Abstract: A content management system (CMS) includes a content modification mechanism that checks a modification contract corresponding to a component in the repository, and determines if all relevant criteria in the modification contract corresponding to the component are satisfied before making changes to or allowing reuse of a component in the repository. The modification contract may specify a profile of authors that are allowed to modify the corresponding component. The content management system includes an author profile update mechanism that monitors modifications by authors to components in the repository, and automatically adjusts a profile of each author according to modifications made by the author. In this manner the rank of authors is automatically adjusted and the modification of components is controlled in a way that allows modification by those who are authorized yet restricts modification by those who are not authorized.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) includes a content reuse mechanism that checks a reuse contract corresponding to a component in the repository, and determines if all relevant criteria in the reuse contract corresponding to the component are satisfied before allowing reuse of a component in the repository. In this manner the reuse of components is controlled in a way that allows reuse when stated criteria in the reuse contract are satisfied yet restricts reuse when the criteria in the reuse contract are not satisfied.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) provides a DITA specialization processing mechanism that provides the full functions of a content management system across the full functionality of the DITA architecture. A DITA specialization is used to generate an import descriptor that describes how to import the DITA specialization, which may include required modules, stylesheets, catalogs, and content rules into the repository of a content management system. When the DITA specialization is imported into the repository, a compound document is created with appropriate parent/child links. Dependency relationships between modules in the compound document are then created. In addition, new XML content rules for the DITA specialization may be automatically generated from existing content rules.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for automatically generating dynamic documentation from a product's configuration related data in a product configuration. A transformation engine incorporates a dynamic documentation mechanism that uses the product configuration file and other information to automatically generate dynamic documentation. In order to automate the creation of dynamic documentation, a new type of annotation element called a “tutorial annotation” is inserted into the product configuration file. The dynamic documentation mechanism provides dynamic documentation such as walk-through tutorials, configuration help, and animations based on the product configuration file and information stored in the tutorial annotations. The dynamic documentation mechanism ascertains a dynamic flow by reading the tutorial annotations and stepping through all of the relationships or dependencies of the product configuration file associated with the software product.

Abstract: In an embodiment, identifiers and states of processes are displayed in a stacked cursor, which is moved in response to movement of a pointing device. The display of the identifiers and the states is customized based on a presentation type associated with each of the processes. If a time threshold associated with the process expires, the identifier of the process and the state are removed from the stacked cursor. In various embodiments, customizing the display of the states and the identifiers may include displaying the state and/or the identifier in text forms, icon forms, and/or colors indicated by the presentation type and/or presenting a sound indicated by the presentation type in response to a change of the state. In this way, a user can determine the states of multiple processes without diverting the user's attention from the stacked cursor.

Abstract: A method and apparatus produces documentation from customized extensible mark-up language (XML) by generating a schema-specific Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) specialization. The DITA specialization is generated from XML schemas which define the XML documents. During the process of generating the DITA specialization, a XSL transform is also generated. The XSL transform is applied to the XML file to produce a DITA file that follows the rules of the DITA specialization. Prior art transforms can then be used to convert the DITA file and the DITA specialization to standard documentation. Generating schema-specific DITA specializations may be an automatic process or a dynamic process under the direction of a user.

Abstract: Embodiments of the invention provide for detecting and (in at least some cases) repairing XML configuration conflicts in a content management system (CMS). One method allows a CMS to evaluate various configuration components and determine when those components may conflict with one another. If a conflict is detected, the CMS may be configured to notify an administrator of the problem, and in some cases, correct the problem. As a result, administrators may not have to carefully evaluate each configuration file associated with a document type definition for a given document type before creating or modifying a content processing rule.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) indicates stale (i.e. outdated) elements in a document according to a stale content policy that specifies one or more thresholds that determine whether or not an element is stale, and if a stale element should trigger an auto suggest mechanism. When an author checks a document out of the repository, the elements in the document are displayed to the user to indicate the element's staleness according to the stale content policy. The auto suggest mechanism populates a related elements list via a query to the repository according to an auto suggest policy that specifies which elements can be included by the auto suggest mechanism in the related elements list. The related elements list is presented to a user, who may select one of the related elements. The link in the document to the stale element is replaced by a link to the selected related element.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) includes an autonomic profile generation mechanism that autonomically generates one or more profiles based on one or more patterns detected in a schema for an object. Autonomically generating profiles allows documents to be rendered in more efficient ways, avoiding the rendering of content that is not needed according to the profiles. The autonomic generation of profiles may be performed at the request of a user, when a user creates a new schema, when a user modifies an existing schema, or at configured times.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) includes a rendering mechanism that receives a desired rendering action for a selected object in the repository, determines from defined rendering rules which elements in the selected object correspond to the desired rendering action, determines which of a plurality of applications corresponds to the desired rendering action, and renders one or more elements in the selected object that correspond to the desired rendering action in the application corresponding to the desired rendering action. The rendering mechanism may insert rendering markers in an object that define a type of data for each element in the object. In addition, nested elements may be rendered by invoking multiple applications that are active at the same time to simultaneously render different types of data.

