!!!New Word Processing Program found!!! To Ton: DocStaff!!!

droddl · Post by **droddl** » Fri Oct 25, 2002 12:39 pm

Heyho...

I found a new wordprocessing program, which is cross-platform!!! I think it's worth a try, isn't it?

http://www.abisource.com

Also we have to decide, which format we are using!!! But first of all Ton should make something like a DocStaff!

Bye...

Flo

Post by **ton** » Fri Oct 25, 2002 1:32 pm

I'm collecting mails from volunteers now. After this weekend I'll assemble the teams, and contact everyone.

S68 · Post by **S68** » Fri Oct 25, 2002 2:33 pm

Cool program, happy to see so many initiatives around doc writing

When you have to write LOTS of stuff and you are MANY you need to work on plain text file in some veeery well documented format.

There is a long thread here about that (YOU started it

).

Plain text because merging various contributors must be automatized (A Python/PERL

/whathever script/suite of scripts or even a CVS system

Very well documented because most probably that script must be hacked by us

A choiche of a Tag oriented format is the best, IMHO, and XML is a pretty good one. Strong points are that you write in a format and you have plenty of translators, or you can write your own, to have nicely formatteed results.

Abi Word looks cool but:

1 - Who has tested it, of us?

2 - Is it a strong and established software we can rely for a medium-long period on? Is it worth learning? If XML is chosen I would use my Xemacs, which kick a*s every other WordPro and be happy, and you can use any XML writing program and be happy.

3 - Is it suitable for a large multi-writer project (if it is a Word clone the answer is NO, word is unsuitable even foe a large single person project. Both the books I wrote were done in LaTeX).

I pose these questions (latter two) because browsing the site I havent found the answers...

Stefano

droddl · Post by **droddl** » Fri Oct 25, 2002 3:07 pm

Heyho...

When you have to write LOTS of stuff and you are MANY you need to work on plain text file in some veeery well documented format.

There is a long thread here about that (YOU started it ).

That's exactly what I want to say!

And I know that thread!

Plain text because merging various contributors must be automatized (A Python/PERL /whathever script/suite of scripts or even a CVS system

Hopefully that's not complicated!

Abi Word looks cool but:

1 - Who has tested it, of us?

I know that! I only wanted to have a look!

2 - Is it a strong and established software we can rely for a medium-long period on? Is it worth learning? If XML is chosen I would use my Xemacs, which kick a*s every other WordPro and be happy, and you can use any XML writing program and be happy.

Is that Xemacs cross platform? So everybody can use it?

I pose these questions (latter two) because browsing the site I havent found the answers...

I don't know that, too!

But what I know is, that I found a windows environment for docbook!
Everyone have a look at it: http://docbook.e-novative.de/

Have fun blending...

Flo

heffel · Post by **heffel** » Fri Oct 25, 2002 4:21 pm

S68 wrote:Cool program, happy to see so many initiatives around doc writing

When you have to write LOTS of stuff and you are MANY you need to work on plain text file in some veeery well documented format.

There is a long thread here about that (YOU started it ).

Plain text because merging various contributors must be automatized (A Python/PERL /whathever script/suite of scripts or even a CVS system

Very well documented because most probably that script must be hacked by us

A choiche of a Tag oriented format is the best, IMHO, and XML is a pretty good one. Strong points are that you write in a format and you have plenty of translators, or you can write your own, to have nicely formatteed results.

Abi Word looks cool but:

1 - Who has tested it, of us?

FWIW, I have used Abiword before.

2 - Is it a strong and established software we can rely for a medium-long period on? Is it worth learning? If XML is chosen I would use my Xemacs, which kick a*s every other WordPro and be happy, and you can use any XML writing program and be happy.

I believe Abiword's "native" format is XML (might be compressed with tar/gz or both, not sure).

3 - Is it suitable for a large multi-writer project (if it is a Word clone the answer is NO, word is unsuitable even foe a large single person project. Both the books I wrote were done in LaTeX).

It mimics the MS Word UI, not sure if it is actually suitable for a large scale project, since I have never used it for that. I believe you can save your document as LaTeX from Abiword.

