Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Hi Chipp, Hmmm. If it wasn't you, then who? Ah, Pierre Sahores. Hmmm. German and French. You think I'd be able to keep that straight. Don't worry, we all know you are just an american... :-D Sorry. Anyway, Klaus, interested in porting HTMLDOC to Mac / Linux? I am sorry, but i do not have the time in the moment. LOL ;-) Chipp Klaus Major wrote: Hi Chipp, Sivakatirswami, ... But that link is very interesting. In fact I've got a complete GUI written around the openSource version of HTMLDOC. Currently it only works on Windows, but I seem to remember handing off the Mac/Linux port to Klaus? To Mr. Major? No, not that i could remember. I actually do not follow this thread, but this kinda jumped into my eye ;-) ... Regards Klaus Major [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.major-k.de ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
100% Dennis - except I think you may have hit copy and paste by accident for points 2 and 3 :) Could I propose that we use your post as rough draft spec? - and put it up on the wiki of course - which one is another matter :) On 29 Oct 2005, at 19:11, Dennis Brown wrote: I am not interested in supporting a mish-mash unstructured free-for- all of information. That is not the point at all. I like much of the structure of the current embedded Rev documentation. The dictionary is immeasurably useful. It is even more useful when integrated into the script editor as done in Constellation. Web notes could have been useful --if it actually worked. However, if RunRev were to just make a wiki available and say have at it, I would fear eminent failure. What I envision, is a well structured database of information that is not only useful to newbie and professional, but allows for upgrading the information without waiting for an annual formal release cycle. We can call it a wiki, but I think it has to be better than the average wiki. Not only does it need to better than a typical wiki, it also needs to do things that a book can not do. Some of the things I would like to see: 1. A single consensus wish list from user the community for RunRev to see --call it a rough draft spec 2. A single consensus wish list from user the community for RunRev to see --call it a rough draft spec 3. A single consensus wish list from user the community for RunRev to see --call it a rough draft spec 4. Article change/delete by voting members --three strikes and you are out --or in 5. Discussion about potential changes occur on the use-rev list as it does now 6. Articles included or pointers to articles with attributions and pointers to about the author --like in the tutorial stacks 7. Rev front end to integrate the site into tools (not browser dependent unless a pointer takes you to another web site) 8. Starting page of link lists of your interest: a. Learning Transcript --takes you to the next index page of topics (linear links take you from topic to topic inside an article, branches to download tutorials from other sites) b. Language Dictionary --takes you to category index page (search always available) c. How Do I --takes you to a category index where you drill down to ever more concise areas, then finally to a list of example/ discussions d. Tools available to developers e. Scripting styles f. Other resources g... As you can see, I look at this as a way of organizing the existing information and resources in one place. I see it as fulfilling several major needs: 1. That wonderful TOC and Index to the great information available (along with the hyperlinks that only an electronic book can have) 2. A place to deposit many of the jewels of information that come from the use-rev list where they can be easily found by the inquiring mind 3. Visibility for rev developers and web sites that is linked directly to the needs of the user --by virtue of were they are looking Having the backing of RunRev for this project significantly increases the odds of success (from 40% to 80%), even if they provided nothing more than acknowledging it on their home page as the place to go to learn. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Yes - but still waiting for Yahoo groups to verify my email address - god I hate Yahoo groups. On 29 Oct 2005, at 19:34, Dennis Brown wrote: Scott, Thank you for pointing that out to folks. I am signed up, anyone else joining us? ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Some of us are already there @;-) Judy On Sat, 29 Oct 2005, Dennis Brown wrote: Scott, Thank you for pointing that out to folks. I am signed up, anyone else joining us? ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 29 Oct 2005, at 04:41, Chipp Walters wrote: I couldn't agree with you more. The multiple books available for HyperCard, including Dan Shafer's and Danny Goodman's excellent tomes, were invaluable to me for learning how to work with HyperCard. That is one of the reasons why I'm pushing for both 'linearity' and 'xml' for whatever wiki is created. Totally Chipp! Wiki's as with HyperCard in fact (wiki's originated with, were inspired by, and were first programmed in HyperCard) - both have the same advantage and bloody aweful problem, of encouraging non- linearity. It is so easy to link anything to anything that you end up with a god-awful wiki mess, and you spend the rest of your time trying to introduce style sheets, templates and navigation structure. It's great for the first 20 cards / pages -but as the thing scales?!? Also seems to have some serious long term mental effects on the coders ability to project manage their work - oh oh another one gone non-linear :) One way to overcome this with wiki's is to look at the area of overlap with blog's. I started to use blog posts - good XMLRPC support there - for developer updates on project tasks - much better navigation. Wiki's are good at dictionaries and free flow association. By the way Chipp - if you are interested in the XML / PDF stuff take a look at Apache Forrest - found it easy to install - simple and quick to get up and running very structured project based sites with great pdf export. Site navigation is a simple XML file. Done some work integrating it with Revolution. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
I am not interested in supporting a mish-mash unstructured free-for- all of information. That is not the point at all. I like much of the structure of the current embedded Rev documentation. The dictionary is immeasurably useful. It is even more useful when integrated into the script editor as done in Constellation. Web notes could have been useful --if it actually worked. However, if RunRev were to just make a wiki available and say have at it, I would fear eminent failure. What I envision, is a well structured database of information that is not only useful to newbie and professional, but allows for upgrading the information without waiting for an annual formal release cycle. We can call it a wiki, but I think it has to be better than the average wiki. Not only does it need to better than a typical wiki, it also needs to do things that a book can not do. Some of the things I would like to see: 1. A single consensus wish list from user the community for RunRev to see --call it a rough draft spec 2. A single consensus wish list from user the community for RunRev to see --call it a rough draft spec 3. A single consensus wish list from user the community for RunRev to see --call it a rough draft spec 4. Article change/delete by voting members --three strikes and you are out --or in 5. Discussion about potential changes occur on the use-rev list as it does now 6. Articles included or pointers to articles with attributions and pointers to about the author --like in the tutorial stacks 7. Rev front end to integrate the site into tools (not browser dependent unless a pointer takes you to another web site) 8. Starting page of link lists of your interest: a. Learning Transcript --takes you to the next index page of topics (linear links take you from topic to topic inside an article, branches to download tutorials from other sites) b. Language Dictionary --takes you to category index page (search always available) c. How Do I --takes you to a category index where you drill down to ever more concise areas, then finally to a list of example/ discussions d. Tools available to developers e. Scripting styles f. Other resources g... As you can see, I look at this as a way of organizing the existing information and resources in one place. I see it as fulfilling several major needs: 1. That wonderful TOC and Index to the great information available (along with the hyperlinks that only an electronic book can have) 2. A place to deposit many of the jewels of information that come from the use-rev list where they can be easily found by the inquiring mind 3. Visibility for rev developers and web sites that is linked directly to the needs of the user --by virtue of were they are looking Having the backing of RunRev for this project significantly increases the odds of success (from 40% to 80%), even if they provided nothing more than acknowledging it on their home page as the place to go to learn. Dennis On Oct 29, 2005, at 12:18 AM, Dan Shafer wrote: Judy. As everyone here knows, you and I don't always see eye to eye on things. OK, we almost never see universe to universe. So what of it? But I thought that a LOT of what you share in this message is, as the Brits say, spot-on. Those who are waiting for electronically delivered information to replace paper-delivered information will wait a long, long, LONG time. Meanwhile, we need to find better and better ways to translate what is good and understandable and usable about printed books into the digital universe. We keep trying. Dan ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Recently, Dennis Brown wrote: I am not interested in supporting a mish-mash unstructured free-for- all of information. That is not the point at all. I like much of the structure of the current embedded Rev documentation. The dictionary is immeasurably useful. It is even more useful when integrated into the script editor as done in Constellation. Web notes could have been useful --if it actually worked. However, if RunRev were to just make a wiki available and say have at it, I would fear eminent failure. This is exactly the kind of discussion that should move to the RevDocs group. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ Regards, Scott Rossi Creative Director Tactile Media, Multimedia Design - E: [EMAIL PROTECTED] W: http://www.tactilemedia.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Scott, Thank you for pointing that out to folks. I am signed up, anyone else joining us? Dennis On Oct 29, 2005, at 1:24 PM, Scott Rossi wrote: This is exactly the kind of discussion that should move to the RevDocs group. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ Regards, Scott Rossi Creative Director Tactile Media, Multimedia Design - E: [EMAIL PROTECTED] W: http://www.tactilemedia.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Dennis Brown wrote: The dictionary is immeasurably useful. It is even more useful when integrated into the script editor as done in Constellation. It is. Right-click on a term in the script to see the dictionary entry. -- Jacqueline Landman Gay | [EMAIL PROTECTED] HyperActive Software | http://www.hyperactivesw.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Thanks for pointing that out. Just shows how easy it is to forget a feature when you have not used the tool in many months --I have been using Constellation since it was first made available, and I did not use the IDE for very many months before I switched. Dennis On Oct 29, 2005, at 2:41 PM, J. Landman Gay wrote: Dennis Brown wrote: The dictionary is immeasurably useful. It is even more useful when integrated into the script editor as done in Constellation. It is. Right-click on a term in the script to see the dictionary entry. -- Jacqueline Landman Gay | [EMAIL PROTECTED] HyperActive Software | http://www.hyperactivesw.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Hi Chipp, Sivakatirswami, ... But that link is very interesting. In fact I've got a complete GUI written around the openSource version of HTMLDOC. Currently it only works on Windows, but I seem to remember handing off the Mac/Linux port to Klaus? To Mr. Major? No, not that i could remember. I actually do not follow this thread, but this kinda jumped into my eye ;-) I'm not sure as it's been awhile ... best, Chipp Sivakatirswami wrote: www.pmwiki.org offers some solutions to most of these problems...check it out the cookbook recipes for PDF export of the wiki pages. Regards Klaus Major [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.major-k.de ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 27 Oct 2005, at 21:02, Chipp Walters wrote: Perhaps I don't know enough about wiki's, but it would sure be nice if they could organize data in a form which could be printed in a real-book format (and had an 'export to PDF' button which did just that, including TOC and index). While they do provide a nice 'random-access' interface (search find), I'm not sure they can really take the place of good serial documentation, which has a beginning, middle and end. And it sure seems like *that* is most needed as well. In fact, I believe the original RevDocs (mostly written by Jeanne DeVoto) were written to accomplish both ways of accessing information. Perhaps Dan Shafer or Jeaane DeVoto might weigh in on this topic as both are accomplished documentation writers. This is possible now in a number of ways. And yes Dan - maybe you should weigh in here :) ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Well said! On 28 Oct 2005, at 01:12, Timothy Miller wrote: I have mixed feelings about what I'm about to say. I expect that the new docs will be a big improvement. They might be excellent. Rev deserves a lot of credit for efforts to enhance the docs. I don't want to see that deprecated. I suspect Rev cares about their users more than most technology companies I could name. OTOH, in my opinion, it's time for the concept of continuous quality improvement came to the world of technical documentation. And, being a Rev loyalist, I'd love to see Rev do it first, maybe with a Rev interface, if feasible. (It would be totally cool if a commercial product, intended for this purpose, could be built mostly with Rev. It would have to be extensible and flexible. But this seems feasible -- not that I know diddly squat about that sort of thing.) With a wiki, continuous quality improvement could mean, it gets a little better every five seconds. (For that matter, the Wikipedia, today, might get a little better every five *milliseconds*!) Some published docs are better than others, but none get anywhere near optimal. Technical documentation is inevitably obsolete the day it is published. There's always room for updated information, clearer explanations, different contexts, more examples, more see also links, better search capacity, and so on. All those little improvements really add up over time. In addition, hyperlink technology (ahh... my old friend, HyperCard) can greatly enhance convenience and real-world useability. Multiple forms of indexing, for instance. Terse, less terse and verbose versions of the same topic, for another. (The beginner will likely want the verbose version. The experienced user will not want or need to wade through it.) I've never seen hyperlink technology live up to its potential, even though it's been in use for fifteen years or more. A docWiki like the one proposed could be the first time. (Wikipedia is already pretty good, I guess. I don't use it that much.) I have some doubt about whether it would ever be profitable for a private company to write docs like those that could arise spontaneously from a wiki. Printed on paper, they might fill 10,000 pages, and would still lack the convenience of hyperlinks, search capacity, and so on. When docs arise spontaneously from a wiki, they will be much cheaper to produce -- almost free, after the early drafts, except for keeping out vandalism and ignorance. And users might also police the vandalism and ignorance at no cost (possibly). For the manufacturer, how good could it get?! Even if a company tried to write optimal docs and practice continuous quality improvement in the docs, users, given the opportunity, could always improve whatever the engineering and technical writing staff came up with, with no publication delay. