Topic domains: Technical content

A DITA domain defines a set of elements associated with a particular subject area or authoring requirement. DITA incorporates several domains into the Technical Content specializations. Other domains are incorporated into basic DITA.

The elements in a domain are defined in a domain module which can be integrated with a topic type to make the domain elements available within the topic type structure. Currently the following domains are provided as part of the Technical Content specializations:

Table 1. Technical content domains. DITA includes domain specializations that are especially useful for authoring technical content. The typographic, utilities, and indexing domains associated with Base DITA are described under DITA Markup.
Domain	Description	Short name	Module name
Programming	For describing programming and programming languages	pr-d	programmingDomain.mod (DTD) programmingDomain.ent programmingDomain.xsd (Schema)
Software	For describing software	sw-d	softwareDomain.mod (DTD) softwareDomain.ent softwareDomain.xsd (Schema)
User interface	For describing elements in a user interface	ui-d	uiDomain.mod (DTD) uiDomain.ent uiDomain.xsd (Schema)
Hazard statements	For providing detailed information about safety hazards	hazard-d	hazardstatementDomain.mod (DTD) hazardstatementDomain.ent hazardstatementDomain.xsd (Schema)
Abbreviated form	For linking between a text reference to a glossentry topic. A specialization of <term> to provide an <abbreviated-form> element	abbrev-d	abbreviateDomain.mod (DTD) abbreviateDomain.ent abbreviateDomain.xsd (Schema)
Glossary reference	For linking from a term to its glossary topic	glossref-d	glossrefDomain.mod (DTD) glossrefDomain.ent glossrefDomain.xsd (Schema)

The technical content domain specializations, like all domain specializations, may be included in the DITA document types beyond those in the technical content section. The DITA document types in the technical content section make use of other domain specializations in addition to those listed in the table.

The elements and attributes included in specific domain specializations are described in the domain elements of the DITA 1.2 Language Reference.

2.2.3 Topic domains: Technical content