Hello again. :-) I'm glad my comments are of value. I'm quite enjoying the OpenSolaris forum model, being able to give back and add value. :-)
Yes, I think a PDF with annotations would do the trick. The issue I refered to earlier was PowerPoint (or equivalent) presentations with just the bare-bones slides turned into PDF's, and all of the critical explanatory monologue during the presentation being lost. Some of the LISA course materials are a good example of what to do: the top of each page is the slide as displayed by the instructor, while the rest of each page is a more detailed explanation if required, maybe pointers to more resources, etc. That is, the kind of things the instructor discusses while you're looking at the three bullet points. I think the important aspect I'm driving at is the associated notes, without which many PDF'd slide shows become valueless. My big difficulty with DocBook was not the writing (never even got much time to produce a document). My problem was confusion over the plethora of tools, what I really needed (there seemed to be several layers, and multiple tool choices per layer), the order to install them, and which worked well together. Things may have changed since then (this was well over 1.5 years ago), but at the time, there was no guidance as to: 1) "You need these three 'pieces'. These three products work well together, as do those three. Pick either set." There was no clear distinction between how many layers there were to getting to a workable state. Indeed, it wasn't always clear which layer a specific tool fit into. 2) "Due to dependencies, you'll need to install the layers in this order: x, then y, then z. For recommended tool set A, that means first Ed, then Harry, then Frank." 3) "That gives you your toolset. Now, to produce a DocBook, start by using Ed to type up a document (and, perhaps, here's at guide to the codes used for formatting). Save it. Call Harry using these parameters and switches. That creates harry.doc. Now call Frank using this switch. When Frank is finished running, you'll see frank.docbook. That's your DocBook output. View using Sally. Rinse, lather, repeat." Now, mind you, things may have changed significantly since I wandered through the moors in the fog, tripping over dead branches. Also, I am admittedly better at the actual writing, and "oh, this detail is missing" part than I am at actually creating fully-formatted, customer-ready output (I'm a vi kind of guy ;-), but if I can do the former in a toolset that easily creates the latter from the input, then I'm more than willing to put in the extra up-front work. (And yes, I still write my HTML in vi.) I think everyone will be happier, though, knowing the above details up front, and not wasting time figuring out, "how do I get there from here?" I hope that clarifies, and that I'm not being overly obtuse. As I say, there may have been significant leaps made since I last explored DocBook creation. I'm just not wanting to spend a day Googling, especially if it's only to find out, "oh, here's the one tool we use, and it takes care of everything for you! Life is much simpler using this." :-) Thanks again. Rainer This message posted from opensolaris.org
