Re: Doc in tex...

["Chris Travers" <..hidden..>]

Hi all;

I think there is a little that needs to be done  before a conversion.
However, here is a brief overview of what I think is necessary both as
a community (who is taking responsibility for merging in
contributions?  I can't do that in a new format for some time) and
technically (how to migrate the documentation).

If people want to convert the current manual, feel free.  I don't have
a lot of time to devote to that at the moment.  But I can give you an
idea of what is to be done:

1)  I believe there are conversion utilities out there.  They won't
convert the whole thing because the current manual uses vector drawing
capabilities in LaTeX not found in DocBook.

2)  One will probably have to use pdf2ps and pstops to extract in
postscript form, those pages which contain vector drawings.  Those
could them be imported into The GIMP, cropped and saved in both eps
and png formats.

Since DocBook doesn't do any rendering itself, my own suggestion is
that we also maintain custom LaTeX .sty and HTML CSS files for
handling the formatting information.  I can maintain the .sty, but it
would be helpful if others could maintain the .css.

Also one question that was brought up before and never really answered
(I thought) was how we want to encourage non-technical users to
contribute documentation. The current approach (use LyX as a graphical
LaTeX editor) would probably have to be changed to "accept user
submissions in HTML from programs like FrontPage or Word and manually
merge them" or "force users (i.e. bookkeepers) who want to contribute
to learn DocBook."  My own preference is with the former, but I don't
have the time to commit to taking on that role.  We should probably
settle that question before we do the conversion.

So I guess those are the immediate questions:

1)  Who wants to take on the docuentation editor role?

2)  What formats will we accept documentation edits in?  Do we want to
force bookkeepers and accountants to learn DocBook, or are HTML
submissions fine?

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers