texinfo ChangeLog doc/texinfo.txi util/htmlxref...

[Karl Berry]

CVSROOT:        /sources/texinfo
Module name:    texinfo
Changes by:     Karl Berry <karl>       10/11/08 19:11:24

Modified files:
        .              : ChangeLog 
        doc            : texinfo.txi 
        util           : htmlxref.cnf 

Log message:
        (History): rationale for texi2html/texi2any

CVSWeb URLs:
http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/texinfo/ChangeLog?cvsroot=texinfo&r1=1.1175&r2=1.1176
http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/texinfo/doc/texinfo.txi?cvsroot=texinfo&r1=1.345&r2=1.346
http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/texinfo/util/htmlxref.cnf?cvsroot=texinfo&r1=1.31&r2=1.32

Patches:
Index: ChangeLog
===================================================================
RCS file: /sources/texinfo/texinfo/ChangeLog,v
retrieving revision 1.1175
retrieving revision 1.1176
diff -u -b -r1.1175 -r1.1176
--- ChangeLog   7 Nov 2010 18:24:34 -0000       1.1175
+++ ChangeLog   8 Nov 2010 19:11:23 -0000       1.1176
@@ -1,3 +1,7 @@
+2010-11-08  Karl Berry  <address@hidden>
+
+       * doc/texinfo.txi (History): rationale for Perl texi2html -> texi2any.
+
 2010-11-07  Karl Berry  <address@hidden>
 
        * doc/texinfo.txi (Customizing CSS): edit.

Index: doc/texinfo.txi
===================================================================
RCS file: /sources/texinfo/texinfo/doc/texinfo.txi,v
retrieving revision 1.345
retrieving revision 1.346
diff -u -b -r1.345 -r1.346
--- doc/texinfo.txi     8 Nov 2010 00:13:45 -0000       1.345
+++ doc/texinfo.txi     8 Nov 2010 19:11:23 -0000       1.346
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 \input texinfo.tex    @c -*-texinfo-*-
address@hidden $Id: texinfo.txi,v 1.345 2010/11/08 00:13:45 karl Exp $
address@hidden $Id: texinfo.txi,v 1.346 2010/11/08 19:11:23 karl Exp $
 @c Ordinarily, Texinfo files have the extension .texi.  But texinfo.texi
 @c clashes with texinfo.tex on 8.3 filesystems, so we use texinfo.txi.
 
@@ -161,6 +161,7 @@
 * Internationalization::          Supporting languages other than English.
 * Defining New Texinfo Commands:: User-defined macros and aliases.
 * Include Files::                 How to incorporate other Texinfo files.
+
 * Hardcopy::                            Output for paper, with @TeX{}.
 * Generic Translator texi2any/makeinfo:: The all purpose converter.
 * Creating and Installing Info Files::  Details on Info output.
@@ -1704,25 +1705,25 @@
 processors, and created Edition 1.0 of this manual.  address@hidden
 Chassell greatly revised and extended the manual, starting with
 Edition 1.1.  Brian Fox was responsible for the standalone Texinfo
-distribution until version 3.8, and wrote the standalone
+distribution until version 3.8, and originally wrote the standalone
 @command{makeinfo} and @command{info} programs.  Karl Berry has
 continued maintenance since Texinfo 3.8 (manual edition 2.22).
 
 @cindex Pinard, Fran@,{c}ois
address@hidden Zuhn, David D.
address@hidden Weisshaus, Melissa
address@hidden Zaretskii, Eli
 @cindex Schwab, Andreas
 @cindex Weinberg, Zack
-Our thanks go out to all who helped improve this work, particularly the
-indefatigable Eli Zaretskii and Andreas Schwab, who have provided
address@hidden Weisshaus, Melissa
address@hidden Zaretskii, Eli
address@hidden Zuhn, David D.
+Our thanks go out to all who helped improve this work, particularly
+the indefatigable Eli Zaretskii and Andreas Schwab, who have provided
 patches beyond counting.  Fran@,{c}ois Pinard and address@hidden Zuhn,
 tirelessly recorded and reported mistakes and obscurities.  Zack
 Weinberg did the impossible by implementing the macro syntax in
address@hidden  Special thanks go to Melissa Weisshaus for her
-frequent reviews of nearly similar editions.  Dozens of others have
-contributed patches and suggestions, they are gratefully acknowledged in
-the @file{ChangeLog} file.  Our mistakes are our own.
address@hidden  Thanks to Melissa Weisshaus for her frequent
+reviews of nearly similar editions.  Dozens of others have contributed patches 
and
+suggestions, they are gratefully acknowledged in the @file{ChangeLog}
+file.  Our mistakes are our own.
 
 @cindex Scribe
 @cindex Reid, Brian
@@ -1748,6 +1749,55 @@
 mark up language for text that is intended to be read both online and
 as printed hard copy.
 