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Good question: On 28 Oct 2005, at 01:26, Chipp Walters wrote: Question: How would one manage 'wiki-bloat' where different people post so much commentary about a function or handler or feature, that it becomes impossible to navigate through? Would special 'editors' need be appointed? If a wiki could be converted into a PDF, I'm not so sure I like the idea of a single PDF document with *everyones* thoughts on a topic. The short answer is not to do a standard wiki but a structured wiki. This is a new area - so no accepted methods - here are my thoughts: 1) It is a bad idea to close off the opportunity for input 2) It should be open to everyone. 3) It is a bad idea (with a few exceptions - ie dictionaries with dedicated communities behind it such as wikipedia) to allow the structure to evolve into something you hope will be readable 4) Most wiki tools have terrible support for structure (see TikiWiki TOC) - it is against there philosophy 5) You can use social filtering - but most tools are so far inadequate (ie most viewed or commented pages) 6) Don't even try to do a conventional moderated editorial unless you plan to fund it properly 7) Think of using a page rank type system of referencing pages 8) Think of a quick way to allow users to indicate whether a page is ready to be published, or work in progress ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 28 Oct 2005, at 02:53, Dan Shafer wrote: Several years ago, I headed up a project which involved an extensive documentation effort and this same issue was raised. I like the way we solved it. Furthermore, I happen to have access to the tool and a server where it could be deployed and would make both freely available if: (a) at least one or two others would be willing to share site management and editing chores; and (b) the community thinks it's a good idea. The approach we used was akin to a discussion board. Each section of the docs was a topic on the board. Everyone who was a member (and that term could be loosely defined, of course) could add their comments to a section of the docs. There was also a general topic area where people could post questions and suggestions about the docs in their totality. Periodically, an editor assigned to a given section would go through the comments, incorporate the suggestions that made sense, edit the topic, create a new topic on that section, hibernate the old, and move comments that remained relevant to the new topic area. At the same time there was a way for any interested party to: (a) see the docs without the comments; (b) navigate using only the official docs; and (c) view and print (and save as PDF) all or some of the currently official documentation. This model is called managed open collaboration and I think it presents the best of all possible worlds in terms of encouraging and incorporating useful input without disrupting the accuracy or utility of the original and modified documentation. Yes - wish i could write like that :) ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 28 Oct 2005, at 05:48, Chipp Walters wrote: Some of these are free, others cost. But the beauty in XML is that it doesn't 'lock' the content inside a display presentation format. I assume wiki's can do the same thing. Yes - and this solves the flexible pdf export side of things much better than most of the php hacks. Jira and the accompanying wiki - Confluence - i believe is built on native XML file structures and allows very reliable pdf export. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
And I've heard in the case of BIG mistakes, a good Wiki can be 'rolled-back' easily by the admin and the offender unsubscribed if there's mischief. Timothy Miller wrote: Sure, some users would bloat entries. But then, other users would prune them. When I look at the wikipedia, the entries I see are remarkably concise. -- stephen barncard s a n f r a n c i s c o - - - - - - - - - - - - ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 28 Oct 2005, at 07:58, J. Landman Gay wrote: Just to play devil's advocate: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/18/wikipedia_quality_problem/ Yes - good article - one of the very rare anti-wikipedia articles. Goes nowhere to say why or to suggest solutions though. This is a side point but if you have seen the social side of wikipedia and how it has had to change from open collaboration as the organisation scaled - you would understand the why - the legal structures they adopted litterally (en)force the insiders to hold onto their position as early adopters, and pit themselves against real experts that come along later - all too painfully predictable. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
you can also enforce that users log in before editing, you can restrict the rights to comments, arcticles, changes etc... And you can also setup groups which have special rights to do this or that... But from experience, leaving anyone to modify anything is not a good idea - even comments... cheers Xavier [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote on 28/10/2005 13:14:00: And I've heard in the case of BIG mistakes, a good Wiki can be 'rolled-back' easily by the admin and the offender unsubscribed if there's mischief. Timothy Miller wrote: Sure, some users would bloat entries. But then, other users would prune them. When I look at the wikipedia, the entries I see are remarkably concise. -- stephen barncard s a n f r a n c i s c o - - - - - - - - - - - - ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution - To make communications with Clearstream easier, Clearstream has recently changed the email address format to conform with industry standards. The new format is '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'. Visit us at http://www.clearstream.com IMPORTANT MESSAGE Internet communications are not secure and therefore Clearstream International does not accept legal responsibility for the contents of this message. The information contained in this e-mail is confidential and may be legally privileged. It is intended solely for the addressee. If you are not the intended recipient, any disclosure, copying, distribution or any action taken or omitted to be taken in reliance on it, is prohibited and may be unlawful. Any views expressed in this e-mail are those of the individual sender, except where the sender specifically states them to be the views of Clearstream International or of any of its affiliates or subsidiaries. END OF DISCLAIMER ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
I really would recommend you have some fun and go and delete a wikipedia entry. I did this a couple of years ago - and have done it once or twice more as a demo. usually corrected within 2 minutes - sometimes as much as 5 minutes - really quite amazing! On 28 Oct 2005, at 13:14, Stephen Barncard wrote: And I've heard in the case of BIG mistakes, a good Wiki can be 'rolled-back' easily by the admin and the offender unsubscribed if there's mischief. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
