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Minister's Sign-off
The DPR is an Estimates document.
Therefore, the minister responsible for each
department and agency submitting a DPR must sign
the report.
The minister's signature must appear on the
departmental title page of the final documents. (4 camera-ready signed originals = 2
originals in French, 2 originals in English +
electronic versions that TBS will post on its web
site.)
Any DPR submitted to TBS without the required
signatures will be considered incomplete. The
printing process cannot begin until signed title
pages are received.
Responsibilities
Departments and agencies are responsible for:
- the quality, integrity and completeness of
the information presented to Parliament;
- the quality of the text in both official
languages. Click here to access the Results-based
Management Lexicon;
- any overtime charges incurred if their DPR
is submitted after the September 22nd
deadline; and
- ordering copies of the DPR for their own use
by August 1st.
Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat is
responsible for:
- the printing of all DPRs and for the
distribution of copies to Parliament, Canada
Government Publishing and library
distribution;
- the tabling of DPRs by the President of TB
on behalf of departments and agencies;
- the delivery to departments and agencies of
their own DPR; and
- the electronic publication and posting of
all DPRs on its Web
site.
DPR Submission
Paper Version
Departments must provide TBS with their final,
signed, camera-ready DPR. The minister must sign 4
final originals: 2 in French and 2 in English.
Cost per printing: approximately .02 cents per
page.
Departments wishing to print their DPR directly
from the electronic file, should:
- submit their file in PDF format;
- avoid the use of color, and
- pay approximately $14.00 per page for output
fees + .02 cent per page for the printing of
the report.
If there are a special printing instructions, a form is provided.
Some technical guidance on format is provided below.
Electronic Version
Departments must provide simple HTML versions
of their DPR content for posting on the TBS
website. The files must conform to the
government's Common
Look and Feel Standards. Departments and
agencies are invited to examine the 2001-2002
DPR postings to see how the content will be
displayed. Some technical advice is provided below.
CD-ROMs or 3.5 inch diskettes may be messengered
to the same address as the paper versions. E-mail
is also acceptable to paulette.somerville@tbs-sct.gc.ca.
Ordering Reports:
Departments are required to place an order for
their own DPR by August 1st using this Order
Form.
2002 DPR Submission Address
It is recommended to use messenger services for
the delivery of DPRs to the following address:
Paulette Somerville
DPR Co-ordinator
Results-based Management Directorate
Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat
9th Floor, West Tower, L'Esplanade Laurier
300 Laurier Avenue West
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0R5
Phone: (613) 957-7167
Fax: (613) 941-8472
Format Guidance
Requirements for Paper
Format
- Submit camera-ready paper copies on 8½ by
11 paper, printed in black and white only. Use
at least 600 dpi quality printing. If the
original has colour or shading, test a black
and white photocopy to see if detail is
preserved. Text size for the main body content
should be 12 points (excluding headings) and
in a standard "serif" font such as
Times New Roman, Univers (W1) or CG Times
(W1). "Sans serif" fonts such as
Arial and Helvetica are hard to read in longer
passages and should be used only for titles,
tables, headings and captions.
- The DPR will be printed in a bound
booklet format. To ensure consistency and
quality of the printed documents, departments
must adhere to the following standards:
- page layout
- Top/Bottom Margins = 1"
- Left/Right Margins = 1¼"
- Headers and footers should be tagged at
0.5"
- footers and page numbers
- Department name and even numbers must
appear in the footer on the left-hand
pages;
- Odd numbers and any section or chapter
names should appear in the footer on the
right-hand pages.
- Footers should begin after the table
of contents.
Example
Electronic
Format (HTML)
- To comply with the Common Look and Feel
Standards for Government Internet Sites,
please submit an HTML version on diskette or
CD or via E-mail attachment. Departments
who anticipate difficulties in meeting this
requirement are strongly urged to contact TBS
to discuss technical possibilities and
assistance.
- It is recognized that the differing
strengths and weaknesses of paper and HTML
mean that some design freedom may be lost.
Department will have to consider the look of
their documents on-screen as well as paper.
- The electronic DPRs will consist of one or
more HTML files and associated graphic files.
References (hyperlinks) within and among the
files must all be relative so that
the files may be moved to new directories
without changing hyperlinks. References to
external resources should be absolute
for the same reason.
