Document Creation Process Overview

The VideoRay document creation process relies on DynaDoc and several supporting PHP programs. In addition, several other free or open source tools are required. The VideoRay proprietary programs, including DynaDoc, are archived in private Git repositories on BitBucket. Other tools can be found on the Internet. These programs can be installed on a local computer to enable a stand-alone document production environment. Information about downloading and installing the required programs and setting up the development environment can be found in the Environment Configuration section of this guide.

Documents are written in HTML with each page being a modular HTML file. JavaScript can be added to make the pages dynamic. A template and CSS files control the page layout, so the author only needs to concentrate on the content of each page. The sequence of the pages in the final document is defined in the DynaDoc script. The results are in the format of this manual, with an automatically generated menu, table of contents and other features. For more information about the technical aspects of using DynaDoc, see the DynaDoc Operator's Manual.

Documentation projects are version controlled using Git and archived in public repositories on GitHub. Completed documents are published to VideoRay product computers and the Internet.

This guide provides step-by-step instructions on how to create and publish VideoRay documents. The basic process is outlined below and details are included in the sections that follow.

1. Set up the computer working environment (one time).
2. Set up the DynaDoc environment.
3. Set up a document project.
4. Create the content for the project.
5. Prepare the project for publishing.
6. Publish the project.
7. Archive the project.