There's been a tremendous amount of discussion about wikis here over the last 48 hours. Clearly a lot of good energy that can be put to productive use for the benefit of all. Given the great many details needed to be worked out to move this forward, much much more discussion will be needed. Rather than continuing to use the use-revolution list as the working group for this project, could a dedicated list be considered? You're welcome to use the RevDocs list for this: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ Most of the dozen or so people here who've expressed an interest in continuing to work on this project are already subscribed there, and the original mandate for that list has long since been abandoned so it's free for your use if you want it. I just posted a message there to help facilitate the migration from a good idea into a working project. I look forward to seeing the group produce a valuable addition to the family of Rev learning tools. -- Richard Gaskin Managing Editor, revJournal ___ Rev tips, tutorials and more: http://www.revJournal.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Richard, I am game for this. I just signed up for the RevDocs list. Let's just make sure that this list gets the occasional post about the progress so others know there is a place to discuss it. Dennis On Oct 28, 2005, at 9:40 AM, Richard Gaskin wrote: There's been a tremendous amount of discussion about wikis here over the last 48 hours. Clearly a lot of good energy that can be put to productive use for the benefit of all. Given the great many details needed to be worked out to move this forward, much much more discussion will be needed. Rather than continuing to use the use-revolution list as the working group for this project, could a dedicated list be considered? You're welcome to use the RevDocs list for this: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ Most of the dozen or so people here who've expressed an interest in continuing to work on this project are already subscribed there, and the original mandate for that list has long since been abandoned so it's free for your use if you want it. I just posted a message there to help facilitate the migration from a good idea into a working project. I look forward to seeing the group produce a valuable addition to the family of Rev learning tools. -- Richard Gaskin Managing Editor, revJournal ___ Rev tips, tutorials and more: http://www.revJournal.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Dennis Brown wrote: On Oct 28, 2005, at 9:40 AM, Richard Gaskin wrote: There's been a tremendous amount of discussion about wikis here over the last 48 hours. Clearly a lot of good energy that can be put to productive use for the benefit of all. Given the great many details needed to be worked out to move this forward, much much more discussion will be needed. Rather than continuing to use the use-revolution list as the working group for this project, could a dedicated list be considered? You're welcome to use the RevDocs list for this: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ ... Richard, I am game for this. I just signed up for the RevDocs list. Let's just make sure that this list gets the occasional post about the progress so others know there is a place to discuss it. Good idea. Something along the lines of a periodic progress report from that group here would be useful. -- Richard Gaskin Fourth World Media Corporation __ Rev tools and more: http://www.fourthworld.com/rev ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Dear Folks, The energy and enthusiasm of this list is a great resource. We want to do everything we can to encourage it. A lot of good sense has been spoken regarding how to set up and manage a revdocs wiki successfully. With a view to facilitating the effort, whilst still retaining control of content to monitor for quality and retain copyright, we propose to set up a runrev revdocs wiki. This may take us a little time to get off the ground, please be patient. If interested parties would like to write to me off list, we can discuss the matter further. When the wiki is up and running and ready for contributions, we will let the list know. Regards, Heather Heather Nagey, Customer Support Manager Runtime Revolution Ltd www.runrev.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Heather, Thank you for your (RunRev's) unequivocal endorsement of this long time desire from this list. I believe it is in RunRev's best interest to take the leadership role and apparently you agree. Please be sure to solicit input INTERACTIVELY with the interested parties during the specification phase so that it can become both the best doc tool and one that people on this list will enjoy using. The most active posters, and the most experienced scripters are the ones who would add the most value to a wiki. The most inexperienced scripters are the ones who would derive the most benefit --especially the ones who don't sign up for this list! Both the experienced and inexperienced scripters that are on this list will likely be the catalyst (through their questions) for driving new content. A well managed docs wiki can become an effective sales tool for spreading the Revolution to the masses. Having a single place to go to for answers to basic questions about using Revolution, ideas for how to start a project, sticky problems, examples, etc. can be addressed along with links to specific resources like the appropriate tutorials, tools and solutions on third party sites, and this list can make such a wiki the cornerstone of new customer support. Please count me in as one who will actively support and promote this effort in any way I can. Dennis On Oct 28, 2005, at 10:40 AM, Heather Nagey wrote: Dear Folks, The energy and enthusiasm of this list is a great resource. We want to do everything we can to encourage it. A lot of good sense has been spoken regarding how to set up and manage a revdocs wiki successfully. With a view to facilitating the effort, whilst still retaining control of content to monitor for quality and retain copyright, we propose to set up a runrev revdocs wiki. This may take us a little time to get off the ground, please be patient. If interested parties would like to write to me off list, we can discuss the matter further. When the wiki is up and running and ready for contributions, we will let the list know. Regards, Heather Heather Nagey, Customer Support Manager Runtime Revolution Ltd www.runrev.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 28 Oct 2005, at 17:21, Dennis Brown wrote: Heather, Thank you for your (RunRev's) unequivocal endorsement of this long time desire from this list. I believe it is in RunRev's best interest to take the leadership role and apparently you agree. Please be sure to solicit input INTERACTIVELY with the interested parties during the specification phase so that it can become both the best doc tool and one that people on this list will enjoy using. I would second that. You cannot centrally manage a community documentation process - only facilitate. Why not join the Yahoo group and discuss this with the small number interested parties as a whole - not solicit individual emails? ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
All, Now that RunRev has committed to create and maintain a Rev Docs Wiki, I think all our efforts should be funneled into giving them our full support for this. I would certainly want them to get all the good input available from this list. A bad wiki is worse than no wiki at all. With no wiki there is still the possibility of a good wiki being created. With a bad wiki, people would be discouraged. Dennis On Oct 28, 2005, at 10:33 AM, Dennis Brown wrote: Richard, I am game for this. I just signed up for the RevDocs list. Let's just make sure that this list gets the occasional post about the progress so others know there is a place to discuss it. Dennis On Oct 28, 2005, at 9:40 AM, Richard Gaskin wrote: There's been a tremendous amount of discussion about wikis here over the last 48 hours. Clearly a lot of good energy that can be put to productive use for the benefit of all. Given the great many details needed to be worked out to move this forward, much much more discussion will be needed. Rather than continuing to use the use-revolution list as the working group for this project, could a dedicated list be considered? You're welcome to use the RevDocs list for this: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ Most of the dozen or so people here who've expressed an interest in continuing to work on this project are already subscribed there, and the original mandate for that list has long since been abandoned so it's free for your use if you want it. I just posted a message there to help facilitate the migration from a good idea into a working project. I look forward to seeing the group produce a valuable addition to the family of Rev learning tools. -- Richard Gaskin Managing Editor, revJournal ___ Rev tips, tutorials and more: http://www.revJournal.