Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2000 00:22:17 -0800 From: Bengt Richter <bokr@accessone.com> To: FreeBSD Security Mailing List <freebsd-security@freebsd.org> Subject: [FAQ] Ideas for automatic FAQ extraction? Message-ID: <3.0.5.32.20001107002217.009641f0@mail.accessone.com>
next in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
I have a pretty goodsized archive from this mailing list, with a lot of valuable Q's and A's, but it would take a *lot* of editing to make a FAQ out of it all. So I thought to ask: (see Q: below, after topic header ...) [T: Markup syntax for automatic FAQ extraction from posted text.] [C: The above T: item defines the beginning a topic scope. This is a comment to be included in the extracted FAQ material.] [Q: Has anyone defined a simple markup syntax that would let people delimit *parts* of their posting so that a simple script could extract material to generate a FAQ document automatically? ] [A: I am proposing this as a straw man, but there are probably others. ] This is a comment that wouldn't show up in the output FAQ. Only stuff inside [] brackets gets extracted. [Q: What about followup questions? ] [A: They'd alternate, like a normal dialog, unless they narrowed in on something. Then nesting might be called for, like usenet threads.] [Q: How does topic scope end?] [A: With start of another, or EOF. Nesting Q: and A: scopes within a T: is permitted, but then it takes X: to exclude text. [X: This is inside an A: scope, so it takes the X: at the beginnig of this to exclude this.] ] This is not inside brackets, so it doesn't get extracted for a FAQ. This represents the parts of postings that you don't want in the FAQ, so you don't bracket it. [Q: How much thought has gone into this?] [A: Not whole lot, but it's pretty simple. [C: This is a comment that is not an answer, but would get carried along, and it has nested scope. Extracted material would be pretty-printed.] [Q: What should this question refer to by its position?] [A: It should have been a nested follow-on question about the amount of thought or something in the answer, or something like that.] [X: Inside the outermost brackets, it takes X: bracketing to exclude text like this. This is still inside an A: scope. ] ] <- ends the A: above, with its nested C:, Q:, A: and X:. This part is outside, and excluded. Even something as trivial ( well, the nesting/threading makes it a little less trivial, but still ) as the above markup might have a lot of effect. It's cheap to try. A little perl could easily make HTML or text FAQ output. [C: Maybe there should be an optional [K: keywords] form to support searching and indexing? BTW the C: makes the [K: ...]'s here be included, but not 'evaluated' since they're inside the C: (comment) scope.] [C: Maybe a special alternate to [T: ...] could designate a final version arrived at by consensus, say add an exclamation point after the colon on things, like [T:! ...] or [A:! ...], etc. or else just use the latest date posting containing a particular [T: ...] topic. To update a [T: Topic line] you'd follow it immediately with its replacement, and leave the old, to tie the new into the same succession. ] [C: We could start with just the T:, Q:, and A: forms and no nesting, and see how it feels. E-mail quoting syntax will complicate extraction a little, but not that bad, I'd guess. ] Thoughts? Regards, Bengt Richter (MOIB - Member of Idea Brigade ;-) To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-security" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?3.0.5.32.20001107002217.009641f0>