From owner-freebsd-doc Mon Mar 10 21:37:55 2003 Delivered-To: freebsd-doc@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id DA9C337B401; Mon, 10 Mar 2003 21:37:53 -0800 (PST) Received: from HAL9000.homeunix.com (12-233-57-224.client.attbi.com [12.233.57.224]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 22F0943FCB; Mon, 10 Mar 2003 21:37:53 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from das@FreeBSD.org) Received: from HAL9000.homeunix.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by HAL9000.homeunix.com (8.12.6/8.12.5) with ESMTP id h2B5bqIX004550; Mon, 10 Mar 2003 21:37:52 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from das@FreeBSD.org) Received: (from das@localhost) by HAL9000.homeunix.com (8.12.6/8.12.5/Submit) id h2B5bpRt004549; Mon, 10 Mar 2003 21:37:51 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from das@FreeBSD.org) Date: Mon, 10 Mar 2003 21:37:51 -0800 From: David Schultz To: Tom Rhodes Cc: seanc@FreeBSD.org, doc@FreeBSD.org, dwmalone@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: your mail Message-ID: <20030311053751.GA4521@HAL9000.homeunix.com> References: <20030310195323.GA2812@HAL9000.homeunix.com> <20030310204035.GU79234@perrin.int.nxad.com> <20030311045239.GA4369@HAL9000.homeunix.com> <20030311000038.7963f10e.trhodes@FreeBSD.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20030311000038.7963f10e.trhodes@FreeBSD.org> Sender: owner-freebsd-doc@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Thus spake Tom Rhodes : > David Schultz wrote: > > Actually, I was thinking of the fact that properly laid out > > DocBook can be converted into a (slightly more concise) mdoc file. > > I have nothing against a manpage listing all of the sysctls, but I > > think that centralizing the information in an SGML-based format > > would be much more useful in the long run. And since you can make > > a manpage out of that, the only disadvantage I see is the extra > > work to put together the DocBook stuff and figure out how to do > > the conversion. > > There is a utility out there which converts mdoc(7) to HTML, we > just need to do that. I've been asked to look into this and am > currently doing the `brainstorm' thing. Hopefully I'll have > something to commit by the end of this month. Converting the other way doesn't work as well. DocBook can contain all sorts of useful metadata about the content of the document, whereas mdoc wasn't designed for that. For instance, the DocBook file might contain MIB names, short descriptions of the knobs, references to manpages, and links to longer descriptions and related MIBs. You could automatically convert it to an mdoc file that contains only the MIB names and references to other manpages. With mdoc, you only get that kind of control if you plan the document very carefully and cook up some macros. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-doc" in the body of the message