Author-it vs DITA Exchange
Author-it
author-it.com
DITA Exchange
ditaexchange.comSide by side
| Figure | Author-it | DITA Exchange |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | — | — |
| Free plan | — | — |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 0 |
| Spec score · Help Authoring Tools | 7.8 (#12) | 7.5 (#18) |
| Audience | The company highlights manufacturing, software, and utilities organizations, especially those with complex content accuracy and compliance needs. | Dx5 is aimed at organizations with regulatory, legal, financial, or operational consequences from inconsistent content and an existing Microsoft environment. |
| Company | Author-it says it was founded in 1996 and is headquartered in New Zealand. | DitaExchange ApS is a Danish company and part of Wirtek A/S; the site lists Aarhus, Denmark and Radnor, Pennsylvania, USA. |
| Content reuse | Content is stored as reusable Topics, and updates flow to every Book that uses the Topic. | Dx5 stores reusable components with version history and approval records, so a component change can flow to every document that uses it. |
| Deployment | Author-it offers a cloud service and an on-premise installer; its customer resources page provides Cloud login links and an on-premise update link. | The product supports SharePoint Online and SharePoint Server 2019 and Subscription Edition; the company also describes national-cloud, hybrid, and air-gapped deployments. |
| Headquarters | New Zealand | Aarhus, Denmark |
| Integrations | Author-it provides APIs for integration and automation with content delivery platforms, translation vendors, and other systems. | Dx5 integrates with Teams, OneDrive, Power Automate, Power Apps, and Loop, and supports Microsoft Entra ID single sign-on. |
| Product | Author-it is a component content management system that unifies structured authoring, review, translation, and publishing. | DitaExchange manages DITA components in Microsoft SharePoint and lets subject matter experts author in Microsoft Word. |
| Publishing | A single source can publish to formats including PDF, HTML5, SCORM eLearning, and AION JSON. | Dx5 publishes content to Word, HTML, and XML, and provides REST endpoints for downstream consumers. |
| Security | The product page describes role-based access control, permissions management, audit trails, and security for cloud and on-premise deployments. | DitaExchange says it runs inside the customer's Microsoft 365 tenant and uses its identity, access control, data residency, and underlying audit log. |
| Support | Customer Resources links to the Knowledge Centre, support tickets, community hub, system status, training videos, and on-premise downloads. | The contact page says inquiries typically reach the right person within one Danish or US east-coast business day. |
Plans
In their own words
DITA Exchange
DITA Exchange is a DITA component-management platform built around SharePoint and Microsoft Word. DxAuthor+ is a Word add-in that applies DITA structure while authors tag content, link topics, and reference other content. Dx5 handles review, approval, quality checks, and publishing. Reusable components retain version history and approval records; changing an approved component can update every document assembled from it. DxMigrationTool imports Word, HTML, Markdown, and plain-text files, captures metadata, repairs links, and turns documents into topics. DxChecker runs configurable, machine-checkable terminology, metadata, and controlled-language rules against Word documents or SharePoint repositories. Dx5 publishes to Word, HTML, XML, PDF, JSON, Markdown, plain text, portal pages, and APIs, with REST endpoints for downstream consumers. Listed integrations include Teams, OneDrive, Power Automate, Power Apps, Loop, and Microsoft Entra ID single sign-on. It supports SharePoint Online and SharePoint Server 2019 or Subscription Edition, inside the customer’s Microsoft 365 tenant. Pricing is on request.