The Curriculum and Catalog Production System

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Paper Written By:
James W. "Jim" Jessee
Director of Academic Publications, Facilities and Database Services
Office of the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs
California State University, Chico

Table of Contents

System Overview

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CSU Chico has developed a Catalog Production System that integrates the Common Management System (CMS) curriculum and course information, along with additional XML files, to publish the printed and Web University Catalog. Please see the attached flowchart.

The Catalog Production System uses the University CMS database and its own catalog files and faculty database, through Microsoft Visual Basic (VB) software to produce XML files for input into Adobe InDesign (ID) and local VB based Web development software, to produce both the printed and Web catalog publications.

All faculty, students, staff, and other contributors of catalog updates and information are encouraged to help us maintain The Catalog in an ongoing basis following University Catalog Publication and Academic Planning Cycle Policy and Procedures in the Department Manual, www.csuchico.edu/vpaa/manual/CatalogDeadlines.htm

The University Catalog is published on a two-year cycle alternating with a two-year curriculum planning and evaluation cycle. This two-year cycle has proven to be extremely cost effective. Catalog stability over the two-year period is highly regarded with respect to external relations with high schools and community colleges. Its use for student advising, and for comprehensive and well considered curriculum planning for both high school preparation and transfer from Community Colleges must be trustworthy.

Deans, department chairs, and curriculum committee members should be aware of this two-year cycle for several reasons:

  1. To protect reliability of current catalog information for the many off-campus users, changes to existing programs or courses are normally approved for implementation effective with the next catalog. New degrees and courses are usually made effective for the next academic year, but will appear in the next two-year catalog. New degrees and courses will be put in the Web-based version of The Catalog as soon as possible after approval.
  2. The Academic Senate and the Chancellor's Office, and/or CPEC require lengthy lead times to review and approve some programs. As much as 9-15 months may be needed. Therefore, we need timely submissions of proposals to guarantee formal reviews and approval in time for inclusion in the next catalog.
  3. Overwhelming feedback tells us that confidence in our catalog for on- and off-campus student advising and planning is greatly improved by having The Catalog as accurate and stable as possible over the entire two-year catalog life cycle.

While we provide ample notice that changes may occur between catalogs (and such changes may be approved for such compelling reasons as an accreditation requirement and so forth), it is the policy of the University to make every effort to assure The Catalog's accuracy throughout the two years that it is in service.

The University policy is to make The Catalog as comprehensive and accurate as is practical to provide all information required for recruiting, admissions, advising, student life and activities, and as "the source" for curriculum and course information. While we disclaim otherwise, we want to prepare and treat The Catalog like a contract. With great care and time given to achieve both, we have made The Catalog a reliable and authoritative source for the University.

In general, the specific files which are used for production of the University Catalog may be divided into two production categories. Each category has its own initiation, paperwork and approval procedures, as well as input and file building and maintenance procedures.

Category I is the main catalog InDesign (ID) "book." It is a comprehensive plan with an outline of all narrative and descriptive text chapters, cover, essay, photos, dividers, and pages allocated for each. This narrative material represents 40% of the final catalog pages. The "book" also anticipates and allocates the blank pages needed for each academic chapter for later input of the Category II materials, reserving pages for each academic chapter's "guts."

Category II is the guts called fondly "CATGUTZ." It is the degree programs, course, and faculty information derived from the CMS database and other catalog XML files, and represents 60% of The Catalog's final pages. This second category is at first handled separately in its own temporary ID "book" for page determination, auditing and proofing. It is later integrated into the Category I main catalog ID book.

Category I: The Narrative Section

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The narrative section of The Catalog includes the cover, dividers, photos, front and back materials, maps, calendars, special essay, descriptions of campus governance and administration, general academic and other policies, student services, admissions, fees, and financial assistance information. It is the "non-operational text," public relations, and informative portions of The Catalog which do not refer to specific operational data such as program requirements, courses, or faculty listings. The narrative sections include the one-page introductory narrative and photos for each of the academic program chapters to be provided. It forms the main catalog "book" or final chapters and planned page allocation for each.

The University Catalog publication is composed ID as a "Book File" (.indb) with the planned page layout, text, paragraph, frame and photo style specifications, and page structure for the entire catalog. This includes anticipated page and photo allocations for the individual chapters or ID "Document files" (.indd). See Catalog Plan of Organization for document/chapter page allocations, responsible authors, and photos planned for each chapter.

The narrative section of The Catalog is maintained directly in ID by The Catalog editor using author provided hand marked-up catalog pages with replacement text and inserts provided for major text updates and new materials. See Catalog Editor Workflow for Catalog Production. Word, Email, PDF and other file formats are all acceptable input for this work. We can even optically scan printed text when it is not provided electronically.

ID allows us to provide to chapter authors PDF files for error corrections, proofing and further editing in an on-going basis. There is as little lag time as possible between submission of catalog narrative updates and returned PDF files for proofing. We make every effort to ready the Category I materials early in The Catalog publication process, to give maximum time to Category II materials, which stay in flux right up to the final deadlines.

Each narrative chapter, special charts, tables or maps, are developed and maintained as a stand-alone piece or "document" within the ID "book." As planned, a number of these stand-alone pieces are printed separately for other uses. For example, the photo essay, maps, academic calendar, and tables. Since they are stand-alone documents, some colleges or departments reprint their catalog chapter for advising handouts.

These ID "document" files include a chapter for each academic program. Space is laid out for the front page and photos of each academic program chapter with the reserved number of pages for academic program descriptions, faculty list, and course descriptions. The ID Catalog book and all of these related files and documents reside on a central University server to allow multiple user access (albeit very limited), and maximized security and daily back up.