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 28 Oct 2005, at 17:31, Dennis Brown wrote: Now that RunRev has committed to create and maintain a Rev Docs Wiki, I think all our efforts should be funneled into giving them our full support for this. I would certainly want them to get all the good input available from this list. Yes - it would be super (as they say in German out here). However I for one would not really want to contribute to a copyrighted company documentation project without being paid - only if the material was released under an Creative Commons style license which others could use as freely as i gave it. This is less of an issue for me for documentation of the Rev IDE - however for community contributions or commercial plugins from other companies within the community? Even more to the point is the sharing of code resources -. controls, groups, libraries and individual handlers. In other words RunRev needs to sort out a proper open content policy for not only documentation, but code, icons - whatever. A public statement of intent along these lines would be warmly welcomed, I am sure, and would shut a lot of people up :) Without this - I would have to assume they still have a lot of thinking to do and figure out how this gels with their existing business plans - that sort of discussion can take months and is easily dropped amidst other business priorities. So RunRev: - What is your official position on supporting open source or public domain content on or off your servers? - Are these contributions to be made accessible from within the RunRev IDE? - What parts or extensions to the IDE, the services, or the documentation you provide are to be under open licenses? - If high quality user created contributions - lets say documentation - comes forward under an open license - how do you plan to release it or integrate it with your existing documentation without breaking the terms of the license? - Do you wish to recommend that the community uses public domain style licences - some may object? Or would you prefer a dual licensing strategy allowing you to include this material within a commercial product? Here's hoping. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Recently, David Bovill wrote: Now that RunRev has committed to create and maintain a Rev Docs Wiki, I think all our efforts should be funneled into giving them our full support for this. I would certainly want them to get all the good input available from this list. Yes - it would be super (as they say in German out here). Agreed. And moving the discussion to the RevDocs as list would be a great start. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ Regards, Scott Rossi Creative Director Tactile Media, Multimedia Design - E: [EMAIL PROTECTED] W: http://www.tactilemedia.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
While I remain highly skeptical that a wiki is a good solution to this problem and prefer a commented discussion board model, I will certainly participate in this process once it's going. Dan On Oct 28, 2005, at 8:21 AM, Dennis Brown wrote: Heather, Thank you for your (RunRev's) unequivocal endorsement of this long time desire from this list. I believe it is in RunRev's best interest to take the leadership role and apparently you agree. Please be sure to solicit input INTERACTIVELY with the interested parties during the specification phase so that it can become both the best doc tool and one that people on this list will enjoy using. The most active posters, and the most experienced scripters are the ones who would add the most value to a wiki. The most inexperienced scripters are the ones who would derive the most benefit --especially the ones who don't sign up for this list! Both the experienced and inexperienced scripters that are on this list will likely be the catalyst (through their questions) for driving new content. A well managed docs wiki can become an effective sales tool for spreading the Revolution to the masses. Having a single place to go to for answers to basic questions about using Revolution, ideas for how to start a project, sticky problems, examples, etc. can be addressed along with links to specific resources like the appropriate tutorials, tools and solutions on third party sites, and this list can make such a wiki the cornerstone of new customer support. Please count me in as one who will actively support and promote this effort in any way I can. Dennis On Oct 28, 2005, at 10:40 AM, Heather Nagey wrote: Dear Folks, The energy and enthusiasm of this list is a great resource. We want to do everything we can to encourage it. A lot of good sense has been spoken regarding how to set up and manage a revdocs wiki successfully. With a view to facilitating the effort, whilst still retaining control of content to monitor for quality and retain copyright, we propose to set up a runrev revdocs wiki. This may take us a little time to get off the ground, please be patient. If interested parties would like to write to me off list, we can discuss the matter further. When the wiki is up and running and ready for contributions, we will let the list know. Regards, Heather Heather Nagey, Customer Support Manager Runtime Revolution Ltd www.runrev.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
RE: Revdocs on a wiki
Richard they call those rss and they are already in tiki wikis. We could also install a simple webforum (tiki has one - but the chat sucks) and for these discussions with latest threads per subjects forums are much handier... And it doesn't clog your corporatly clogged mail client... Not a rant, just a practical preference if anyone is in the same or alternate case... X -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Richard Gaskin Sent: Friday, October 28, 2005 4:38 PM To: How to use Revolution Subject: Re: Revdocs on a wiki Dennis Brown wrote: On Oct 28, 2005, at 9:40 AM, Richard Gaskin wrote: There's been a tremendous amount of discussion about wikis here over the last 48 hours. Clearly a lot of good energy that can be put to productive use for the benefit of all. Given the great many details needed to be worked out to move this forward, much much more discussion will be needed. Rather than continuing to use the use-revolution list as the working group for this project, could a dedicated list be considered? You're welcome to use the RevDocs list for this: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ ... Richard, I am game for this. I just signed up for the RevDocs list. Let's just make sure that this list gets the occasional post about the progress so others know there is a place to discuss it. Good idea. Something along the lines of a periodic progress report from that group here would be useful. -- Richard Gaskin Fourth World Media Corporation __ Rev tools and more: http://www.fourthworld.com/rev ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
RE: Revdocs on a wiki
