DocBook Technical Committee Meeting Minutes: 25 March 2009
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The DocBook Technical Committee met on Wednesday,
25 March 2009 at 1:00p EDT (10:00a PDT, 17:00GMT,
18:00BST, 19:00CEST, 02:00JST+, 11:30p India+) for 70
minutes.
1. Roll call
Present: Paul Grosso, Scott Hudson, Dick Hamilton,
Richard Kwan, Larry Rowland, Bob Stayton, Norm Walsh.
Absent: Jim Earley, Keith Falhgren, Patricia Gee, Nancy
Harrison, Corey Leong, Dave Pawson, John Pederson,
Pine Zhang
Regrets: Gershon Joseph, Jirka Kosek
We have a quorum of voting members.
2. Accepted the minutes [1] of the previous meeting.
3. Next meeting: 15 April 2009
4. Review of the agenda.
Add three items: 7.1, 10.1 and 10.2
5. Review of open action items
a. Bob to organize TDG reading after names are fixed.
CONTINUE
b. Norm to write up a backwards compatibility policy document.
CONTINUE
c. Norm to incorporate group parameter change (RFE 1998852) into the
schema
for 5.1.
CONTINUE
d. Norm to ask mailing list about 'rep' on methodparam.
COMPLETED
e. Norm to update OASIS site for 5.0 spec and schema.
CONTINUE
f. Norm to update spec to include public and system identifiers
for the 5.0 DTD version.
CONTINUE
g. Jirka to add schema comparison table to DocBook 5.0 Transition Guide.
CONTINUE
h. Norm to add floatstyle attribute to sidebar for 5.1.
CONTINUE
i. Norm to write up proposed content model for initializer.
CONTINUE
j. Norm to add subtitle to sidebar for 5.1.
CONTINUE
k. Dick to incorporate the final charter changes and send out for
approval.
COMPLETED
l. Norm to determine OASIS requirements for charter updates.
CONTINUE
m. Norm to solicit for a third DocBook 5 user again.
COMPLETED
(the following items were missing from the agenda)
n. Norm to work with Mary to make Publishing Subcommittee
schema a Committee Working Draft.
CONTINUE
o. Norm to work with Keith and Scott to update the OASIS committee
site to make the Publishing Subcommittee Working Draft
publicly available.
CONTINUE
p. Scott to write up a modular DocBook proposal for the TC
to discuss.
COMPLETED
q. Scott to append suggestions to RFE 1722935 from the
Publishing Subcommittee regarding additional class values.
COMPLETED
r. Larry to write additional documentation for the existing name
elements describing how they are best used in different locales.
COMPLETED
6. DocBook TC charter review.
Continued, awaiting completion of Norm's action item.
7. DocBook 5.0 standards update
Richard Kwan just affirmed that Pearson PLC is using DocBook 5, is
a member of OASIS, and will attest to that fact. Now we
have three members and can proceed.
ACTION: Norm to move DocBook 5.0 into the OASIS process
for approval as an OASIS Standard.
7.1 Printed version of DocBook: The Definitive Guide.
Dick is pursuing getting TDG back in print, updated
for DocBook 5. He is in discussion with O'Reilly, or
may publish it through XML Press. The current format
has very long syntax sections, leading to a 1500 page book size.
ACTION: Dick will initiate an email discussion on how to
present content models using more compact syntax.
8. Policy for backwards compatible changes (Norm).
Continued.
9. Publishing Subcommittee report (Scott).
Waiting for working drafts to be made available for public
review (see action item o ).
10. Using a map for modular DocBook (Dick and Jim).
Scott sent out the discussion group's proposal [2].
It proposes a new <assembly> element to map DocBook
elements into a publication. It would use a <toc>
element to define order and hierarchy, a <resources>
element to declare potential resources to be used,
and a <relationships> element to define relationships
between resources. The assembly is similar to
IMF manifest for SCORM, making it useful for
eLearning applications.
Most TC comments described the proposal in favorable terms.
Discussion of what scheme to use for relationships:
existing comprehensive standard such as RDF, or
simpler new scheme? Different groups need more
than others. Suggested shipping it with a simple
scheme, with provisions and instructions for
binding in a more comprehensive system.
ACTION: Scott to work up an complete assembly example
with basic relationships.
10.1 DocBook promotion
The group still feels a need for more promotion of DocBook.
Some discussion of more conference participation.
ACTION: Norm to make available the "branding" icons he produced.
10.2 firstname and surname elements
Larry researched the issue and reported on it [3].
The group decided to first update the documentation.
Larry's doc suggestions were approved.
ACTION: Norm to incorporate Larry's new text into TDG.
See also RFE 1770787 below.
11. Review of Requests for Enhancement
To browse a specific RFE, enter the URL (on one line):
http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&;
group_id=21935&atid=384107&aid=XXXX
RFEs to be considered:
1097183 Allow Task as a sibling of sections
This proposal would confuse the hierarchy of DocBook elements,
and no member felt it was necessary to achieve the purpose of
integrating tasks into documents. Rejected.
1679665 Add better support for modular documentation
See minutes for item 10 above. Still open.
1722935 DocBook 5: Adding proofreader in @class for othercredit?
The Publishing Subcommittee suggested several more.
The TC accepted them.
ACTION: Norm to incorporate new attribute values into 5.1.
1770787 Rename firstname and surname
Proposal to allow new element givenname as alternative
to firstname in 5.1 was approved. This item is now closed.
1907003 biblioid content model too broad
2021383 Is 'rep' on methodparam a mistake?
The TC acknowledges that this is probably a mistake, but
changing the schema would be backwards incompatible, and
are not willing to make that change. This item is closed
with no action taken.
2100736 initializer should allow constants
The TC agreed that the content model needed changes.
ACTION: Norm to write up a new content model for approval.
Meeting adjourned at 2:10 EDT.
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[1] http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/docbook-tc/200901/msg00014.html
[2] http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/docbook-tc/200903/msg00004.html
[3] http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/docbook-tc/200902/msg00003.html
Bob Stayton
Sagehill Enterprises
b...@sagehill.net
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