Category II: The Academic Program Requirements, Faculty Listings, and Course Descriptions-CATGUTZ

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This category is the "operational" material which forms the "guts" of the academic chapters in The Catalog. It includes the general degree program requirements, general education requirements, and specific academic program descriptions for all majors, minors, credentials, and certificates, as well as faculty listings and course descriptions. This represents nearly 60% of printed material in The Catalog. This "operational" material is the information directly needed for academic advising and planning, degree audit and evaluation of student progress.

Category II includes all information which is linked to or derived from the University Common Management System (CMS) and other XML based operational data files:

  • Catalog Definitions File -- CATDEF
  • Master Catalog File -- CATPROGRAM
  • Course Description File -- CATDESC
  • Faculty Information -- AACATALOG FACULTY DATABASE

The first three files above are maintained on the central campus servers using a simple text editor, but shortly all text files will be converted to XML and an XML file editor and/or user interface. The Catalog Faculty Database is already an XML file maintained with its own interface.

The use of a "structured text file" allows for global search and replace. This is used when courses are renumbered, basic catalog terminology is changed, and other reasons are found to globally search and replace course IDs, titles, prerequisites or other repeated information in the course descriptions, prerequisites, and degree program descriptions throughout The Catalog. See Catalog File Maintenance in the Department Manual (To be developed by Claudia and placed in Department Manual). The new XML based catalog files will provide the same global replace opportunity that we cannot do with CMS based files. This is a huge time saver for us, and guarantees we have the information correct everywhere it appears, or not, but at least consistent!

These current catalog text files and future XML files are then read, parsed, and addressed by a special purpose set of VB programs, called the "Black Box." (DWIGHT PLEASE GIVE ME A HANDLE FOR THIS) These programs have been developed by the CSU, Chico Administrative Computing Services and Academic Affairs staff to produce an XML file with all the "guts" for complete ID catalog publication and Web input, in separate academic chapter units. We call this Catalog Program "Dwight's Black Box" after Dwight Holman who has developed it.

The first file in the Category II set is the catalog definitions or CATDEF file. It defines the CATPROGRAM identification codes or macro command language elements to be used, and it defines standard text elements or boiler plate used repeatedly throughout The Catalog in conjunction with specific macro commands. These boiler plate elements include appropriate XML tags required for publication formatting using ID or other XML based input programs.

The second file and main part of the Category II materials is a single large file named "CATPROGRAM." It is the script or sequential series of macro commands and associated parameters for producing all the academic program information or "guts" in the exact order desired. The CATPROGRAM file script contains both the necessary text for chapter and page structure and direct narrative for headlines and explanatory information, as well as the macro commands that will assemble a degree program set of requirements, the course description, and the faculty listing. The macro commands address the CMS Course Catalog, The Course descriptions file, AA Faculty Database, and other subprogram routines. These macro routines produce expanded publication copy for the program descriptions, course descriptions, and faculty listings, with XML tags for each element.

Every academic program requirement, from general degree requirements and general education to specific majors, minors, credentials, and certificates is coded sequentially in the order in which you want the material to appear. Line breaks, italics, or bold text commands are provided as needed for publication specifications. Macros for placement of specific Faculty Listing and Course Descriptions subprogram calls are coded and provided in appropriate places.

Every program is placed sequentially according to the planned structure of The Catalog and each program is identified at the beginning of its descriptions with a Program Identification code ($ID macro) and terminated with a program end command ($IDND macro). Each program is described by a series of macro commands followed with appropriate parameters for the macro to use. These macros and their required parameters are described fully in the document referred to below and in examples of how to script a program.

The third file is a single XML file, Course Descriptions File, CATDESC, that has all the Course narrative title, prerequisites, and narrative descriptions not kept in the CMS Course Catalog. It is supplementary to the CMS course catalog with all the narrative information we need to handle globally for course renumbering, and other systematic changes that appear in many places or course descriptions.

The fourth file is a XML based Catalog Faculty Database, AACATALOG FACULTY, which contains all faculty information for Catalog publication, not provided in CMS Human Resources. We hope to unify this file with CMS HR files some day, but current CMS operations prevent that now.

Maintenance of these files is described in their own file documentation. The specific coding for these files are described in the document "Master University Catalog File-Text and Macro Command Line Coding, Format and Definitions."

The Catalog Program

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A special Catalog Production job reads the CATPROGRAM file and uses the macros and subprogram calls in the order provided to expand the information referenced, drawing on the CMS Course Catalog, CATDEF, AAFACULTY, and other data and definition tables to create a full program description in publication form, complete with all text and necessary XML tag specifications. ID maps the XML tags to appropriate ID paragraph and text tags. This expanded output XML file, or series of files, is named the Catalog Publication File (CATGUTZ) and is the input file for the Adobe InDesign software to produce The Catalog academic chapter guts for integration into the Category 1 "book." This program is discussed in detail in "the Catalog Program Programmers Documentation." [Dwight To Do]

The CATGUTZ file is divided into appropriate academic chapter pieces and merged into appropriate academic chapters in the final Catalog ID Book for the final preparation appropriate for proofing and ultimate production.

InDesign integrates all final materials from Category I and II into a single publication, or book. The documents are repeatedly proofed until all errors, corrections, or other issues are completely resolved. See the Catalog Editor's "InDesign Catalog Production Guide" for details on this process. [Richard to do]

The CATGUTZ file resulting from the Catalog "Black Box" is also the XML source for the Web Catalog final production, too. See the "Webmaster's Guide to producing the Web Version of The Catalog." [Dwight to do]