Date: Fri, 17 Aug 2001 09:12:30 +0100 From: Nik Clayton <nik@freebsd.org> To: John Murphy <jfm@blueyonder.co.uk> Cc: doc@freebsd.org Subject: Re: <acronym> Message-ID: <20010817091230.A59279@clan.nothing-going-on.org> In-Reply-To: <hinont8fhal36o8pusq5c3jvc9t2thmdll@4ax.com>; from jfm@blueyonder.co.uk on Fri, Aug 17, 2001 at 01:16:13AM %2B0100 References: <hinont8fhal36o8pusq5c3jvc9t2thmdll@4ax.com>
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[-- Attachment #1 --] On Fri, Aug 17, 2001 at 01:16:13AM +0100, John Murphy wrote: > I am impressed. It is a good way to write a book :) > > However: I'm stuck on the <acronym> tag. I first saw it around IDE, then found > it not around BIOS or SCSI etc. 'twould seem to me that these, and more, are > unequivocal throughout the Manual and could, therefore, be treated as part of > the final process. Else I could easily acronymize (sorry), the occurrences I find. > > I think i'm confused, because i tend to say I de E, buyos, skuzy. > The latter two seem more acronymy than the first... (I used to say Lie Nux!) An acronym is anything formed from (typically the initial) letters from a phrase. So BIOS, SCSI, RAID, and IDE are all acronyms. An abbreviation is a shortened form of a word. > Abbreviation tag anyone? There is an <abbrev> element. . . As to whether we use the elements or not -- there's no "formal" policy on this. My personal opinion is that we have, through general usage, evolved a core set of elements that we use in the documentation -- things like <filename>, <replaceable>, <username>, the &man.foo.x; entities, and so on. If a document is submitted that doesn't use these elements where appropriate then I'd try to add it to the mark up before committing it. Then there are "non-core" elements. <acronym> and <abbrev> fall in to this category. They are nice to have, but it's not a showstopper if they're not used when they should be. But they do add to the value in the text (because then we can produce tables of acronyms, allowing readers to see where acronyms like "IDE" are used in the text), so if you, or anyone else, wants to tighten up the mark up in text that you're looking at then you should feel free to do so. N -- FreeBSD: The Power to Serve http://www.freebsd.org/ FreeBSD Documentation Project http://www.freebsd.org/docproj/ --- 15B8 3FFC DDB4 34B0 AA5F 94B7 93A8 0764 2C37 E375 --- [-- Attachment #2 --] -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.0.6 (FreeBSD) Comment: For info see http://www.gnupg.org iEYEARECAAYFAjt80e4ACgkQk6gHZCw343UYFgCdHdUVm4NYZJMw9cdLFX/z5cXB vsQAoIbqhHQoc9OPpx+IGVFtQkYPs9rN =L5K8 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----help
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