> first of all, if i wanted to print the docs out - i would buy
> a book. 3com hurt themselves by having a PDF version.. they
> should make money from the docs - but now everyone can download
> and in two seconds.. get a book..
I think a lot of computer companies have realized that they are not in the book
publishing business. API books are never up to date, leave it to 3rd parties who want
to make some money.
> they are scripts (in unix) - that will print a heirarchy of HTML
> files.. (you just need to find them)
HTML gets reformatted every possible way the browser sees fit. All browsers are
terrible in their printing support.
> when i want to access the docs, i want ONE page - not the whole
> book.. so i dont mind seeing a small .HTML file.
That's why I always have Acrobat running in the background. I dont think it is more of
a memory hog than Netscape or MSIE.
> searching? if you are using linux / unix.. easy.. "grep".. finds
> everything you need..
yes, drop down to a separate window to do a grep and then have to manually open the
resulting file(s). In Acrobat you can search the currently open document or search an
entire collection of documents easily jumping to the correct page.
> Java does their documentation perfectly.. whats wrong with 3com
> doing the same? i have a lot of problems with the PDF - it chews
> memory on my machine - it takes ages to load.. and what for? one
> page..
>
> multi format.. thats they key.. i suggested a utility like JavaDoc
> previously.. if the headers are documented enough - you can
> generate the HTML from the code..
Well there is a memory hog - Java. The Java runtime will eat megabytes of ram just for
running a tiny application.
> PDF, HTML are a definate.. at a minimum.. i prefer HTML over PDF.
> smaller, easier to use (IMHO) and faster to load.
A browser takes as much time to load as Acrobat. What can be easier than clicking on a
bookmark on the left pane and having the correct page display on the right pane? Plus
if everybody is so concerned about printing, when you print out the PDF it is as good
as buying the book. If you get the Adobe PS driver you can also print n-up and it'll
still look good. PDFs are compressed internally and there are free utilities to
convert PDF to html.
Chris
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