- While the content of the electronic and
paper versions must be the same, the formats
and layouts will diverge because of the
differing characteristics of the two media.
Text within each HTML file must be a single
column (tables excepted). Graphics should
be inserted at the most appropriate point in
the text. If a graphic is so large that it
disrupts the flow of text, a
"thumbnail" link to the full version
can be used.
- Coloured charts and graphics are acceptable
in HTML versions (unlike paper) but all
graphics require a text description in an
<alt> tag for the
use of visually impaired readers.
- Formatting will be governed by a cascading
style sheet at TBS, on whose servers the
documents will reside. This means that
formatting for titles, headings, body text and
so on will be set by the style sheet.
Departments should restrict themselves, in
general, to the basic HTML tags such as
<h1>, <p>, <br>, <em>,
<strong>, <img>, <hr> and
the <table> and <list> tags. The
<font> tags are to be avoided.
- Tables should not be converted to images
since these are not accessible to screen
readers. Avoid specifying the width of tables
and cells so that the browsers can optimize
the display according to the user's settings.
Tables should have a <summary> tag.
- Standard CL&F headers and footers will
be supplied by TBS.
- It is recommended that files be validated
with the HTML validation service at www.w3c.org.
This will alert authors to poor code and
illegal characters.
- Note that the simple "Save as
HTML" instruction from typical
word-processing and desk-top publishing
software does NOT produce acceptable
simple HTML. Such functions are intended to
preserve the look of the paper page and
typically include voluminous layout and font
specifications that inflate file sizes and
confound the accessibility provisions of the
CL&F standards. TBS has a tool that can
help strip extra XML and the like but careful
hand clean-up is still needed. Most
departments will now have experienced
webmasters who are familiar with the CL&F
standards. Their assistance should be sought
early in the process.
Departments and
agencies are invited to examine the 2001-2002
DPR postings to see how the content will be
displayed.
Discussion and Advice on Paper and Electronic
Formats
In recent years, TBS has cut back on the advice
given departments on the physical appearance of
the Performance Reports, emphasizing
principles that were concerned more with content.
However, the Common Look and Feel Standards for
Government Internet Sites mean that the electronic
versions of the DPRs now must conform to
some new format requirements.
First of all, the primary electronic versions
must be HTML. Other formats such as MS-Word, Rich
Text Format (RTF) or Adobe Acrobat PDF are
optional but cannot substitute for HTML.
Departments are asked to submit suitable HTML
versions of their reports at the same time as the
camera-ready paper copies.
As well, the standards for onscreen layout
require all the elements of the Common Look and
Feel: FIP, Canada Wordmark, standard menu bars (in
this case, TBS menu bars), white background,
resizable sans serif font, single column 450 pixel
width, decoration confined to left 150 pixel
margin and so on. Some departments have done HTML
versions on their own in the past but most have
not followed the CL&F format.
Just as it requires care to maintain
consistency between French and English versions of
the DPRs, a similar challenge arises in creating
parallel paper and electronic versions.
Departments are strongly advised to create the
content as much as possible in a relatively plain
text version. Once approved, simple text can be
easily turned into acceptable HTML and also turned
over to the Word Processor or Desktop Publishing
experts for final formatting of the paper version.
Until departments and TBS get more experience in
this parallel publishing process, simple formats
are emphatically encouraged. It can take many days
to convert a complex MS-Word or Quark Express
document to HTML. And the results can be
disappointing, since HTML is not designed to do
some things that look good on paper. Remember that
some departments have had trouble making the
publishing deadlines even without this extra
challenge.
The following table describes some of the
issues to keep in mind when preparing a DPR for
simultaneous paper and electronic publication.
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Paper
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HTML
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Advice
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Most use a single column
about six inches wide. Some DPRs use a two column, magazine
style layout.
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GOL CL&F requires that an honest
attempt be made to fit all content into a
450-pixel single column.
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Do not rely on the number and width of
columns to be part of the layout. Write in
one column and apply complex formats later,
if necessary.
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Previous guidance recommended a font such
as 12 point Times Roman or equivalent for
body text. This is the best for paper
printing. Some departments use different
fonts and/or changed the size to fit pages
or design elements.
