What is the role of conditional processing in content delivery for different IT user groups?

November 10, 2023
|By Bryan Tipper

Conditional processing is a crucial feature in DITA for tailoring content delivery to different IT user groups. IT documentation often needs to serve various audiences, such as administrators, end-users, and support teams. Conditional processing allows you to create content that is relevant to specific user groups while maintaining a single source of truth. Here’s how conditional processing plays a role in content delivery:

1. Audience-Specific Content: DITA enables you to mark sections of content with conditions that specify the intended audience. For example, you can mark certain instructions as relevant to “Admins” and others as relevant to “End-Users.” When delivering documentation, you can then use these conditions to generate versions of the content tailored to each user group, ensuring that each audience receives the information most pertinent to them.

2. Efficient Maintenance: By using conditional processing, you can maintain a single source of content while meeting the diverse needs of IT user groups. When updates or changes are needed, you can make them in one place, and these changes will automatically propagate to the different versions generated for various user groups. This streamlines content maintenance and reduces the risk of inconsistencies.

3. Example:

Here’s an example of how conditional processing works in DITA. Consider an IT manual for a software application. Some sections contain instructions for configuring the software, and others provide usage guidelines for end-users. You can apply conditional processing to distinguish these sections:


<!-- DITA Conditional Processing Example -->
<topic id="software_manual">
  <title>Software Application Manual</title>
  <body>
    <section conref="config_instructions.dita" audience="Admins"/>
    <section conref="usage_guidelines.dita" audience="End-Users"/>
  </body>

In this example, conditional processing ensures that the “config_instructions.dita” section is included when generating documentation for “Admins,” and the “usage_guidelines.dita” section is included when creating documentation for “End-Users.” It allows for efficient content delivery to different IT user groups from a single source.