[Gimp-docs] GIMP manual writing in 2009

[Joao S. O. Bueno]

On Tuesday 10 June 2008, Axel Wernicke wrote:
> Hi List,
>
> due to the discussion in other threads on this list, I'd take the
> chance to propose one more idea on "how the editing of the GIMP
> manual could look".
>
> What we achieved with the GIMP manual in the last couple of years
> is really astonishing to me. It's great how "just a bunch of
> enthusiasts" can create some thousand pages of documentation and
> even having fun with that. I'm really proud to be part of this!
> Despite all this success there is no doubt about the fact, that we
> are severe short of not only authors, but even more critical,
> interaction with our readers. Has anybody ever seen responses of
> reader on the list? Has ever a reader supported our work by
> bringing some enhancements or even tips for enhancements? If ever,
> this mus have been a verly long time ago unfortunately.
>
> This is the base, I assume we all share, for the thinking on how to
> change that.
>
> So, we kind of think to have found out what might cause the current
> situation:
> - docbook editing is complicated
>
> But is this all? May be we can find more reasons.
>
> What did we come up so far with as a solution?
> - divide the crowd into authors and translators and hide the
> docbook xml (structures) as good as possible for the translators.
>
> But ist that the only possible solution? May be we can simplify
> writing and in addition to that get rid of that programming taste
> that sticks to the "writing" of the GIMP Manual today?
>
> I propose to wholeheartly and open minded discuss alternatives.
> Please have a look into
> http://lexaikon.dnsalias.org/~medius/mediawiki/index.php/Meta/Why_G
>IMP-Manual_as_wiki#Pro.27s_.26_Con.27sand let me know what you think
> about it.
>
> Greetings, lexA

YEs - a wiki approach would please a lot of people, but, just 
wikifying it might come to a too "loose" manual - we ḋ would not have 
the master language, and it would  be very hard to synchronise 
changes.

But maybe we could get out with an "hybrid" system  - 
for example, extracting the manual structure from the current XML 
files, and having more or less fixed topics on the wiki pages. 
Translators/users could then edit the text inside those topics, but 
not create new ones, change their order - that would be done in a 
master file (either in the wiki or in svn).

I can see how this would be achievable through scripts  (I mean, to 
preserve the structure,  and of course, populate whatever contents 
already written in the xml  into the wiki). Some extra scripts could 
even make possible a wiki ->xml transform so we could have our 
multiple output version just as today.

Regards,

	js
	-><-