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On-screen body type is better in
Helvetica or Arial. The user should be able
to select his/her own type size for
visibility. The GOL CL&F stylesheet
alternates seriffed and sans serif fonts for
the various sizes of headers.
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Do not rely on any font specifications
other than bold (<strong>), italic
(<em>) and header (<h1>). The
paper version should use a 12 point serif
font. The HTML should have no specifications
since it will inherit its appearance from
the GOL CL&F stylesheet, ie., sans serif
and 10 point resizable.
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Some DPRs use background images,
watermarks, coloured or shaded blocks,
graphic borders, fancy page numbers and
other decorations.
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Since HTML does not have physical pages
that are a predictable size, these
decorations are difficult to duplicate
effectively. GOL CL&F limits decoration.
For example, the background must be white.
The left column can have embellishments but
they are not usually part of the message.
HTML has its own bag of tricks (e.g.
rollovers) that are not possible or
effective on paper.
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Create "plain vanilla" content
and get that approved. If there is time and
money available, modestly fancy formatting
can be added to the paper version. Keep the
HTML plain to facilitate TBS posting.
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| Some
DPRs have used wide graphics or tables,
sometimes requiring "landscape"
printing. |
The CL&F guidelines aim at 450-pixel
content. If absolutely necessary, wider
content may be used but it may be best to
create a "thumbnail" that links to
a larger display. All graphic elements must
be described in words for the screen readers
used by the visually impaired.
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Try to avoid wide tables. Try to avoid
graphics of such complexity that they are
difficult to describe in words.
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| Pagination.
(Past
guidance requested a specific page
number format "page.-6". This
special format is no longer required.) |
HTML doesn't use page numbers. Hyperlinks
are used to make "clickable"
connections among the parts of an HTML
document.
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Do not refer to specific page numbers in
the text such as "see page 19".
Use logical links such as "see section
3.1". Make sure all working HTML links
internal to the document are relative (as
opposed to absolute) since the HTML will be
in a new location. The same applies to links
to images.
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Paper documents are designed for serial
page turning. Ideally, the reader does not
have to flip back and forth very much, if at
all. But this does lead to lengthy passages
being presented for the "captive"
reader. Document designers often try to
"lighten up" the relentless flow
of text by inserting little distractions -
pictures, vignettes and so on.
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HTML is designed to make non-serial
reading very convenient with hyperlinks,
"back" buttons and new windows.
Content can "cascade" or
"drill down". On the other hand,
the relatively small screen (especially the
450-pixel column) makes the inclusion of
large pictures or "forced"
digressions awkward.
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Make
the content stand on its own. Keep it short
enough not to need distractions. Get the
message into the first paragraph or sentence
as in good newspaper writing. The essential
content of each section should be in one
connected flow. Greater detail can be
offered in annexes to the paper version or
through hyperlinks in the HTML version. |
| Paper
reports sometimes use footnotes for
references. |
Footnotes
are awkward in HTML since the
"bottom" of the page is not
usually visible. |
References can be spelled out within the
text, allowing them to be hyperlinked in
HTML. Endnotes are another way of handling
references.
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| Some
departments devise an elaborate format or
"look" and then add content to fit
the layout. Unfortunately, conversion to
HTML can be expensive and/or time-consuming.
The simpler the document, the simpler the
conversion. |
Effective HTML on-screen layout may be
quite different from the paper version.
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It may be best to compose the original in
raw text or even in HTML until very few
changes are anticipated. Contributions can
be collected by e-mail or from word
processors as relatively "raw"
text.
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The components of a paper version are all
usually in a single large document. This was
required by previous guidance, although
technically impossible in a few cases where
documents were very long or complex.
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The on-line layout in HTML may involve
several chapter files and a number of shared
auxiliary files such as graphics.
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This is another reason to use a plain
format-neutral method of generating the
document content to simplify file updating
and maintenance.
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DPR Submission Checklist
Has your Minister signed the title pages?
- Two originals of the French
version title page signed
- Two originals of the
English version title page signed
Are the following items included?
- Four originals (single-sided) including
- Two originals of the French version
- Two originals of the English version
- Special Printing Instructions Form if
applicable
- HTML versions in one of the following
formats:
- 3.5 inch, 1.44 MB IBM Compatible Floppy
Disk
- CD-ROM
- e-mail attachments
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