I pose these questions (latter two) because browsing the site I havent found the answers...

Stefano

Hope that helps,
Heffel

pato · Post by **pato** » Fri Oct 25, 2002 4:25 pm

S68 wrote:Abi Word looks cool but:

1 - Who has tested it, of us?

2 - Is it a strong and established software we can rely for a medium-long period on? Is it worth learning? If XML is chosen I would use my Xemacs, which kick a*s every other WordPro and be happy, and you can use any XML writing program and be happy.

3 - Is it suitable for a large multi-writer project (if it is a Word clone the answer is NO, word is unsuitable even foe a large single person project. Both the books I wrote were done in LaTeX).

I pose these questions (latter two) because browsing the site I havent found the answers...

Abiword is a well established and very active Free Software project so its not going to just disappear. Its handling of DocBook however leaves a lot to be desired. You're trying to fit a square peg into a round hole by having a WYSIWIG editor like Abiword and make it use something like DocBook as an Abiword "Style." Here's a pretty good summary of DocBook in Abiword:

http://www.abisource.com/mailinglists/a ... /0256.html
and
http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/do ... 00227.html

Cheers,
-Pato

S68 · Post by **S68** » Fri Oct 25, 2002 4:30 pm

Hey

droddl wrote:Heyho...
Is that Xemacs cross platform? So everybody can use it?

EMACS (can't recall the full meaning of the acronym) is UNIX native

Xemacs is the incredibly resource consuming fully full of widgest X11 version of emacs.

Xemacs is one of those gigantic program which were GNU since the Beginning of the GNUs, It is a full fledged TEXT editor with coloured syntax, parent matching, but, most important, its own scripting languages which allows for a lot of things.

It runs also on Windows and Machintosh, but I'd bet you can compile on any SO where you cvan install the GNU dev. tools

Heffel wrote: Hope that helps,

Sure it does... my point stands in "we must define the framework" and everyone can contribute in that framework, and the look and feel of the docs must be given by the framework, not by the authors, with automatic formatting styles.

LaTeX of course allows for this. XML too, but XML is so abstract that we musd decide which flavour we use...

*SOB*

Stefano

xitnalta · Post by **xitnalta** » Fri Oct 25, 2002 11:28 pm

Hi!

I just want to provide some additional information on GNU / GNU Emacs / XEmacs.

S68 wrote:
droddl wrote:Heyho...
Is that Xemacs cross platform? So everybody can use it?
EMACS (can't recall the full meaning of the acronym) is UNIX native

Not exactly. The GNU project started in 1984 with the goal to build a portable operating system. Unix was a model that was considered to copy because of its then-known portability (that is still a nice fact today). The goal was obviously reached, the operating system not only runs on almost all possible hardware that can count with zeroes and ones, but also entirely or in parts on top of other operating systems. (See Cygwin, Debian GNU/*BSD, and Debian GNU/Hurd (using the GNU project's own kernel).)

GNU Emacs was one of the (or probably even just the) first useful software product that the GNU project brought to life. In 1985 (the year that the Free Software Foundation was founded), GNU Emacs worked well enough that people used it.

Nowadays, GNU Emacs runs on every not-too-exotic operating system. (But that doesn't mean that it wouldn't run on some exotic ones as well

.)

S68 wrote:Xemacs is the incredibly resource consuming fully full of widgest X11 version of emacs.

Xemacs is one of those gigantic program which were GNU since the Beginning of the GNUs, It is a full fledged TEXT editor with coloured syntax, parent matching, but, most important, its own scripting languages which allows for a lot of things.

From a beginner's perspective, GNU Emacs (which is the original) and XEmacs (which is a fork) feel almost the same. (They have some different defaults, but almost the same capabilities.) So all you said also applies to GNU Emacs (which I prefer mainly because I didn't look at XEmacs for too long, so I can't say much about XEmacs).

You get a small summary of the history of the XEmacs fork at http://www.xemacs.org/About/index.html .

