LYNX-DEV Henry's SIMPLEDIR proposal (was Re: DOS suggestions)

[Klaus Weide]

I am finally commenting on this (older) message:

On Mon, 29 Sep 1997, Nelson Henry Eric wrote:

> > The distribution archive still contains
> > "about_lynx/about_lynx-dev.html", despite the fact that it was renamed
> > "about_lynx/lynx-dev.html" several versions ago. I don't believe that we
> > need both versions in the distribution.

I'll get rid of about_lynx/about_lynx-dev.html in the next update.

> Agreed.  This was dealt with in my proposal to rearrange the top directory
> of the distribution: "http://163.51.110.11/lynxdev/SIMPLEDIR.gz";.  I kept
> the name "about_lynx-dev.html" and removed the duplicate, but I would be
> happy to go the other way, IF I COULD JUST GET SOME FEEDBACK.  A change
> needs to be made in "lynx_help_main.html", and probably other files, if
> the location/name of the "about*" files is/are changed.  Actually, my
> proposal does away with the whole "about_lynx" subdirectory by moving all
> files there, I believe appropriately, to /docs and /lynx_help.
>
> __Henry
> 
> In a nutshell, my proposal is to remove only 1 file, "docs/RFC-MAILCAP.txt"
> (which says "expires 8/1/93"), remove "utils/inews" and rearrange the files
> and subdirectories so that the top directory becomes 26 files/directories:

That looks very convincing overall :)

However, some comments about the detail:

I don't think it's a good idea to get rid of top-level directories as you
propose.  I don't know why you want to get rid of about_lynx/, I tend to 
think it fulfills some useful purpose separate from lynx_help/ and docs/.
I wouldn't mind the change that much though.  But you haven't caught all
the references to something in about_lynx/ that would need to be modified
(at least some of the .html files under lynx_help/, RELEASE_STATEMENT,
UCdomap.c, and LYMain.c).  Overall I think this change gains little, and
would probably lead to broken links (say at freenets or dialup
installations which point to about_lynx/about_lynx.html from some other
pages).

I think samples/ should not be made less visible by putting it under
docs/, and test/ should also stay where it is.  (I should also add some
chartrans test files to test/.)

The newfiles.* aren't good for anything any more (as far as I know),
consider them gone.

I'll have to do something about README.chartrans and other documentation
about the whole chartrans thing.  CHANGES.chartrans will probably just
go away.

And the current CHANGES should become CHANGES2-7 and the current
CHANGES.new become CHANGES or something like that.

There is a reference to RFC-MAILCAP.txt in the lynx.cfg files; that should
be replaced by a reference to an URL location for the RFC, for example
<URL:http://www.internic.net/rfc/rfc1524.txt>.

VMSPrint.com and fixed512.com *maybe* could go into a subdirectory
since they are not used for compiling and installing but for running
Lynx.  VMSPrint.com is only used if explicitly configured in lynx.cfg.
Also fixed512.com isn't invoked automatically (unless the symbol
USE_COMMAND_FILE is defined for HTFWriter.c, which isn't being done
anywhere AFAICS and seems to be historical).  Some VMS user should
comment.

That's all for now. :)

       Klaus

> INSTALLATION       aclocal.m4         configure.in       lynx.man
> LYMessages_en.h    build-slang.com    descrip.mms        lynx_help
> MAKEFILE.W32       build.com          docs               makefile.in
> README             config.guess       fixed512.com       src
> RELEASE_STATEMENT  config.hin         install.sh         userdefs.h
> VMSPrint.com       config.sub         lynx.cfg           utils
> WWW                configure          lynx.hlp
> 
> Instead of 53 files/directories:
> 
> CHANGES                  README                   configure.in
> CHANGES.chartrans        README.chartrans         descrip.mms
> CHANGES.configure        README.configure         docs
> CHANGES.new              README.win-386           fixed512.com
> CHANGES2-3               RELEASE_STATEMENT        install.sh
> CHANGES2-4               SOCKETSHR.announce       lynx.cfg
> CHANGES2-5               TCPWARE.announce         lynx.hlp
> CHANGES2-6               VMSPrint.com             lynx.man
> CMU.announce             VMSWAIS.announce         lynx_help
> CRAWL.announce           WWW                      makefile.in
> DESC                     about_lynx               newfiles.chartrans
> FM.announce              aclocal.m4               newfiles.configure
> IBMPC-charsets.announce  build-slang.com          samples
> INSTALLATION             build.com                src
> LYMessages_en.h          config.guess             styles
> MAKEFILE.W32             config.hin               test
> Makefile.old             config.sub               userdefs.h
> PROBLEMS                 configure                utils

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