Working with Content References

The DITA feature called conref (short for content reference) enables a piece of content to be included by reference in multiple contexts. When you need to update that content, you do it in only one place. Typical uses of content references are for product names, warnings, definitions or process steps.

You can use either or both of the following strategies for managing content references:

Oxygen XML Author creates a reference to the external content by adding a conref attribute to an element in the local document. The conref attribute defines a link to the referenced content, made up of a path to the file and the topic ID within the file. The path may also reference a specific element ID within the topic. Referenced content is not physically copied to the referencing file, but Oxygen XML Author displays it as if it is there in the referencing file. You can also choose to view local content instead of referenced content, to edit the attributes or contents of the referencing element.