Resources: Events - ASI Conference Workshop
ASI Conference Workshop: Creating Website Indexes
Presented by Heather Hedden
This half-day workshop presented by Heather Hedden instructs participants on how to create back-of-the-book style indexes on web sites or intranets. The presentation content, examples, and exercises come from the full 13-week online course that taught by Hedden Information Management in 2005. A review of HTML codes will be provided, so participants with no prior experience with HTML may take this workshop, but prior experience with HTML is an advantage. Indexing experience is also not necessary, but a basic familiarity with the concepts of subentries, double-posting, and cross-references is assumed. Indexing techniques and tools specific to web site indexing will be presented. Participants will be engaged in interactive discussion, and demos of different software will be provided.
Workshop Outline
1. Introduction to web site indexes
Types of web site indexes and an analysis of sample indexes and their
source code.
2. HTML tags
A review of the HTML tags used to create links from and within an index
and the tags used to indent subentries.
3. Indexing software overview
Overview of the different kinds of software available for web site indexing,
and summary instruction on how to output HTML indexes created in Cindex,
SKY, or Macrex into HTML indexes, with or without the conversion utility
HTML/Prep and the conversion feature of XRefHT.
4. Indexing tools: XRefHT
Instruction and demonstration of using the freeware tool XRefHT (Windows
or Java).
5. Indexing tools: HTML Indexer
Instruction and demonstration of using the commercial tool HTML Indexer
(Windows).
6: Formatting and style
When and how to change a web index's format and style and special considerations
in web indexing, such as those pertaining to subentries.
7. Indexing techniques
Deciding which web pages to index and what to index within the pages chosen,
among headings and other concepts. Deciding how to word the index main
entries and subentries, when and how to form entries, and how to come
up with additional terms. Creating See and See also
cross-references and considerations in editing the index structure.
8. Web index market
What sites are most suitable for indexes. Awareness, knowledge, and demand
for web site indexes. Includes discussion of marketing for freelancers
and the issue of index maintenance.
9. Related topics
Taxonomies, database indexes, and meta data indexing.
About the Presenter: Heather Hedden offers freelance services in book and web site indexing and in taxonomy creation through Hedden Information Management. She previously served as an in-house periodical indexer and then senior vocabulary editor at Thomson Gale information taxonomist at Viziant Corp. She continues to teach online courses in web site indexing, both independently and through the Continuing Education Program of Simmons College Graduate School of Library and Information Science. She has published numerous articles on web site indexing and has recently written a book, Indexing Specialties: Web Sites, for ASI and Information Today, Inc. Heather was manager of the Web Indexing SIG of ASI from 2005 to 2006 and was president of the New England Chapter of ASI in 2006.