Abstract: A content management system provides a profiling mechanism that automatically tags changes made to elements in a document with applicability metadata, and uses the applicability metadata when processing a request to the repository by a user to filter the query results according to a profile for the user. A profiling mapping policy defines roles for users of the content management system. When content is requested from the repository, the profiling mechanism inserts one or more additional request parameters based on the profile of the user. The results that match both the original request and the additional request parameter(s) are returned to the user. When the user views the results, additional filtering may occur to filter individual elements from the user that do match the user's profile.

Abstract: A content management system provides a way to detect a change to one part of a document, and to generate a corresponding change in a different part of the same document. Dynamic inclusion rules define conditions that, when satisfied, allow automatically changing a link in a document to a new link when corresponding data in the document is added or changed. If a change corresponds to a defined dynamic inclusion rule, a corresponding query in the rule is evaluated according to the changes in the document. When there is enough information to run the query, the query is automatically executed in a background process. If there is a single link that satisfies the query, the document may be updated with the new link. If multiple links satisfy the query, the top ranked query result may be automatically selected, or the user may select which link should be included in the document.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) includes a content modification mechanism that detects a change to a shared document in the repository, and in response to the detected change, inserts applicability metadata in the shared document. The content modification mechanism may broadcast the change to each parent document. Each parent document votes on whether or not to accept the change. If enough of the parent documents accept the change (i.e. the votes meet a defined voting threshold), the applicability metadata is removed from the shared content. If not enough of the parent documents accept the change, the applicability metadata remains in the shared content, and a profile corresponding to the applicability metadata is created for each parent document that accepted the change. In this manner, profiling may be used to account for changes to shared content in a content management system.

Abstract: Embodiments of the invention generally provide for highly tolerant and adaptable content reuse in a content management system (CMS). The method and system allow an author to reuse fragments of content that are composed from a document structure incompatible with a document structure of a document which the fragment is being incorporated. In such a case, the CMS may be configured to generate a new branched fragment, based on the content of the original fragment, but composed according to the grammar of the document which the fragment is being incorporated. Additionally, the CMS may be configured to maintain a relationship between an original fragment and branched fragments derived therefrom. Further, any content changes made to the original fragment may be incorporated by any associated branch fragments.

Abstract: Embodiments of the invention provide a method for managing and updating documents containing specialized content in a content management system (CMS) by chaining plug-ins. Rather than create a unique rule for each specialized scenario, a CMS may be configured to apply a plug-in chain in an order based upon a type of document encountered and/or configured criteria.

Abstract: When creating or editing a document in a content management system and specific content is needed, documents in the repository are searched for an element that has the desired content. If an element is found in a document in the repository that has the desired content, the element is bursted on-demand by extracting the element from the parent document where it was found and creating a document in the repository for the element. A link that points to the bursted document in the repository is then inserted into the document that needed the element. If the parent document from which the element was extracted is mutable, then the element in the parent document is replaced with a link to the bursted document.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) monitors and logs review activity for elements in a document. A review activity policy includes one or more thresholds that define one or more ranges that define corresponding review activity levels. A schema or document type for the document is annotated based on the logged review activity to indicate one or more review activity levels for one or more elements in the schema or document type. When an author edits or creates a document based on the same schema or document type, the schema or document type for that document is read, and the elements in the document are displayed to the user to indicate past review activity according to the annotations in the document's schema or document type.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) includes metadata for each element in the repository. When an element has missing content that needs to be created, the repository is queried to identify elements which most closely match the metadata of the missing content. The metadata for these identified elements is analyzed to determine the authors for these elements which most closely match the element that needs to be authored. The authors are then ranked according to an author selection policy that may specify any suitable criteria for ranking authors, including author selection criteria, author ranking criteria, author filtering criteria, and author backup criteria. The result is a ranked list of one or more authors that are deemed the best choices of authors to author the missing content. The user may then request one of the authors in the ranked list to create the missing content.

Abstract: A content management system (CMS) monitors a user's activity for a document, generates corresponding usage data for the user, and binds the usage data to corresponding sections of the document. A relevance policy may be defined for a user and/or for a user's role. The CMS may then render the document to the user based on the usage data and the relevance policy. The rendered document may include displayed sections, hidden sections, and accentuated sections. The result is a document rendered to a user in a way that hides sections that are not of interest, displays sections of interest, and accentuates sections of high interest, all based on usage data that indicates how the document was accessed in the past.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for improving the performance of a CMS system configured for bursting is disclosed. The CMS may be configured to automatically scan the CMS for unused document fragments and “clean up” the repository by reinserting the unused document fragments back into a corresponding source document. Thus, embodiments of the invention do not rely on beforehand knowledge and policy setting as current approaches. Rather, an autonomous method is used to manage document fragments by detecting and reinserting unused fragments back into their original documents.