ORACLE TUTOR DATA SHEET ORACLE TUTOR AUTHOR PROCEDURE WRITING MADE EASY WITH AUTHOR, PROCEDURES PRACTICALLY WRITE THEMSELVES SAVES TIME Toolbar lets you write and format quickly Automatic flowcharting of narrative text Predefined templates for creating commonly used business documents Automatic hypertext linking Automatic HTML conversion Automatic Visio vdx file conversion Automatic XPDL file conversion PROVIDES STANDARDIZATION Consistent format gives all documents same look and feel Predefined structure helps you organize information INCREASES PRODUCTIVITY Documents are accurate, user-friendly and relevant Employees have immediate access to documentation For many of us, writing an effective procedure to document an activity in the workplace can be pretty daunting. Granted, you have first-hand knowledge of the activity. So nobody is better qualified than you to document it. But writing just isn't your thing. So where do you begin? How detailed should the procedure be? What format should you use? How do you put the procedure on the company network? Should you flowchart the activity? If so, which tools should you use? Fortunately, there's one simple answer to all of these questions: Tutor Author. Because with Author, the structure for creating procedures and other types of documents is already in place. What is Tutor Author? Author simplifies procedure writing by providing additional functionality to Microsoft Word. Proprietary toolbars and buttons are installed over Microsoft Word and allow you to do many documenting tasks with one click. Using Tutor Author, you can be writing procedures within minutes. And not just ordinary procedures, but procedures that are consistently organized and formatted, procedures that include flowcharts, and procedures in HTML format with hyperlinks to other Tutor Author documents. Use Tutor Author to: Write a variety of process document types Consistently format paragraphs in a procedure or other support documents with hierarchical, logical, pre-defined styles Format text with one mouse click (no need to open Word dialog boxes) Renumber procedure tasks and directives Create a flowchart of a process or procedure (this feature allows you to keep your narrative text and flowchart graphic of the procedure in sync with one easy click of a toolbar button - no more duplication of effort to update a procedure and its corresponding flowchart) Create an HTML version (includes quick access tabs to the desired section of a document, hyperlinks to other documents, and hypersensitive flowcharts) Import PowerPoint content into a Word document Write a variety of courseware document types Convert HTML files into a Tutor formatted Word document. Tutor Author: Guides you through the writing process (helps you identify and organize critical information) Automatically determines the required distribution for a procedure Allows you to hyperlink documents by simply underlining text (no lengthy paths or server names) Provides a complete methodology-the do's and don'ts of procedure writing Has a short learning curve, due to the Microsoft Word interface
Author also provides: 1) A writing methodology that helps you identify and organize procedures and their corresponding support information, and 2) Predefined document types that support the organization of this information. The Author Method A procedure is the documentation of an activity a step-by-step explanation of exactly what employees need to do to complete the activity. The Author method reflects a logical approach to creating a procedure: writing an introduction, writing a task segment, and generating a flowchart-which is a clear, graphic way to communicate the procedure. The introduction provides the context of the procedure. Here, you describe what the procedure covers (scope), the corporate or departmental rules that directly impact the activity (policy), who does what (responsibility), and other preparatory information. The task segment is the heart of the procedure. It describes the action: what triggers the activity, who performs each task, the tasks themselves, notes about the tasks, and so on. The Author renumber feature selectively renumbers when you add or delete tasks. The flowchart is a graphic representation of the procedure. After employees use a procedure, they may not need to refer back to all of the detail contained in the document. A concise flowchart communicates the important tasks to completing an activity, and it can be quickly read and understood. Author also provides help in writing and integrating other types of process documents-documents that support and complement your procedures. Author includes pre-defined templates for the following types of documents: Forms Education Overviews Instructions Coding Conventions Labs Navigation Instructions Procedures Reference Documents Using Author Author adds features to an installed version of Microsoft Word to make writing procedures intuitive and quick. When you start Author, you choose from a list of Author document templates or from a list of existing template "skeletons" that you have already created. Figure: Create New Document dialog box 2
The Author Window The template or existing document then opens in the main Author window, which is divided into two columns: A list of paragraph styles on the left A list of procedure information on the right, which is the document itself Figure: Procedure Skeleton You write and edit the procedure information in the right-hand section and assign a style to each paragraph using the Author menu or toolbar. The Author Toolbar The Author toolbar lets you quickly assign styles or information types, promote and demote task levels, set conditions, and other tasks. Figure: Author toolbars All the shortcut buttons correspond to commands accessible in Word's Author menu. Automatic Flowcharting Flowcharts are essential tools for communicating procedures quickly. Choosing Flowchart in the Author menu automatically creates a flowchart of the procedure you are working on and adds the graphic at the end of the document. The flowcharting function offers several important benefits: Automatic - Manually drawing flowcharts is time consuming and redundant. And changes to a procedure can require completely redrawing the flowchart. With Author, any change to the procedure text will appear in the flowchart-in seconds. Analyzes logic - The flowcharting function verifies that task numbers within a procedure have not been skipped or duplicated, that statements within a procedure do not reference nonexistent tasks, and that the flow of a procedure does not bypass requisite tasks. 3