+Moving forward, the original translator to create Info was written
+(primarily by RMS and Bob Chassell) in Emacs Lisp, namely the
address@hidden and other functions.  After several
+years, Brian Fox reimplemented the conversion program in C, now called
address@hidden
+
address@hidden Cons, Lionel
address@hidden Dumas, Patrice
+In 2011, the C @command{makeinfo} was itself replaced by a Perl
+implementation generically called @command{texi2any}, based on
address@hidden, an independent program originally written by
+Lionel Cons, later with substantial work by many others.  The many
+additional features needed to make @command{texi2html} a replacement
+for @command{makeinfo} were implemented by Patrice Dumas.
+
+The new Perl program is much, much slower than the old C program.  We
+hope the speed gap will close in the future, but it may not ever be
+entirely comparable.  So why did we switch?  There were several
+important reasons.
+
address@hidden @bullet
address@hidden HTML customization.  Many GNU and other free software packages
+had been happily using the HTML customization features in
address@hidden for years.  Thus, in effect two independent
+implementations of the Texinfo language had developed, and keeping
+them in sync was not simple.  Adding the HTML customization possible
+in @command{texi2html} to a C program would have been nearly
+impossible.
+
address@hidden Unicode, and multilingual support generally, especially of east
+Asian language.  Although of course it's perfectly plausible to write
+such support in C, in the particular case of @command{makeinfo}, it
+would have been tantamount to rewriting the entire program.  In Perl,
+much of that comes essentially for free.
+
address@hidden Additional back-ends.  The @command{makeinfo} code had grown
+convoluted to the point where adding a new back-end was quite complex,
+with unfortunate interactions with existing back-ends.  In contrast,
+the Perl implementation provides a clean tree-based structure for all
+back-ends to work from.  People have requested numerous different
+back-ends (@LaTeX{}, the latest (X)HTML, @dots{}), and they will now
+be much more feasible to implement.  Which leads to the last item:
+
address@hidden Making contributions easier.  In general, due to the cleaner
+structure, the Perl program should be considerably easier than the C
+for anyone to read and contribute to, with the resulting obvious
+benefits.
address@hidden itemize
+
 
 @node Texinfo Mode
 @chapter Using Texinfo Mode
@@ -18511,7 +18561,7 @@
 @end quotation
 @end cartouche
 
-This chapter describes how to customize virtually every aspect of the
+This chapter describes how to customize many aspects of the
 @command{texi2any} HTML output.  Although some of the features here
 can technically be used with other output formats, it's not especially
 useful to do so, so we'll write the documentation as if HTML were the
@@ -18527,7 +18577,7 @@
 * Customizing Output-Related Names:: File names and target names.
 * Customizing HTML Headings::        Sectioning commands.
 * Customizing Indices::              Manipulating index entries.
-* Customizing CSS::
+* Customizing CSS::                  CSS customization for HTML.
 @end menu
 
 
@@ -22830,7 +22880,7 @@
 (@url{http://www.gnu.org/software/rcs}) version control systems, which
 expand it into a string such as:
 @example
-$Id: texinfo.txi,v 1.345 2010/11/08 00:13:45 karl Exp $
+$Id: texinfo.txi,v 1.346 2010/11/08 19:11:23 karl Exp $
 @end example
 (This is useful in all sources that use version control, not just manuals.)
 You may wish to include the @samp{$Id:} comment in the @code{@@copying}
@@ -22909,7 +22959,7 @@
 
 @verbatim
 \input texinfo   @c -*-texinfo-*-
address@hidden $Id: texinfo.txi,v 1.345 2010/11/08 00:13:45 karl Exp $
address@hidden $Id: texinfo.txi,v 1.346 2010/11/08 19:11:23 karl Exp $
 @comment %**start of header
 @setfilename sample.info
 @include version.texi

Index: util/htmlxref.cnf
===================================================================
RCS file: /sources/texinfo/texinfo/util/htmlxref.cnf,v
retrieving revision 1.31
retrieving revision 1.32
diff -u -b -r1.31 -r1.32
--- util/htmlxref.cnf   7 Nov 2010 18:24:35 -0000       1.31
+++ util/htmlxref.cnf   8 Nov 2010 19:11:24 -0000       1.32
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 # htmlxref.cnf - reference file for Texinfo files on the web.
 
-htmlxrefversion=2010-11-07.18; # UTC
+htmlxrefversion=2010-11-08.17; # UTC
 
 # Copyright 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
 # 
@@ -11,7 +11,8 @@
 # The latest version of this file is available at
 # http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/texinfo/htmlxref.cnf.
 # Email corrections or additions to address@hidden
-# The goal is for it to list all relevant GNU manuals, at least.
+# The primary goal is to list all relevant GNU manuals;
+# other free manuals are also welcome.
 #
 # Maintainers: for information on putting manuals on the web, including
 # automatically generating all the useful formats, see
@@ -181,6 +182,11 @@
 gama           mono    ${GS}/gama/manual/gama.html
 gama           node    ${GS}/gama/manual/html_node/
 
+gawk           mono    ${GS}/gawk/manual/gawk.html
+gawk           node    ${GS}/gawk/manual/html_node/
+ gawkinet      mono    ${GS}/gawk/manual/gawkinet/gawkinet.html
+ gawkinet      node    ${GS}/gawk/manual/gawkinet/html_node/
+
 gcal           mono    ${GS}/gcal/manual/gcal.html
 gcal           node    ${GS}/gcal/manual/html_node/
 
@@ -237,6 +243,11 @@
 gperf          mono    ${GS}/gperf/manual/gperf.html
 gperf          node    ${GS}/gperf/manual/html_node/
 
+grep           mono    ${GS}/grep/manual/grep.html
+grep           node    ${GS}/grep/manual/html_node/
+
+groff          node    ${GS}/groff/manual/html_node/
+
 grub           mono    ${GS}/grub/manual/grub.html
 grub           node    ${GS}/grub/manual/html_node/