thanks I will have a look. I was blocked in an airport yesterday night so ... no way to check internet
On Dec 14, 2010, at 12:14 PM, Torsten Bergmann wrote: > > Stef wrote on Mon Dec 13 10:02:56 (see [1]): >> Now what I want is that people can type >> ... >> <help> >> > > I already gave exactly such an example to Lukas already back in > May. Again - PLEASE have a look at it (just load the code in [2] > and run > > HelpBrowser openOn: PragmaHelp > > The code is small and simple: > > - beside the existing help builders it just introduces a > "PragmaHelpBuilder" that uses the pragma <help> to > collect the help data > > - a Foo and Bar class is included to demonstrate > how you define help with this new builder (similar to > the way Stef/Lukas wanted) > > As I said adding "pragma help" is just a new "help builder" > to define and one can easily add it. > > Think of another scenario: maybe one doesnt care about > the "class to book mapping" or a "pragma approach". > > He wants to define his help contents completely different > in external text files. Same pattern: he introduces a new > HelpBuilderFromExternalTextFile that converts his custom > (external) format into help topics. Nothing more. > > So the real work is in thinking about/defining how and in what > format you want to write the help contents itself. > > The problem: there are MANY ways to define the contents - > and as Stef showed us with the TWO "pragma" descriptions > examples in his mail [2] that we are currently NOT SURE > about the "pragma description" format to use. > But if we want pragma help in the help system we have to > find ONE and it should be simple and fit best. > > To say it in simple words: if we want to use pragmas > we have to find a way to use pragmas to define nestable > and extensible books (with pages and page order). > > I once requested this from Lukas but regarding extensible > books his simple answer was: > > "I would not make the books extensible themselves, > that complicates things and is rarely needed in practice." > > This answer is not satisfying to me since extensible books > ARE EASILY POSSIBLE with the "class to book mapping" that > the help system already have. And I use them. > > We can use "pragmas" but we should have the same possibilities > and not use pragmas because they are "modern" or they are > used by the Settings framework. > > And I agree with him that it may be hard to do with pragmas ... > especially since I already experimented on this with pragmas > But maybe we all can find a solution here together. > > In the end I switched to the "use classes and the class hierarchy" > approach since it is more natural (at least to me) and easy to > use/understand. > > Stef further wrote: >> and that if the help is loaded we can see it in help. > > A registration mechanism to mark which custom help builders > are included in the standard browser is on my todo list. > Currently it is only one and hard coded (see HelpBrowser>>defaultRoot) > > If the above pragma help builder is in good shape we > can add it too as one of the defaults - but a registration > mechanism is better in the long run. > > But again: > The problem I have with this simple pragma approach > > foo: myBuidler > <help> > myBuilder ... > > is that with this you can easily describe a page with a > title and text - but it is hard to describe a complete > book with structure and even extensible books. > > So we have to clearly think about the builder part of > this approach to keep the help contents definitions > simple. And this is what I requested you all to do if > we want to move on here... > > Just use my simple code example [2] to experiment and > find the "pragma" description format we want to introduce. > > Stef may answer: use the one that I showed you. But if > one uses pragmas we may want to describe the whole book. > Not just a simple <help> tag to describe a single page > with a title! > > Thx > T. > > [1] > http://lists.gforge.inria.fr/pipermail/pharo-project/2010-December/037545.html > > [2] > http://lists.gforge.inria.fr/pipermail/pharo-project/attachments/20100505/cc589ac2/attachment-0001.obj > > -- > GMX DSL Doppel-Flat ab 19,99 €/mtl.! Jetzt auch mit > gratis Notebook-Flat! http://portal.gmx.net/de/go/dsl >