Abbreviated (high-level) view of a process--author flowcharts reflect tasks and directives. They only show "who" and "what to do" along with the flow of work based on certain conditions. Detailed explanations and instructions are omitted. With the user-maintainable abbreviation table, a flowchart can condense as many as 10 pages of a text-based procedure into a single, graphic page. Matches text exactly compliance program auditors routinely applaud the fact that any flowchart produced by Author's software will match the procedure text exactly. This is often not the case when a flowchart has been drawn by hand, even using a software tool, too often some information is omitted or added. Figure: Flowchart automatically generated from text in Tutor Author procedure. Parallel Tasks Tutor Author allows writers to designate a set of tasks, in the narrative text of the procedure, which can be performed concurrently by different participants. Consequently, when the narrative procedure is imported into the Oracle tools BPM or BPA, the resulting swim lane diagram will show the tasks in parallel. Converting Models from Oracle BPM Tools to Tutor Format Process models developed in Oracle BPA Suite and Oracle BPM Suite are converted to Tutor procedure documents from toolbars within each of those tools. The conversion program will convert the selected model into a.docx file in Tutor Author format. The newly created narrative document can then be opened in Author, modified if necessary and deployed using Tutor Publisher into an HTML environment serving the end user community For details on this feature, see the datasheet on the Oracle Business Process Converter. Converting Visio and XPDL diagrams to Tutor Format Visio diagrams provide the greatest opportunity for time saved in redeveloping procedure content because there are so many of them in the organizational environment. Tutor Author s content conversion capability accelerates procedure development by converting Visio and XPDL process model artifacts into written procedures. 4
KNOW MORE, DO MORE, SPEND LESS CUT YOUR POLICY AND PROCEDURE DOCUMENTATION COSTS BY UP TO 85% WITH ORACLE TUTOR Create and document custom business procedures for the tasks your users perform in a fraction of the time it would take to develop them from scratch. Update procedures online and use the Web to distribute reference materials only to the users who need them. Guide your employees through all relevant business scenarios with streamlined flowcharts Figure: Microsoft Visio file Following is the task section of the procedure (the Visio diagram converted to narrative text) RELATED PRODUCTS User Productivity Kit (UPK) Oracle Business Process Management Suite (BPM) Oracle BPA Suite (Business Process Architect) RELATED SERVICES Oracle University Tutor Implementation Engagements: Orientation Workshop Tutor Software Training Procedure Editing Workshop Figure: Microsoft Visio file converted to Tutor Author Word narrative format Automatic Web Pages With Author, it is extremely easy to deploy procedures online. Clicking the HTML button creates an HTML version of your procedure for posting on your organization s intranet or the Web. With the Tutor system, traditional and proprietary hyper linking is supported. Within your document, you can include a reference to another online procedure and Author will automatically generate a hyperlink. Author also automatically converts URLs into hyperlinks. 5
Figure: HTML version of procedure created with Tutor Author Jumpstart your process documentation effort Using Author, you can be writing procedures within minutes. And not just ordinary procedures, but procedures that are easy to keep consistent and current using the Tutor system and method. For System Requirements and other Oracle Tutor products See the data sheet for Tutor System Requirements as well as the respective data sheets on Tutor, Tutor Author, Tutor Publisher, Tutor Business Process Converter, and Tutor Model Documents. Contact Us For more information about Tutor, visit Oracle.Com or the Tutor Blog. Post your questions at the Tutor Forum. Call +1.800.ORACLE1 Copyright 2010, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. This document is provided for information purposes only and the contents hereof are subject to change without notice. This document is not warranted to be error-free, nor subject to any other warranties or conditions, whether expressed orally or implied in law, including implied warranties and conditions of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. We specifically disclaim any liability with respect to this document and no contractual obligations are formed either directly or indirectly by this document. This document may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, for any purpose, without our prior written permission. Oracle and Java are registered trademarks of Oracle and/or its affiliates. Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners. AMD, Opteron, the AMD logo, and the AMD Opteron logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices. Intel and Intel Xeon are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation. All SPARC trademarks are used under license and are trademarks or registered trademarks of SPARC International, Inc. UNIX is a registered trademark licensed through X/Open Company, Ltd. 0410 6