LYNX-DEV Re: FAQ update

[Al Gilman]

  X-within-URL: http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/msg01029.html
     
                            Re: LYNX-DEV Re: FAQ update

       * From: Joe Kincaid <address@hidden>
  
  > 2.b.  Are y'all planning to take the existing help files under your
  > wing?  There are lots of modest reforms one could apply to the
  > h)elp, like cross-linking between the related topics in the
  > keystroke paragraph and the command-line paragraph, where the
  > same degree of freedom (e.g. IMAGE_LINKS) is affected.
  
  It really is my intention to read/revise the existing documentation to
  build this FAQ. It may not seem like it at this time, because I wanted to
  start with a true FAQ/FAA structure whose content was derived from the
  other documents. As I write my pages, I am frequently bouncing around the
  current documentation looking up answers, etc.
  
As y'all work on what goes inside the new page tree, we need to
be concurrently refining our plan for how it integrates into the
operational configuration of the universe of Lynx help/support
installations.  Lots of ad-hoc teams have been ineffective
because there was inadequate planning for what happens when they
are "done."

I should probably try to work up a point paper on a sketch of the
Lynx support installation after the rewrite.

  Also, the cross-linking is important to me. It is this potential of
  cross-linking that makes hypertext so powerful. Of course, it also can
  lead to navigation/maintenance headaches (it's a poor atom blaster that
  can't point both ways), but if we work to insure the coherency of the
  document as you pointed out previously, then I think we'll be OK.

It takes planning.  The HTML hyper-link is a one-way thing.  The
email archiver [equivalence class including at least Hypermail and
MHonArc and Pipermail..] is an existence proof for the tooling to
maintain bidirectionality over some class of links.  But because the
native medium of the Web is a directed graph, it takes tooling and
planning to create something that is reliably consistent reading
both ways.  Actually, if we go into recognizing that 

        Reference "how it works" documentation/services
        Tutorial "how to get going and gain skills" documentation/services
        Diagnostic "Now, what went wrong!" documentation/services

are three concurrent views of a common corpus of knowledge (some
facts just have to show up in multiple views) we should be OK.
I think that we should be targeting to have different "layers"
with a different tone and organization.  The reference layer assumes
more serious reading and is organized around the way the system 
works.  For example, in the reference view we can talk about
a gross partitioning of the universe at the HText.  The Lynx process
segments there into the User side of the HText and the Other side
of the Htext.  The User side includes everything from the 
radio-button reformatting of SELECT widgets through color out
through helping users solve problems when their communications
software doesn't support VT-100 mode adequately.  The Other side
includes protocol handling, recovery from bad HTML, etc.

This imagery [split the universe at the HText] appeals to me but
is utterly inappropriate to the novice.  They need Tutorial and
Diagnostic views that one visits lightly, and that are sorted
on the basis of the surface symptoms that the naive user can grasp.

We need a three-view plan that explains how we are going to systematically
link the document segments to build all three views.

  >       analogy between anchor-to-anchor navigation
  >       and hit-to-hit motion via n)ext-hit after
  >       a WhereIs
  
  I'm sorry. This is too obscure for me. I know what you are referring to,
  but I don't know what the Q/A would be here.
  
I agree.  Possibly a note in the Reference layer.

  > 4.  The interactive manipulation of user options is a major topic
  > I don't see in your (top-level) list. -- linked to offline
  > manipulation of lynx.cfg and at compile time.
  
  This should probably be in the installation section with cross-references
  to it from areas that are affected by it.
  
Well, in my view of how a trainee progresses up the skill ladder, they
get to the o)ptions menu before they tackle lynx.cfg.  So I would want
the o)ptions menu given its own high-level visibility independent of
installation.

  Great comments! Thanks for the feedback (including previous letters I'm
  still digesting :-). Keep those cards and letters coming!
  
As in <this msg.>.

I have inserted a link to the new FAQ construction site in my page.

Al Gilman
  
  
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  References
  
     1. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/msg01030.html
     2. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/msg01028.html
     3. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/index.html#01029
     4. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/threads.html#01029
     5. mailto:address@hidden
     6. mailto:address@hidden
     7. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/msg01027.html
     8. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/msg01027.html
     9. mailto:address@hidden
    10. mailto:address@hidden
    11. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/msg01027.html
    12. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/msg01030.html
    13. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/msg01028.html
    14. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/index.html#01029
    15. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/html/month1196/threads.html#01029
    16. http://www.flora.org/lynx-dev/
    17. http://www.flora.org/
    18. http://lynx.browser.org/
  

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