hi everyone, bad news... posted in a good mood ;) I disagree with most of this tiki thing for rev docs. But not entirely, since revDocs are not net 'capable' or showing any evolution. But please don't chase away the current help system for something uncertain... For one, the rev dox are complete (but still missing the @ entry - bugzed). It has naggies, sometimes it gets hidden at loc=32000-32000 (not bugzed), it's not the smartest ebook (not bugzed) since it's now net aware at all (bugzed) but it's WELL made (not bugzed or praised enough!!!) They have hypertext, cool icons, context features, filters!, it's readable, it's much better than 2.x2.6.1, and it's fast!!! Compared to a browser, it's also low cost in your desktop! And it's fast, and it never looses its cookies like bugzilla on win32 and firefox??! And the wiki's which I've discovered in the past months, despite making cookies stale requiring you to remember yet another password still don't match up to the quality of rev's ebook. There's someone behind web based CMS which has to continuously update and watch and backup the dbs... This experience with wiki and phpNuke resumes to: they are CLUNKY! Yes... They work, they are available (so is a link to the latest updates in the docs) or via revonline if rev ever went that way... It could be revolutionary support! The process of using a browser requires more manipulations (which can be maddening when firefox's stupidity in dealing with copy-paste or Rev's limited ways of pasting them later - add lotus notes to create hell in your daily IT tasks workflow which is what it's supposed to make easy in a clunkier way than a web interface anywhere ;)). Web sites are also open to taggin or slimin, while Rev's Docs are only used by caring pro's. It's not because it's windows, it's because its web made with poor tools. And forms are a pain when boxes are too small, when you need to translate text again ~[whatever]~~ --- etc... All it takes in rev is the standard quickest text editing we all use... Not that tikis or cms web sites made to support the xtalk or transcript more available are bad... They are easily extended with new modules or fitter sql tables to handle more stuff in a php-like language with sql tabs in between - and that's infinite - (so is rev ;)! We all love that which is why we use rev right? Maye a web client could relieve that problem but I still don't see it coming for long... It requires much more maintenance for a poor coder (not a poor scripter.mt - where's that transcript wiki engine?)... Not that it's hard to make a good wiki like wikipedia did. Still with the tikiwiki.org engine I got, im not overly happy, PHPNuke was lots friendlier though not category or user groups aware - tiki overdoes or underdoes these still but it's a younger CMS... This all takes LOTs of time in a language which has one of the best user-friendly language references on line with user examples. Check it out at www.php.org, no, http://www.php.net - start to get confusing real fast though. http://www.php.net/docs.php here... here's an example which helped me a lot in phpnuke... http://www.php.net/manual/en/security.magicquotes.php see the comments below that page, that's what web notes could be! need I suggest more? Output to a web page I overly simply based on their xml pages if they ever thought about it, the rest is workflow! So anyway, there's the song of a different, lived view of CMS, development of e-documentation bases... I didn't mention taoo but Im sure you read it all over - This could be a prime usage example of TAOO - time permitting until it's ready, I'll keep it to the taoo team. just my 2-bit cents cheers Xavier http://monsieurx.com/taoo ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
You missed the point. MY comment was marked as a rant, not yours! On Oct 27, 2005, at 8:29 PM, Timothy Miller wrote: Sorry you think it was a rant. Oops. Well, yours didn't look like a rant, but mine did, at least to me. How bout we both take a free pass, then. I think it's time for me to bow out of this topic in any case. I'm really in way over my head, in terms of my expertise. But wait... One final comment. Many will be happy to know it's not about wikis. In an off-list exchange with one of the subscribers, I got the impression that most of the list subscribers are lurkers, and most of the lurkers are newbies. He/she said, I wish the newbies would ask really basic questions more often, like, 'What is a button?' When I taught myself hyperCard, I literally started with What is a button? Double-clicking on the button really made me nervous. Then it was, What is a script? It was slow going for me. I struggled with if - else - end for a week before I could use them effectively. I hardly knew what the internet was, back then. I didn't have access. But with Danny Goodman's book in one hand, the keyboard in the other, I figured it out. Many thousands (how many, really, I wonder? Millions, maybe?) did the same thing. Danny Goodman's book was rather expensive, and I had to buy at least one revision, maybe two. That was a serious barrier to me. (I should add, learning HC was easier for me than it would have been for most newbies. I had taught myself Basic, a few years before, on my Atari 64, and actually wrote a rather complex application.) Do we all agree that it's harder to teach oneself Dreamcard, not to mention Revolution, than it was with HC? And now there's no Danny Goodman book. (But everyone should buy Dan's book!) A hyperlinked indexed reference of some kind would probably be more comfortable and effective than Danny Goodman's book was. That wasn't technically possible at the time. It is now. It seems possible that such an electronic reference could be equally attractive and effective for a big range of users, from What-is-a-button? types, all the way up to seasoned developers. Good as the new version of Rev's docs might be, it's hard to imagine that they could optimally address the needs of such a broad spectrum of users. I know little about the Runtime Revolution company, or its prospects, except I sometimes hear it's short on resources. And I've gotten the impression that Rev is not catching on as fast as early enthusiasts had hoped. Doesn't Rev need to become loved and needed by hundreds of thousands of really green new users, if it is to survive and prosper? Nuff said. Tim ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Wow! When it's up, I'll be happy to submit material intended to assist rank beginners. I hope this will be helpful to Rev and new users. Cheers, Tim Dear Folks, The energy and enthusiasm of this list is a great resource. We want to do everything we can to encourage it. A lot of good sense has been spoken regarding how to set up and manage a revdocs wiki successfully. With a view to facilitating the effort, whilst still retaining control of content to monitor for quality and retain copyright, we propose to set up a runrev revdocs wiki. This may take us a little time to get off the ground, please be patient. If interested parties would like to write to me off list, we can discuss the matter further. When the wiki is up and running and ready for contributions, we will let the list know. Regards, Heather Heather Nagey, Customer Support Manager Runtime Revolution Ltd www.runrev.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 28 Oct 2005, at 19:57, MisterX wrote: Compared to a browser, it's also low cost in your desktop! And it's fast, and it never looses its cookies like bugzilla on win32 and firefox??! And the wiki's which I've discovered in the past months, despite making cookies stale requiring you to remember yet another password still don't match up to the quality of rev's ebook. Xavier - the idea is that the local Rev document is an off-line cache of the wiki - so you get the best of both worlds. You can edit using a browser if you want to or from within Revolution. That is the basics, it can apply to transcript code, images, or documentation. The questions for me are just establishing exactly which are the best tools to do the job, and secondly how to ensure that the content is open and can work both for the Rev IDE and other developers as a collaboration tool. Based on a couple of years experience with TikiWiki - it doesn't cut the custard. