### 1.5 How DITA2Go works

DITA2Go works on map files, not directly on .dita files. If necessary, you can use auxiliary program DITA2Map to generate a map file from your DITA files; see §46. Creating a map with DITA2Map.

DITA2Go can work with files anywhere on the local system or on mapped drives (in Windows). DITA2Go does not attempt to duplicate the source directory structure in the output, but instead creates by default a flat structure, and by adjusting the HTML names, ensures that there are no name conflicts.

If you really need a directory structure for output, you can have it, but the structure cannot go above the level of the default output directory. This is a limitation imposed by many Help formats, such as CHM for HTML Help. DITA2Go handles such output structure requirements so they do not dictate the input structure you can use.

With the DITA2Go Project Manager, a simple tabbed dialog, you can set up DITA2Go projects, edit your project configuration files, run conversions, and inspect the resulting log files. When you click Start on the Run Project tab, Document Coding Language filter dcl.exe is invoked; see §45. Converting via DCL.

First, the files in your DITA document are converted to an intermediate representation via input filter drxml.dll.

Next, the intermediate representation is converted to whichever output format your starting configuration file specifies, via output filter dwhtm.dll (for HTML/XML outputs) or dwrtf.dll (for Word or WinHelp outputs).

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Parent Topic: 1. Getting started with DITA2Go

Sibling Topics:

1.1 What you need to know

1.2 What you need to have

1.3 What you need to do

1.4 How to update DITA2Go

1.6 How to start and stop DITA2Go

1.7 How to work with DITA2Go

1.8 How to uninstall DITA2Go