Treffer: The publishing process: the hyper-book approach

This paper presents a general overview of the publishing process, including both paper and electronic publishing. The main actors (e.g. authors, publishers and libraries) and the associated publications channels are discussed. One channel is discussed in more detail: this channel incorporates all the steps involved from the acquisition of a manuscript in a generic mark-up language to the presentation of the final electronic publication to the user in the library. The use of a generic mark-up language (e.g. SGML - standard generalised mark-up language) is viewed as being an essential component for facilitating the exchange of electronic documents between different systems and applications. In addition, the use of a generic mark-up language allows several steps of the publishing process to be automated, from the production of electronic books, to the addition of the resulting books to a (electronic) library. A system is proposed which provides the acquisition and authoring tools required to generate electronic books, together with an appropriate interface and readers' services. The system incorporates two notable features: a model of an electronic book (hyper-book) based on the book metaphor and designed within the context of an electronic library, and an environment which supports the semi-automatic generation of electronic books (hyper-book builder) starting from a manuscript which is already available in SGML format.