Re: Emacs documentation.

[Alan Mackenzie]

'nAbend, David!

On Sat, Sep 29, 2007 at 10:01:40PM +0200, David Kastrup wrote:
>looked at Alan Mackenzie <acm@muc.de> writes:

> >>Go ask around the OSS world what's being used for documentation.

> > Why?

> Because you'll find that any XML-based process would be rather unusual
> (at least ouside of the Java world).  Man-pages, hand-written HTML,
> plain text files, Texinfo, LaTeX and other stuff are more prevalent.

That's what I would've thought.  Given the existence of, in particular,
TeX and LaTeX, I really don't understand what the point of Docbook is.
(That's NOT a rhetorical comment.)

What has irritated me about David P.'s posts is he seems to assume that
Docbook doesn't need justification - it is the Right Thing for any
documentation application, and it is somehow not done to ask questions
about it.  I'm still hoping he'll come back with some answers.

[ .... ]

> The long dampeners on Trabant were actually a good complement to the
> lousy road quality in the GDR.  Imported cars suffered from a higher
> probability of breakdowns because they were less well suited to the
> potholes there.

How things have changed since 1989!

[ .... ]

> >>>  I suspect most Docbook writers actually use special purpose
> >>> editors to create their source code, rather than Emacs or vi.

> >>Emacs has done for me for the last ten years.

> > Do most Docbook writers use special purpose editors or don't they?

> To be fair: people using Emacs _are_ generally using a special purpose
> editor (in the form of a good major mode).  Even LaTeX is not
> uncommonly written with special purpose editors and modes.

I didn't express myself very well.  I think what I meant by "special
purpose editor" was one that interprets the XML data structure and hides
it from the user, much like Open Office does with ODF.  I contrast this
with an editor where you actually see and edit the raw XML file, possibly
with the help of a good major mode.  I suppose it's analogous to the
difference between editing Elisp source files and hacking through the
internal form created by the Lisp reader.

I don't think that Emacs developers would be willing to learn such a
special purpose editor, just to write Info-MkII documents with.

> So if you want to get more relevant numbers, you probably should ask
> on some vi user group, as that sort of editor can't be tailored as
> well to the task.  How many of those would write Texinfo and LaTeX
> with their favorite general purpose editor, but revert to special
> systems for XML writing?

> I suppose still some, but have no hard numbers.

Nor me.

> David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Ittersbach, Germany).