From owner-cvs-all Sun Jun 20 16:46:18 1999 Delivered-To: cvs-all@freebsd.org Received: from cimlogic.com.au (cimlog.lnk.telstra.net [139.130.51.31]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 55E6814D8D; Sun, 20 Jun 1999 16:46:12 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jb@cimlogic.com.au) Received: (from jb@localhost) by cimlogic.com.au (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA07097; Mon, 21 Jun 1999 10:11:26 +1000 (EST) (envelope-from jb) From: John Birrell Message-Id: <199906210011.KAA07097@cimlogic.com.au> Subject: Re: cvs commit: doc/en/handbook/ports chapter.sgml In-Reply-To: from Bill Fumerola at "Jun 20, 1999 7:34:16 pm" To: billf@jade.chc-chimes.com (Bill Fumerola) Date: Mon, 21 Jun 1999 10:11:26 +1000 (EST) Cc: jb@cimlogic.com.au, cvs-committers@FreeBSD.org, cvs-all@FreeBSD.org X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL43 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk Bill Fumerola wrote: > On Mon, 21 Jun 1999, John Birrell wrote: > > > I understand that it is useful to have the history of __FreeBSD_version > > documented in a manner that is convenient for ports people, but when > > you look at it from the other direction, doc/en/handbook/ports seems > > a bit odd. > > *shrug* At this point it's only to help people understand what happened > when. > > Perhaps that whole section could be replaced with a link to > http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/cvsweb.cgi/src/sys/sys/param.h That won't work because sys/param.h only shows what the latest value is, not why it is what it is, or why it was what it was. 8-) It is the RCS file that contains the reason why the developer changed it, but the commit message is unsuitable for the documentation (no consistent style). And the commit message is always in (nerdy) English - we need a structure that allows for translation to other languages. As a developer, I would never have thought to look in the ports section of the handbook for this sort of information. IMHO, the ports section is for use more often by people creating ports from other people's code. We need to document things in a way that suits the "other people" too. -- John Birrell - jb@cimlogic.com.au; jb@freebsd.org http://www.cimlogic.com.au/ CIMlogic Pty Ltd, GPO Box 117A, Melbourne Vic 3001, Australia +61 418 353 137 To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe cvs-all" in the body of the message