Alright we seem to have slowed down in here, which means we've probably
run out of ideas and steam to drive them.
Thus I shall propose the following:
1). Those people who would like to see us use some form of cvs gateway
for those who don't have cvs or don't know how to use it can contribute
to the site, well you guys bring it to the table in a demonstratable
form, and we'll all take a look. I have no objections to adding such a
feature but it would be plain wrong to go off and develop it and then
find we can't use it for whatever reason... It would be much better if
only those interested in it were to try it first, the rest should
concentrate on the html/css and perl side of it.
2) The above also goes for the SGML/DocBook people. I just spoke to Dawn
Endico who says that making everyone use DocBook is out of the question,
but if parts of the site were available in such a form it would be great
(obvious rationale there). So again, bring to the table a demonstratable
system, and we'll look into making it work. That doesn't have to mean a
team of people doing a html->docbook translation, it could mean a
selected area html->docbook translation of say end-user documentation.
Whatever.
3) If you are one of those who believes firmly that using a database to
serve up the content, then you make a nice, quick-to-use interface, and
we'll take a look. If it's that quick to use, it should be no problem
with moving our work out of files and into the database, right? Again,
this should be interested parties only.
4) Am I right in thinking that XHTML1.0 and HTML 4.01 Strict are roughly
the same, at least in terms of code used and end result in browsers? If
so, we need to settle on one or the other.
5) We also need to settle on layout mechanisms. I tried to use floating
divs to lay out the homepage, and it was unsuable in netscape 4 (divs
floated above links and prevented them from being clickable). I would
suggest that we use <table>s, but without html attributes. Sadly that
means combining the current site's navigation menu with the main content
into one table, but it's that or risk being unusable in other browsers.
Blame the browser engineers, then cheer those who are reversing the
trend of non-compliance in the more recent browsers.
6) We need to settle on filesystem layout and URI layouts. Some have
been suggested, I'm not aware of anything we should be working to. It's
make our minds up time.
7) Layouts. Do we keep the current layout, even in a basic navbar on the
left, content on the right, system? We need to see suggestions on the
web. Use your homepages space.
8) I suggest several of us come up with designs that validate and that
also look good on older browsers. Once we have something that we would
be proud of seeing on mozilla.org and that doesn't make people using Nav
4.x on unix puke, then we go and see Dawn for final approval, then we
make the rest of the site work too.
Remember, this is my proposal.. Don't flame me saying you don't agree
with something, instead suggest an alternative.
Oh, and apparently we must work well on Nav 4.x on Solaris. So Dawn says.
If anyone's interested in hopping onto IRC, irc.mozilla.org
#documentation, I'll be around.
James Green
