what next?
Karsten Wade
kwade at redhat.com
Tue Nov 7 13:51:29 UTC 2006
On Mon, 2006-11-06 at 17:17 +0000, Dimitris Glezos wrote:
> I believe we should try to organize our docs in a way that they could be
> combined into one document (Fedora Handbook?). We have talked about this
> in the past: this should be developed in a modular way so that each
> document (chapter) has an editor and some writers. See a recent
> discussion at [1], [2]:
>
> [1]: http://www.fedoraforum.org/forum/showthread.php?t=125807
> [2]:
> https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-docs-list/2006-October/msg00081.html
+1
That has been the goal for about ... 18 months? Looking at your
outline, we have a large amount of that work done already -
installation, desktop usage, release notes, FAQ.
I've hesitated at taking on a large project for a single document output
that requires so many people to make it happen. For the first time in
this project's history, I think we can do it. It means many of you are
going to need to learn to write in a consistent style using a common
voice and common markup. But the momentum is here as well as the need,
and obviously we are desiring a single, unified Fedora Handbook. :)
There are still tools we need in place to make this work right (Plone,
PDF toolchain, Wiki <-> XML), but these are just implementation details.
> The goal should be to ship a new guide with each release that will be
> available in PDF [3]. If we succeed in this, then we will have a
> printable manual for Fedora -- something very important IMHO for any
> person's bookshelf.
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/DocsProject/Handbook
Let's work out the structure and other process details/tasks there.
> [3]: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/DocsProject/Tools/PDFconversion
>
> Having such a goal will give us a vision much greater than "just a doc
> on a subpage of our website". I believe that it's importance will be
> greater than the sum of the current's docs importance; for example, it
> could become something that the FreeMedia program could ship for free
> too, or ambassadors hand it (or parts of it) at events and we will have
> to have it ready by the release date.
+1
> One easy way to handle this would be the wiki, like the Beats with a
> clear hierarchy that has cross-references between chapters. This way, we
> could monitor the changes and docs members could "maintain" chapters. If
> we go with the wiki-way, we can have people chip in here and there more
> easily.
Yes and no. Until we have a entirely Wiki front-end to DocBook, there
is some content that we are going to have to work on outside of the
Wiki. The Installation Guide comes to mind here; converting it to the
Wiki losses much of the semantic markup, and since we'll have to convert
it back out eventually, I don't think it is worth the effort for the
small amount of additional contributions we'd get via the Wiki.
What we could look at doing is a "scratch" conversion, that is, make a
Wiki version of some of the XML content, then do a semi-manual
conversion of the content back into the XML in CVS.
Other content we may choose to have live on the Wiki as the source
content.
> Some sample contents:
I moved all this to the DocsProject/Handbook page to collaborate on it.
:) - Karsten
> * Introduction
> - The Fedora Project
> + What is Fedora, FOSS, History
> + Getting help, Communicating, Participating
> - Packages
> - Glossary (jargon-buster)
> * Fedora Core 7: Tour, Release notes
> * Installing Fedora Core
> * Using Fedora's desktop
> * System administration
> * Tips and tricks
> * FAQ
>
> And here are some more references:
>
> * TLDP guides [4]
> * Old "Linux Manuals and Documentation" page [5]
> * Gentoo Linux x86 Handbook [6]
> * Debian GNU/Linux Desktop Survival Guide [7]
>
> [4]: http://tldp.org/guides.html
> [5]: http://www.estart.co.za/linux_doc.html
> [6]: http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-x86.xml?full=1
> [7]: http://www.togaware.com/linux/survivor/
>
>
> My 2 cents.
>
> -d
>
>
> --
> Dimitris Glezos
> Jabber ID: glezos at jabber.org, PGP: 0xA5A04C3B
> http://dimitris.glezos.com/
>
> "He who gives up functionality for ease of use
> loses both and deserves neither." (Anonymous)
> --
>
--
Karsten Wade, RHCE, 108 Editor ^ Fedora Documentation Project
Sr. Developer Relations Mgr. | fedoraproject.org/wiki/DocsProject
quaid.108.redhat.com | gpg key: AD0E0C41
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