Delivered at the CMS/DITA Europe conference, this presentation describes The Rail Safety and Standards Board's (RSSB) project to enable delivery of their Rule Book via native mobile app and print/PDF from a single content source. Mekon Ltd was the main contractor on the project with Congility providing the dynamic content delivery platform powering the new app.

1.
The Rail Safety Rule Book Modernised
Planning and Implementing a
Successful Mobile App
Joe Girling
Dave Harrison

2. Agenda
RSSB and the Rule Book
Why a Mobile App?
Mobile App Design
Digital Rule Book Roadmap
Project overview

3. RSSB and the Rule Book
RSSB
- Member-funded organisation – 74 Members
- Works with UK rail industry to develop and
implement national standards and operating
rules
The Rule Book
- National rulebook first published 1950
- 120,000 UK users
- Published in A5 and A6 styles in hard copy and
PDF
- Updates published annually
- All content certified by the Plain English
Campaign

4. Why Mobile App?
Strengthen RSSB’s value proposition
– Flexibility and availability
– Increased functionality (audio/video)
Reliable offline capability
– Train drivers, track workers, signalmen, etc
Increase frequency of updates
– Advance notification of updates
– Acknowledgement of updates
– Tracking and reporting acknowledgements

5. Mobile App Design
User experience
– Device independent
– Rapid access to content
– Personalisation (User authentication/SSO)
– Activity tracking and reporting
Taking content offline
– My Rule Book
– Offline/online sync
Highlighting relevant new/updated content
– Automatic content switching
– Links to change descriptions

8. Takingcontentoffline

9. Takingcontentoffline

10. Takingcontentoffline

11. Takingcontentoffline

13. Managingcontentupdates

14. Managingcontentupdates

15. Managingcontentupdates

17. RSSB Digital Rule Book Project Roadmap
Sept 16 Jan 17 Feb 17 Mar 17
Project
Commences
Develop IM
Convert
Content to
DITA
Update CCMS and Author
Future Amendments
Stylesheet
Development
Mobile App Design, Development and Testing
Initial
Release of
IOS version
of App
Oct 16 Nov 16 Dec 16 Apr 17 May 17 Jun 17 Jul 17 Aug 17
Release
Android
version of
App
Latest
Release
of App

18. Key Constraints
Maintaining existing PDF offering while improving UI with
new app
– Role and responsibility indicator
– Change bars

21. New Information Model
– Developed by Mekon working with RSSB team
– Publishing to both legacy PDF output and the new mobile app
– Metadata for role and responsibility
– Metadata and mechanisms for automatically handling release
of updates and changes
• In Force dates
• Future Amendments
– Authoring guidelines for the Rule Book defined DITA mappings

23. Data Conversion
– Initially used automated conversion tools - PDF to DITA
– Applied the new Information Model
– Pilot phase using most complex documents to cover all DITA
structures
– Mekon and RSSB carried out QA and enriching of the content
manually
– DITA content imported into RSSB CCMS and published out to PDF
for comparison with original PDFs

24. Content Conversion and Migration Process
PDF
Legacy
Content
Automated
Conversion
Tool
Converted
DITA
Content
Manual
Clean Up
Information
Model
PDF
Legacy
Content
DITA
Imported
to
CCMS
Hi-Res
Images
and
Tables
Publish
content to
Mobile App
via
DITAweb
Mobile
App
Publish
content to
PDF via
Stylesheet
plugin
PDF

25. PDF Style Sheet Development
– Plugin developed by Mekon using XSL- FO
– Linked to Antenna House for publishing
– Interactive development with RSSB team
– Consolidated changes to Information Model
• Change links also drive PDF change bars
• Role and Responsibility indicators
– Enabled better judgement of conversion quality

26. PDF Style Sheet Development

27. PDF Style Sheet Development
<booknumber>
<booklibrary>
<mainbooktitle>
<edition>
<completed>
<bookevent>
type in-force
<bookpartno>

28. Activity Monitoring and Reporting

29. Activity Monitoring and Reporting

30. “The layout of information on the
screen is clear and visually
appealing”
“It is easy to ‘add a document to’
and ‘remove a document from’ My
Rule Book”
“It is easy to find highlighted
amendments within a document”
“Users can access content 24/7, making searching for specific topics easier
than ever. It is also easier to update the content, allowing people to be notified
of changes, with each amendment accompanied by an explanation of change.
These benefits simply can’t be done on the traditional paper version”
RSSB’s Professional Head of Operations (April 2017)

31. End of Presentation
Questions?
Dave Harrison – dave.harrison@mekon.uk
Joe Girling – joe.girling@congility.com
Please come and see us at
the Congility booth