I wanted to clarify my statements in the our meeting last week about structure vs. unstructured information.
When we use the word "Structured," it typically means content in a structured markup language. But, I believe it is possible to provide structured/organized information without a markup language, just as you can provided unstructured/unorganized information with a markup language. In the meeting, I was trying to find out what community requirements we have for structured markup? As we all know, producing information in a structure markup language creates a high barrier to entry for many folks in the community, so we need to make sure the costs don't outweigh the benefits. If the only reason for structured markup is to produce good-looking PDF documents, then I'm not sure that is a big enough reason to undermine the ease-of-use requirements we now face with the community. I realize that structured markup provides many more capabilities than just the ability to produce good-looking PDF documents, but if we don't take advantage of those other benefits, then we are missing the opportunity to let the community easily contribute. And, as for the PDF requirement, wiki technology is starting to provide this capability as well. So, I still want to understand the prioritized list of community requirements for developing OpenSolaris information, and then start providing technologies that will best serve those needs. Maybe this is something we can talk about in our next meeting. Paul This message posted from opensolaris.org