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Hmmm. If it wasn't you, then who? Ah, Pierre Sahores. Hmmm. German and French. You think I'd be able to keep that straight. Sorry. Anyway, Klaus, interested in porting HTMLDOC to Mac / Linux? LOL Chipp Klaus Major wrote: Hi Chipp, Sivakatirswami, ... But that link is very interesting. In fact I've got a complete GUI written around the openSource version of HTMLDOC. Currently it only works on Windows, but I seem to remember handing off the Mac/Linux port to Klaus? To Mr. Major? No, not that i could remember. I actually do not follow this thread, but this kinda jumped into my eye ;-) I'm not sure as it's been awhile ... best, Chipp Sivakatirswami wrote: www.pmwiki.org offers some solutions to most of these problems...check it out the cookbook recipes for PDF export of the wiki pages. Regards Klaus Major [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.major-k.de ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Good question, Tim (even though Im hurt that you used Danny's book to learn HC and not mine, which was MUCH better. heh heh. JK) I think the answer is yes but this opens a whole can of worms about how to position, package, price and market Rev, whether for the audience you and I see or for the professional programmer. RunRev tries to both and I don't think that can be done well. At least I've never seen it done well. On Oct 28, 2005, at 11:55 AM, Timothy Miller wrote: Doesn't Rev need to become loved and needed by hundreds of thousands of really green new users, if it is to survive and prosper? ~~ Dan Shafer, Information Product Consultant and Author http://www.shafermedia.com Get my book, Revolution: Software at the Speed of Thought From http://www.shafermediastore.com/tech_main.html ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Yeah, unfortunately, it's the same problem as the web, writ albeit a tad bit smaller. In a take-home exam essay, I had several students providing citations from wikipedias. Even worse, after we had discussed in class Microsoft's stance on their errors in Encarta being less important than Encarta's being politically palatable, a few cited Encarta. :-( This is one of the problems of the illusion of quality that computer technologies make possible. Sigh. Judy On Fri, 28 Oct 2005, David Bovill wrote: On 28 Oct 2005, at 07:58, J. Landman Gay wrote: Just to play devil's advocate: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/18/wikipedia_quality_problem/ Yes - good article - one of the very rare anti-wikipedia articles. Goes nowhere to say why or to suggest solutions though. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Interesting article. A good friend of mine submitted a photoshopped pic of his ex-boss as an 'evil spirit' in wikipedia. Last I looked, it was still there! -Chipp J. Landman Gay wrote: Timothy Miller wrote: Sure, some users would bloat entries. But then, other users would prune them. When I look at the wikipedia, the entries I see are remarkably concise. Just to play devil's advocate: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/18/wikipedia_quality_problem/ ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
This sort of goes to the heart of why I think that a well-done book, complete with a good index and a plethora of commented code snippets, would be invaluable as opposed to any sort of online analog. The main point is this: people already know how to use books. In all the years since the 1460s invention of the printing press, but especially in the last 150 years or so, we've codified the format of the printed book in terms of the table of contents, glossary, index, and usage of headers and footers. I'd guess that there's scarcely a semi-literate adult who's unable to use descriptive, functional and locational terms to describe a TOC, a glossary, an index (heck, even my students can do it!). But these things are either not standardized in online formats or absent altogether. You're new to the environment, and, looking to leverage your existing (programming?) knowledge, you type in some technical term which does not exist in Transcript. What do you get? Nothing. That's not helpful. In a printed book with a well-done index, if there was an expectation that the readership of the book might well be looking for that term, you'd get the following: GeekyC++thingy-- see CorrespondingNotSoGeekyTranscriptThingy. Which is worlds more helpful than a not found message, because not found makes people feel stupid, people don't like to feel stupid, and they especially don't like *paying* to feel stupid (well, okay, clearly _I_ don't mind so much looking stupid). I just received via interlibrary loan a book on one of my medieval history interests. It was published in 1982. And the *^%! thing doesn't have a *(%! index!!! It makes me want to hunt down the author and throttle him! Has anyone on this list a well-thumbed programming-related book? Did you scribble in the margins? Hilight text? Bookmark pages with stickies, paperclips, or by bending back the pages to mark them? Read it in bed/at the bus stop/while outside watching your kids? How many of these things can be done with any online documentation strategy? And that's without bozos like me going in and running amok with your wikis. And, for the newbies wondering what is a button?, imagine how they feel when a tabbed control looks and acts like a set of buttons, only you can't disable their contents so obviously because, as someone will inevitably tell you, you know, they're really not buttons; they're menus. And we're back to feeling stupid again. Judy On Oct 27, 2005, at 8:29 PM, Timothy Miller wrote: In an off-list exchange with one of the subscribers, I got the impression that most of the list subscribers are lurkers, and most of the lurkers are newbies. He/she said, I wish the newbies would ask really basic questions more often, like, 'What is a button?' When I taught myself hyperCard, I literally started with What is a button? Double-clicking on the button really made me nervous. Then it was, What is a script? It was slow going for me. I struggled with if - else - end for a week before I could use them effectively. I hardly knew what the internet was, back then. I didn't have access. But with Danny Goodman's book in one hand, the keyboard in the other, I figured it out. Many thousands (how many, really, I wonder? Millions, maybe?) did the same thing. Danny Goodman's book was rather expensive, and I had to buy at least one revision, maybe two. That was a serious barrier to me. (I should add, learning HC was easier for me than it would have been for most newbies. I had taught myself Basic, a few years before, on my Atari 64, and actually wrote a rather complex application.) Do we all agree that it's harder to teach oneself Dreamcard, not to mention Revolution, than it was with HC? And now there's no Danny Goodman book. (But everyone should buy Dan's book!) A hyperlinked indexed reference of some kind would probably be more comfortable and effective than Danny Goodman's book was. That wasn't technically possible at the time. It is now. It seems possible that such an electronic reference could be equally attractive and effective for a big range of users, from What-is-a-button? types, all the way up to seasoned developers. Good as the new version of Rev's docs might be, it's hard to imagine that they could optimally address the needs of such a broad spectrum of users. I know little about the Runtime Revolution company, or its prospects, except I sometimes hear it's short on resources. And I've gotten the impression that Rev is not catching on as fast as early enthusiasts had hoped. Doesn't Rev need to become loved and needed by hundreds of thousands of really green new users, if it is to survive and prosper? Nuff said. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Judy, I couldn't agree with you more. The multiple books available for HyperCard, including Dan Shafer's and Danny Goodman's excellent tomes, were invaluable to me for learning how to work with HyperCard. That is one of the reasons why I'm pushing for both 'linearity' and 'xml' for whatever wiki is created. -Chipp Judy Perry wrote: This sort of goes to the heart of why I think that a well-done book, complete with a good index and a plethora of commented code snippets, would be invaluable as opposed to any sort of online analog. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 10/28/05 7:31 PM, Judy Perry [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This sort of goes to the heart of why I think that a well-done book, complete with a good index and a plethora of commented code snippets, would be invaluable as opposed to any sort of online analog. Actually, only one comment about printed tech books.. they are usually processed through the marketing/publishing machine and so the main body of work may be great and a few illustrations mislabeled or misplaced, BUT... peeve My biggest pet peeve is the indexing. Either... 