Real-time data integration, such as vessel tracking data, into documentation is achieved with DITA by leveraging the extensibility and integration capabilities of the DITA XML format. This allows maritime organizations to incorporate dynamic and constantly changing data into their documentation, ensuring that information remains up-to-date and accurate.

Data Source Integration

Maritime organizations can establish integration points with data sources like vessel tracking systems, weather APIs, or AIS (Automatic Identification System) data feeds. These integration points collect and transmit real-time data to a centralized repository, ensuring that the latest information is readily available for documentation updates.

Dynamic Content Tags

In DITA, organizations can define custom elements and attributes to represent real-time data. For example, a custom DITA tag could be created to capture vessel position, speed, or weather conditions. These dynamic content tags can be embedded within DITA topics, allowing documentation authors to reference and display real-time data in their content.

Example:

Here’s an HTML-friendly example illustrating how real-time vessel tracking data can be integrated into DITA documentation:

<topic id="vessel_tracking">
  <title>Vessel Tracking</title>
  <content>
    <p>This topic provides real-time tracking information for a vessel in the following format:

    <vessel-position>
      <latitude>42.3601</latitude>
      <longitude>-71.0589</longitude>
      <speed>15 knots</speed>
    </vessel-position>
    <p>For the latest updates on the vessel's location and speed, refer to the real-time tracking system.

  </content>

In this example, the “Vessel Tracking” DITA topic includes custom tags like <vessel-position> and related elements to capture latitude, longitude, and speed. This allows documentation to display real-time vessel tracking data within the documentation.