Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 21:34:44 +0100 From: Nik Clayton <nik@nothing-going-on.demon.co.uk> To: Dutch Collins <dutch@charm.net> Cc: bsd-doc <freebsd-doc@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Documents - the plain paper look - always? Message-ID: <19990711213444.B61012@catkin.nothing-going-on.org> In-Reply-To: <3788A8FE.2A8DBAB2@charm.net>; from Dutch Collins on Sun, Jul 11, 1999 at 10:23:58AM -0400 References: <3788A8FE.2A8DBAB2@charm.net>
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Hi, On Sun, Jul 11, 1999 at 10:23:58AM -0400, Dutch Collins wrote: > I have stuffed DocBook in the 'ol brain and have a question(s). > > 1) What are the limits to page beautification, shading and color. Depends. DocBook itself says very little about how the information in the document should be formatted. Currently, we use a stylesheets written in a (scheme-like) language called DSSSL to do that, and a processor (called Jade) which reads in the DocBook and the stylesheet, and generates the formatted output. > 2) I looked over the CD-ROM (walcrk) and did not find the BSD version > of DocBook. Do I have to ftp the DocBook-FreeBSD version from > FreeBSD.org? http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/cvsweb.cgi/doc/share/sgml/freebsd.dtd You'll also need the CATALOG file and freebsd.dsl file in that directory as well. The organisation is tied quite heavily to the FDP. If you're planning on using these with your own documents, but aren't up to speed with SGML and DSSSL yet, I recommend using CVSup to download doc/en/* and doc/share/*, and seeing how the Makefiles use the various programs to generate the formatted output from doc/en/handbook/ and doc/en/tutorials/docproj-primer/. > 3) Almost all web sites I visited that had something to do with > documentation had the same look, plain paper. Is this the preferred > look for sites or just a look generated by DocBook? It's a look generated by the 'default' DSSSL stylesheets, written by Norm Walsh. They're not 'default' in the sense that they ship with DocBook, but they are the most complete set in existence, and since the output is (for most people) 'good enough', no one bothers to customise the output. It can be customised, either by tweaking variables in the stylesheets, or by rewriting the stylesheets functions to do things differently. The previously mentioned freebsd.dsl file does this in some cases. I'm no style maven, so if you've got suggestions for how the look and feel of the formatted documentation could be improved then I'm all ears. > a) New Topic: WP8 does have DocBook and the DOD SGML on the CD. I > think I have enough windoze\disk\space to give it a try. What > kind of HTML will fall out? Got me. As soon as I generate > something useful I will post the URL. It will be notes or maybe > a man page. ???Maybe something from my C books from 198x years.??? Absolutely no idea I'm afraid. I haven't got WP8 installed. But I'm interested in your results. N -- [intentional self-reference] can be easily accommodated using a blessed, non-self-referential dummy head-node whose own object destructor severs the links. -- Tom Christiansen in <375143b5@cs.colorado.edu> To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-doc" in the body of the message
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