Open Innovation Projects

Hi @ all,

for some time now, I have been thinking about the feasibility of "Open Source Technical Documentation" or, OSTD.

What made me think this could be a good idea was the observation, that manuals (for whatever product...) always contain some or all of the following content:
- About this manual
- Warranty issues
- Signs and Symbols used
- Various warnings, such as "caution, hot, do not touch" or the like.

My idea of OSTD would be to make such content publicly available, e.g. in DITA-XML or LaTex or ... file formats, so that the maintenance could be handled by a community.

<edit>
You might say "Already right in place, it's called GFDL".
My idea is not about the grassroot-style collaborative creation of new content, but about making available existing content.
I have seen manuals for OSS, e.g., Gimp.
These are written quite well, but unfortunately do not comply with any regulations, such as ANSI or DIN.
</edit)

Feedback welcome!

-Marty