Legacy conversion is the data conversion from an old format to a more modern format to better meet the current industry standards or the client’s immediate operational requirements. Generally, products with extensive remaining service life will benefit from having a partial to complete data conversion, future-proofing a vendor’s business for decades to come.
Since it is universally agreed upon that S1000D is becoming the prominent standard for the aerospace and aviation industry including both the sectors of commercial and defense, Interactive Electronic Technical Publication (IETP) output built upon for S1000D Functionality Matrix is almost always considered the best investment for the conversion.
Needless to say, not every S1000D conversion project is similar as it depends on the original formats of the legacy data, as well as the conversion methodology implemented. For technical concerns regarding how the data conversion project should be approached, it is best to consult a subject matter expert to avoid labor-intensive, manual data retying (when you can automate most of the conversion) or failing to notice any human-error inaccuracies that may occur while converting the data.
However, before heading down a conversion journey, the decision-making unit of your organization should first prudently address a few high-level concerns regarding the opportunities and challenges of the conversion.
Are the opportunities worth the cost (and time)?
Even though your organization might have already foreseen certain benefits for the initiative, there is a trade-off that should always be taken into account since the conversion usually requires a substantial financial and time investment.
As previously stated, the best case for S1000D legacy conversion is when a product is expected to remain in service in decades to come, saving your organization time and money by reducing the future effort to maintain and distribute content. This should be done especially when the data to be converted will remain useful for its intended purpose, yet currently remains in an older format (e.g. PDF, MS Word, paper-based) where it fails to be efficiently utilized by advanced systems to deliver a more modern speed and interactivity.
How smoothly the data can migrate to S1000D while retaining 100% content accuracy?
Quite frankly, this is a tricky subject the decision-making unit may not have an answer to right away. Nevertheless, it’s important to keep in mind that the current format and structure of the data can greatly determine its conversion cost and time as well as its ability to be reauthored compliant with the data module structure of S1000D. With that being said, some data might have to be restructured and reorganized. Certain redundancies should be eliminated for clarity and interactivity. Low-quality illustrations might have to be redrawn or reworked to be better formatted as higher quality rasterized images.
Regarding the original format of the document, semi-automated conversion technologies can be utilized for digital formats like MS Word and PDF where more manual procedures such as Optical character recognition (OCR) scanning are often needed for paper-based documents. However, expect that there is currently no fully automated method, as human intervention is key for the quality and integrity assurance of mission-critical data.
Do you have full permission to convert the data?
In the scenario where there are multiple stakeholders in a single product, the ownership of the accompanying right-managed data can be hard to trace. However, it is inevitably vital to make certain that your organization possesses ample proprietary rights to convert the data either through majority ownership or via other forms of permission-granting agreements before any conversion activity starts. You do not want to be halfway into the project and then discover that you were not allowed to convert the data, as the combined legal consequences can gravely jeopardize your operations, not to mention the wasted efforts. When it comes to intellectual property rights, it is simply better to be safe than sorry.
After having these high-level questions addressed by your decision-making unit, your organization may now decide whether or not to initiate the conversion. Again, if you believe your organization does not possess ample facilities for the project’s success, it is crucial to be in touch with an S1000D expert who can determine how to effectively implement the conversion or whether the conversion is ultimately a good idea.
SYNAXIOM can help
Have questions with S1000D? With over a decade of experience in multi-spec aerospace projects and elite customers including one of the world’s largest aircraft manufacturers, SYNAXIOM can help with any of your highly-specific concerns regarding the S1000D standard and ATA legacy data. Contact us today for a free consultation.