Governance Gauge: Only You Can Model Your ContentGovernance Gauge: Only You Can Model Your Content

Government regulation drives some companies to seek tools to control their content. Mandates for periodic reports containing certain elements of information, proscribed report presentation formats and requirements for archiving and on-demand retrieval create needs best answered by content modeling.

Conforming to industry standards and enabling information interchange are other good reasons to model your content.

As a result, many enterprises are using standard content models such as DocBook, the Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) and Shareable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM).

"Many people think ... they can just adopt the content model in the standard. This is not really a good idea," content management consultancy The Rockley Group wrote in a paper it just released. Instead, suggests Rockley, you should develop your content model before choosing a standard.

To create an effective content model, analyze your content's life cycle: how it's created, delivered, used and retired. It's important to know all the content products you need to produce and how you can design them for optimum reuse. Then you can figure out what metadata and content standards will support your needs. Your content model should also specify storage and workflow plans.

— Jeanette Burriesci

Coincidence or Catchup?

Maybe application integration vendor Tibco shouldn't leave its cafeteria open to the public — IBMers might be dining there. A week before Tibco announced the release of DataExchange, its new extract, transform, load (ETL) product (which competes against IBM's WebSphere product line), IBM bought dominant pure-play ETL vendor Ascential. To Tibco's advantage, DataExchange is deeply integrated into the Tibco BusinessWorks architecture and design; even IBM's existing WebSphere products don't interoperate so well.

Code Your Way to Fame and Fortune

If a $5,000 credit for ESRI ArcWeb Services is your idea of riches, you could win this fortune by creating a Web application that uses the service's on-demand geographic information system (GIS) content and capabilities. This fortune comes with fame: Three winners will be showcased at ESRI's July user conference in San Diego and promoted in marketing and press materials. The deadline is May 20. Entries will be judged for their usefulness, ease of use and originality. For more information, see www.esri.com/arcwebchallenge.