Handling content outside the map directory
By default, DITA-OT assumes content is located in or beneath the directory containing the DITA map file. The generate.copy.outer parameter can be used to adjust how output is generated for content that is located outside the map directory.
Background
- The DITA map is in a directory that is a peer to directories that contain referenced objects.
- The DITA map is in a directory that is below the directories that contain the referenced objects.
Let’s assume that the directory structure for the DITA content looks like the following:
images/ fig.png maps/ start.ditamap topics/ topic.dita
The DITA map is in the maps directory, the topics are in the topics directory, and the images are in the images directory.
Exclude content outside the map directory
Let’s assume that you run the HTML5 transformation. By default, the DITA-OT uses the generate.copy.outer parameter with a value of 1, which means that no output is generated for content that is located outside the DITA map directory.
You receive only the following output:
index.html commonltr.css commonrtl.css
The index.html file contains the navigation structure, but all the links are broken, since no HTML files were built for the topics.
How do you fix this? By adjusting the parameter setting to shift the output directory.
Shift the output directory to include all content
To preserve the links to referenced topics and images and make it easier to copy the output directory, set the generate.copy.outer parameter to 3.
Now your output directory structure resembles the structure of the source directory:
images/ fig.png maps/ index.html topics/ topic.html commonltr.css commonrtl.css
The index.html file is in the maps directory, the HTML files for the topics are in the topics directory, and the referenced images are in the images directory.