Btw., Emacs means Editing macros. Emacs is a very old text editor that was written by Stallman probably decades before he started the GNU project (I can't remember the exact date) and it was originally based on TECO. That explains its huge version number of currently 21.2 - the first GNU version (I assume it was a rewrite of Emacs) was something around version 15. It's a dinosaur, and it's programming language is Emacs LISP (LISt Processing, also a very old language), which has a hook for every key you press in Emacs.

S68 wrote:Sure it does... my point stands in "we must define the framework" and everyone can contribute in that framework, and the look and feel of the docs must be given by the framework, not by the authors, with automatic formatting styles.

LaTeX of course allows for this. XML too, but XML is so abstract that we musd decide which flavour we use...

In the next few days, I hope I can find some time to write a proposal on what I believe would be an optimal environment (framework) for the blender.org documentation effort(s). The only thing I'm missing for this are some terms that might be needed to convey precisely what's what in the proposal, but I think I'll be able to get it somewhat understandable. I'll then post a message in the forum for announcing and (important!) discussing. I hope that nobody felt too attacked by me in the other thread and like to welcome everybody to participate when I have it.

I still want to get everybody happy. It is technically possible, but it surely will take some (or perhaps a lot of) time to implement all necessary conversion tools. But that's the way blender.org works in general, anyway.

heffel · Post by **heffel** » Mon Oct 28, 2002 7:46 pm

Just to throw another idea out there, OpenOffice is a free, open source office suite which runs under Solaris, Linux and Windows, and I think a Mac OS X port is on the way.

http://www.openoffice.org

I believe the native format of the word processor (Writer) is XML.

I see an advantage of using an "easy" word processing package like AbiWord or OpenOffice, documentation writers can focus on writing documentation, instead of learning how create DocBook/LaTex/whatever.

If you already know how to create LaTex, good for you, but the barrier of entry would be much lower for documentation writers if it does not require specialized knowledge.

Both AbiWord and OpenOffice can export to HTML, which would make it very easy to place documentation online.

Heffel

S68 · Post by **S68** » Tue Oct 29, 2002 9:08 am

Point is, and I think xinalta to is on this wavelength, that we must separate the writing process from the style.

We need to write in the framework of a structure, and who write must care only of the content, not of the layout.

That's why DocBook(XML) LaTeX and POD are good.

Because you write, you place your tag, the Doc Commitee put everithing together and everithing is nice and consistent.

If you use a WordPro it would very difficult to prevent people to use some nice-cute-small-option-they-found-so-nice-and-useful-but-which-screws-completely-the-final-global-document...

What we need is an abstraction layer. You write with watever you want as soon as what you provide conforms to a given standard (which we are fighting *herm* discussing on)

We cannot stich to a single WordPro

(my 2 cents)

Stefano

ratbag · Post by **ratbag** » Tue Oct 29, 2002 3:07 pm

Erm, why are you even discussing what program you are going to write the docs in? The relevant question is what format the docs are written in. And in the present climate, the only sensible format is XML. The choice of editor program then becomes completely irrelevant, which is exactly how it should be.

As to the choice of tags you use, the arguments for using DocBook are pretty strong....

Rob.

nabaf · Post by **nabaf** » Fri Nov 15, 2002 7:15 am

Hi I am looking for some tutorials of heads how to do heads in blender 3d please could you send me some links of good sites I am testing the blender 3d thanks

gimp_child · Post by **gimp_child** » Sun Nov 24, 2002 6:35 pm

here is a really good one, nabaf.

http://www.linuxgraphic.org/section3d/b ... 1-ang.html

IngieBee · Post by **IngieBee** » Tue Nov 26, 2002 9:45 pm

ton wrote:I'm collecting mails from volunteers now. After this weekend I'll assemble the teams, and contact everyone.

Um, just wondering. If someone (er... like me) were to get a bug, and write a section of information for the document system. Could we just hand it over to one of the people from the volunteer group, to stick into the document? I would think some people who might be willing to write up and explanation or information for the documentation, might not want to have to deal with another program to learn in order to submit it.

Or am I just getting tired? and lazy, LOL.... ?