
does not impose a uniqueness restriction for the topic IDs in the 
context of the entire project.


DITA 1.3 specs:

https://www.oxygenxml.com/dita/1.3/specs/archSpec/base/uri-based-addressing.html


> This addressing model makes it possible to reliably address elements 
> that have values for the |@id| attribute that are unique within a 
> single DITA topic, but which might not be unique within a larger XML 
> document that contains multiple DITA topics.

But it is true that Oxygen and other tools attempt to create by default 
unique IDs for a created topic file in the context of the entire 
project, some CMSs may need them, sometimes the publishing (for example 
Oxygen's DITA to WebHelp output) may use these unique IDs for certain 
features.


> So there is an arbitrary combination of only 9 characters, mostly 
> letters. But perhaps sufficient for ensuring uniqueness...
Indeed the ${id} ID value we generate has about 9-10 unique letter-digit 
combinations. We consider this to be enough. The number of unique 
combinations is about 36 (26 letters in the English alphabet + 10 
digits) to the power 9, it's 1 followed by about 14 digits. We consider 
this to be enough for a value which is not intended to be unique by the 
DITA specification anyway.

By the way we also have a longer "${uuid}" editor variable which can be 
used and expanded, a unique sequence of 32 hexadecimal digits if you 
want something even more unique.

https://www.oxygenxml.com/doc/versions/25.1/ug-editor/topics/editor-variables.html


> However, when I use the "DITA > Insert > Insert New DITA Resource" 
> command, oXygen does not honor the "ID Option" setting, but creates 
> IDs which are identical to the file name. 
Usually an ID derived from the title or from the file name is more user 
friendly when for example inserting references to elements inside a topic.

We would do the same by default when using the "File->New" wizard dialog 
to create the topic but the topic is not yet saved on disk so we do not 
yet know its file name or its title so we use the random value instead.


In the Oxygen Preferences->"DITA / Topics" page there is an "Use the 
filename as the value.. of the root element id" which you can uncheck if 
you want.


Regards,

Radu

Radu Coravu
Oxygen XML Editor

On 3/27/23 11:43, Frank Dissinger wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
>
> I understand that a topic ID must be unique within the scope of the 
> root ditamap used for publishing the content.
>
>
> FrameMaker, which I used previously, creates IDs of the type
>
>
> id172OC0C03J7
>
>
> So there is an arbitrary combination of 11 digits and letters.
>
>
> In oXygen I have set the "DITA > ID Option" as follows:
>
>
> ${localName}_${id}
>
>
> Which creates IDs of the following type:
>
>
> task_rf2_vcg_ywb
>
>
> So there is an arbitrary combination of only 9 characters, mostly 
> letters. But perhaps sufficient for ensuring uniqueness...
>
>
> However, when I use the "DITA > Insert > Insert New DITA Resource" 
> command, oXygen does not honor the "ID Option" setting, but creates 
> IDs which are identical to the file name.
>
> This is not what I want and surely not suitable for ensuring uniqueness.
>
>
> How can I get oXygen to honor the "ID Option" setting or make it 
> otherwise generate IDs with arbitrary characters which are likely to 
> be unique?
>
>
> Regards,
>
> Frank
>
> -- 
>
> *Frank Dissinger*
>
> Documentation Manager
>
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