RE: Yet another question

[Luis Villa <liv@duke.edu>]

On Mon, 24 Jul 2000, Gregory Leblanc wrote:
> > -----Original Message-----
> > So, I found the section on ldp.dsl in the HOWTO. This isn't 
> > the format I'm
> > used to (or prefer) but it is getting closer. I have a couple 
> > of questions
> > about it:
> > 
> > 1) Is there any way to force section 1 to be on a separate 
> > page from the
> > table of contents? That combination makes the first page huge for me.
> 
> Yes, there is.  Unfortunately, I don't know what it is, and I hate the look
> of DSSSL so I haven't dug into it very much.  Perhaps Jorge Godoy or Greg
> Ferguson can tell you how to do that.  I'd prefer it to be that way as well
> as it makes for a nicer document.

Jorge? Greg? :) I can't promise anything other than massive thanks, but
that should count for something :)
 
> > 2) What is the canonical way to include your email in the 
> > information at
> > the top of the index page? I've tried a few variations on 
> > <AuthorBlurb>
> > and <Affiliation> with no success. Since that is what several 
> > LDP authors
> > use (at least in the versions available on the web site), it 
> > looks like
> > the LDP does not yet use DocBook to actually generate their 
> > documents (at
> > least, they don't use DocBook in any way that I've made sense 
> > of.) So- any
> > better suggestions?
> 
> The easiest way is to snag it from a well written SGML document, the
> HOWTO-HOWTO would be a good once, since Mark looks to be really getting
> pretty good with DocBook.  Getting the DocBook source will let you look at
> some of the other nice markup that DocBook provides that LinuxDoc does not.

I had looked at a couple others, but didn't have the sense to realize that
(of course) the HOWTO-HOWTO would probably be the best written of the
bunch. That said, while it does have some cool tags (I understand how the
revision history works now, I think) it still doesn't display the email up
top like I'd like to have (and like has always been LDP practice.) Anyone?

> > 3) Why is <Rant> not a DocBook tag? Seriously... I had always assumed
> > (when I heard that the LDP was switching from LinuxDoc to 
> > DocBook) that
> > that went that DocBook had a well developed set of tools to work with,
> > just like LinuxDoc. These kinds of tools are what give CLIs a 
> > bad name- I
> > don't see the advantage to switching to them if no one can 
> > get anything
> > done with them. Of all things, writing docs should be 
> > straightforward and
> > not require technical wizardry. Jeez. </Rant>
> 
> Well, the tools are progressing a lot, they're actually hundreds of times
> better than when I started into this (isn't that comforting?) and I expect
> them to be almost good by the time that September rolls around. 

After I wrote that rant, I read even further back in the list archives. I
hadn't realized it was quite so new. Still... very frustrating.

> I don't
> have the processing tools installed at all on the machines where I write
> documentation, I just write them, and email it off to the publishers. If
> they don't like how it looks, that's their problem, not mine.

Heh. I wish :) I've only written one book, but the editor is a Mac guy, so
you know what that meant for formatting... that's right, Word. Ugh.

> > Anyway, thanks again for your time- please cc: me to answers. I looked
> > into signing up, but the idea of getting 4 cron job messages 
> > every hour is
> > unappealing.
> 
> Paul!  It's broke again.  :-(  Those CRON messages only show up in the
> archiver, and it's because something is wrong with MhonArc on Metalab.  Or
> at least I assume that's it, since almost everybody on the Mailman list
> swears by it as an archiver.  Anyway, sign up for the list, these are the
> kinds of messages we get, and it's pretty low traffic.

Oh, OK. That's cool. <insert snide Duke joke about UNC people here>

Thanks so much for all the help, everyone...
Luis

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	    "Summertime... and the living is easy...
	    fish are jumping and the cotton is high...
	    So hush, little baby, baby don't you cry."
					-Ella

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