Books by JoAnn Hackos
 Content Management for Dynamic Web Delivery
With Content Management for Dynamic Web Delivery learn how to successfully manage Web content to achieve a competitive edge.
Using the content-management strategy that she developed for companies such as Nortel, Motorola, Cisco, and others, Hackos walks readers through the stages of effective Web content management. She shows how to establish a content strategy based on what type of content a user needs, the platforms to which it should be delivered, and the types of content necessary for the organization. Readers will learn how to develop and incorporate an information model into their Web site design as well as how to transform their organization's processes to ensure dynamic content delivery. They'll also find tips on how to take advantage of XML.
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 Information Development: Managing Your Documentation Projects, Portfolio and People
The 1994 best–selling classic Managing Your Documentation Projects set the industry standard for technical documentation. However, since then, much has changed in the world of information development. With this new title, JoAnn Hackos looks beyond the structured project of the 1980s and 1990s. Instead, she focuses on the rapidly changing projects of the 21st century and addresses how to introduce agile information development without neglecting the central focus of planning information design and development around the needs of information users.
As an information-development manager, you are expected to reduce costs and project time, do more work with fewer resources and less money, and increase the value of the information you deliver. Recognizing this, Hackos has carefully designed this book to help you do precisely that. She helps you make strategic decisions about information development and directs the discussion of project management toward smarter decision making.
An update of the original 1994 Information Process Maturity Model (IPMM) presents you with a method by which you can compare the state of your organization to others, evaluate your current status, and then consider what is necessary to move to the next level. Building on the original ideas and first-hand experiences of the author, this book provides you with what you need to enhance the maturity of your organization, get a clear understanding of the direction of information development, and incorporate various techniques of project development with innovations in information design to expand otherwise traditional project management.
Information Development offers a completely new look at best practices for all phases of the document development lifecycle, including:
- Managing a corporate information portfolio
- Evaluating process maturity
- Partnering with customers and developing user scenarios
- Developing team effectiveness and collaboration
- Planning and monitoring information projects
- Managing translation and production
- Evaluating project performance
- Managing for quality, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness
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Managing Your Documentation Plans
The only book devoted exclusively to technical publication project management, Managing Your Documentation Projects arms you with proven strategies and techniques for producing high-quality, extremely usable documentation, while cutting cost and time-to-market. Dr. JoAnn Hackos, a top documentation design and project management consultant to major corporations, including IBM and Hewlett-Packard, shares with you the fruit of her more than 15 years of experience in the field. She gives you
- clear-cut, rational guidelines to managing every phase of the project from planning and development, through production, distribution, and project evaluation
- scores of usable templates, checklists, summaries, and forms
- dozens of real-life case studies and scenarios taken from the author's extensive experience at top corporations
- techniques applicable to virtually all fields of documentation
If you are a publications-project manager, you will find much food for thought, as well as specific procedures, in this book. If you are responsible for managing your own projects as an independent contributor, you will find a great deal to get you started toward improving the quality of your management activities. If you are a publications manager who is responsible either for managing projects directly or for training and supervising those who manage projects, you will find new ideas about the "people" part of the publications project.
Managing Your Documentation Projects was designed to function as a comprehensive guide for new managers and a daily tool of survival for veterans. It is also an invaluable resource for technical writers, editors, graphic designers, consultants, and anyone called upon to produce high-quality technical documentation on time and within budget.
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Standards for Online Communication
Standards for Online Communication gives you guidelines for how to place information online in your company. It provides both a design and development process and a set of guidelines for the Internet, intranets, and help systems for designers and authors who need to create effective electronic information.
Drawing on their years of design and consulting experience, authors JoAnn Hackos and Dawn Stevens demonstrate how to tell what will work for your users, how to translate users' needs into a set of clear specifications, and how to implement these specifications. And, with examples of good design, they provide expert advice and guidance on
- giving customers and employees the online information they need to do their jobs
- organizing online information so your users can easily navigate through it
- dealing with the special design requirements of the Web, intranets, and online help systems
- learning what graphics users really need and where sound and video fit in
- handling accessibility and navigation-multimedia, maps, indexes, hypertext and more
On the accompanying CD-ROM, you'll find a Winhelp file of the book designed according to the principles taught in the book. Whether you are a webmaster, user interface designer, content creator, or technical writer, with Standards for Online Communication you'll experience first-hand what makes online information work and why.
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 User and Task Analysis for Interface Design
Designing an effective interface doesn't happen by chance. Good design happens only when designers understand who will be using their product, what the users are trying to accomplish, and the circumstances under which users must work. In User and Task Analysis for Interface Design, JoAnn Hackos and Ginny Redish share their experiences in gathering this information directly from users and then applying what is learned to the difficult task of interface design.
User and Task Analysis for Interface Design gets you started on the path toward designing a usable interface. It starts with basic information about what you need to know about users, tasks, and environments and then takes you through a step-by-step process for planning and conducting site visits, including
- how to build a business case for conducting a user study
- how to prepare for a user study, including who and what to bring with you, who to talk to, and what to do during the study
- how to see and hear what users are really telling you
- how to make sense of the information you have gathered
- how to translate the results of your study to the design of usable interfaces
- how to create workflow diagrams, task sequences, user/task matrixes, task scenarios, use scenarios, and other analysis tools
You'll find a variety of techniques and variations on techniques for data gathering, for analysis, and for moving from analysis to design. Each has been tested and proven by experts in the field and each has a specific purpose or situation for which it is best suited. You'll find that different techniques and combinations of techniques are needed on different projects, depending on the issues you need to learn about, the time you have to conduct the study, and your own corporate culture. Pick and choose from among these techniques to formulate your own methods for your specific situation and needs, and then return to the book each time you begin another study to again choose the appropriate mix of techniques.
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 Introduction to DITA: Arbortext Edtion
by JoAnn Hackos
Introduction to DITA: A User Guide to the Darwin Information Typing Architecture — Arbortext Edition picks up where the original edition of Introduction to DITA leaves off. As DITA becomes further entrenched as an ever more popular XML solution to topic-based authoring, a number of XML editors are available to assist content creators. This user guide is designed to provide its readers with a task-oriented approach to learning the Darwin Infor-mation Typing Architecture (DITA). In this edition, we introduce you to PTC’s Arbortext Editor. You will find conceptual overviews, background information, tutorials, and the sample XML markup you need to get started using DITA. You learn to use DITA at the same time you learn to apply the Arbortext Editor to author-ing, conditional processing, and publishing.
Here are some of the questions we help you answer:
- How do I create DITA topics?
- How do I assemble DITA topics into DITA maps for output?
- How do I do conditional processing with DITA?
- How do I create my own specializations?
- How do I use the DITA Open Toolkit?
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 Introduction to DITA: A User Guide to the Darwin Information Typing Architecture
by Jennifer Linton & Kylene Bruski
Finally! A user guide for the popular OASIS DITA standard. If you have been using DITA, or are just joining the DITA community, this book provides you with the information you need to accomplish your goals. The user guide not only presents the basic methodology of DITA and its benefits for creating your information set, but explains step-by-step how to author DITA XML topics, create maps for your deliverables, and work through the production processing tasks. The book includes a thorough explanation of the DITA model and the major elements used to create your topics using the task, concept, and reference information types. The DITA User Guide uses a task-based approach (the user guide is written with DITA) to help you create topic-based output. Here are some of the questions we help you answer:
- How do I create DITA topics?
- How do I assemble DITA topics into DITA maps for output?
- How do I do conditional processing with DITA?
- How do I create my own specializations?
- How do I use the DITA Open Toolkit?
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