1. The word I am trying to find is not there, and any synonym is a dead end 2. The word is there, but it is a sub-listing so you have to read the whole index to find it 3. The editor's use of the word is not how you would use it 4. Eureka! it is here, but the page numbers don't have the word on them anywhere. 5. Eureka! it is here, but all the citations discuss something other than the context you need. I would love it if they included a thesaurus to the index. (in case you could not tell, I just went through this last night in books and on the web related to Applescript) /peeve I think this is the rationale for the 'recipes' in the docs. Some web sites are such that the links take you through a sequence that is logical, bite-sized, and printable. Perhaps the wiki could have long, gentle newbie paths and also short cuts for the same material. Jim Ault Las Vegas On 10/28/05 7:31 PM, Judy Perry [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This sort of goes to the heart of why I think that a well-done book, complete with a good index and a plethora of commented code snippets, would be invaluable as opposed to any sort of online analog. The main point is this: people already know how to use books. In all the years since the 1460s invention of the printing press, but especially in the last 150 years or so, we've codified the format of the printed book in terms of the table of contents, glossary, index, and usage of headers and footers. I'd guess that there's scarcely a semi-literate adult who's unable to use descriptive, functional and locational terms to describe a TOC, a glossary, an index (heck, even my students can do it!). But these things are either not standardized in online formats or absent altogether. You're new to the environment, and, looking to leverage your existing (programming?) knowledge, you type in some technical term which does not exist in Transcript. What do you get? Nothing. That's not helpful. In a printed book with a well-done index, if there was an expectation that the readership of the book might well be looking for that term, you'd get the following: GeekyC++thingy-- see CorrespondingNotSoGeekyTranscriptThingy. Which is worlds more helpful than a not found message, because not found makes people feel stupid, people don't like to feel stupid, and they especially don't like *paying* to feel stupid (well, okay, clearly _I_ don't mind so much looking stupid). I just received via interlibrary loan a book on one of my medieval history interests. It was published in 1982. And the *^%! thing doesn't have a *(%! index!!! It makes me want to hunt down the author and throttle him! Has anyone on this list a well-thumbed programming-related book? Did you scribble in the margins? Hilight text? Bookmark pages with stickies, paperclips, or by bending back the pages to mark them? Read it in bed/at the bus stop/while outside watching your kids? How many of these things can be done with any online documentation strategy? And that's without bozos like me going in and running amok with your wikis. And, for the newbies wondering what is a button?, imagine how they feel when a tabbed control looks and acts like a set of buttons, only you can't disable their contents so obviously because, as someone will inevitably tell you, you know, they're really not buttons; they're menus. And we're back to feeling stupid again. Judy On Oct 27, 2005, at 8:29 PM, Timothy Miller wrote: In an off-list exchange with one of the subscribers, I got the impression that most of the list subscribers are lurkers, and most of the lurkers are newbies. He/she said, I wish the newbies would ask really basic questions more often, like, 'What is a button?' When I taught myself hyperCard, I literally started with What is a button? Double-clicking on the button really made me nervous. Then it was, What is a script? It was slow going for me. I struggled with if - else - end for a week before I could use them effectively. I hardly knew what the internet was, back then. I didn't have access. But with Danny Goodman's book in one hand, the keyboard in the other, I figured it out. Many thousands (how many, really, I wonder? Millions, maybe?) did the same thing. Danny Goodman's book was rather expensive, and I had to buy at least one revision, maybe two. That was a serious barrier to me. (I should add, learning HC was easier for
RE: Revdocs on a wiki
illustrations mislabeled or misplaced, BUT... peeve My biggest pet peeve is the indexing. Either... 1. The word I am trying to find is not there, and any synonym is a dead end 2. The word is there, but it is a sub-listing so you have to read the whole index to find it 3. The editor's use of the word is not how you would use it 4. Reminds me of Borland Delphi. The subject in the index for Recursive - when you go to the page it says See Recusrive... ;-) Scott ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Judy. As everyone here knows, you and I don't always see eye to eye on things. OK, we almost never see universe to universe. So what of it? But I thought that a LOT of what you share in this message is, as the Brits say, spot-on. Those who are waiting for electronically delivered information to replace paper-delivered information will wait a long, long, LONG time. Meanwhile, we need to find better and better ways to translate what is good and understandable and usable about printed books into the digital universe. We keep trying. Dan ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
RE: Revdocs on a wiki
Hi Heather... How long before the new documentation is available? How long before a RunRev sponsored revdoc wiki would be available? If we get impatient, and want to create our own, is that permitted? One possibility is that if we create a revdoc wiki with the new documentation, then when RunRev is ready to create their own wiki, the user-created wiki could be ported to RunRev for your use. Take care, Jonathan -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Heather Nagey Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2005 11:06 AM To: use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Subject: Revdocs on a wiki Dear list members, Regarding the recent debate about extracting the current revdocs and putting them on a public wiki. We have discussed this here, and we feel that at this moment in time such effort would be largely wasted, as the docs are under active review right now. However at a later date we plan to make space available on our server for a documentation wiki, if people are still keen to work on that. If and when a wiki is set up, it will be necessary to have a copyright notice incorporated, as the documentation is copyright Runtime Revolution. Warm Regards, Heather Heather Nagey, Customer Support Manager Runtime Revolution Ltd www.runrev.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On 27 Oct 2005, at 18:09, Lynch, Jonathan wrote: One possibility is that if we create a revdoc wiki with the new documentation, then when RunRev is ready to create their own wiki, the user-created wiki could be ported to RunRev for your use. Sounds good to me. Rev Docs are fine and available locally - it's the additional stuff and open source collaborative environment that makes this useful - not replicating the existing docs. If and when a wiki is set up, it will be necessary to have a copyright notice incorporated, as the documentation is copyright Runtime Revolution. Warm Regards, Heather Heather Nagey, Customer Support Manager Runtime Revolution Ltd www.runrev.com How about the French and German versions of the Docs? Or perhaps Japanese? I do wish you guys would have a clear and positive open source strategy which would allow the community to release some of it's latent potential. License your docs under a Creative Commons (non- commercial license) would enable others to contribute without enabling them to use the material commercially. The community here is an asset you should really learn to make more use of. Holding on to non-essential copyright and in so doing holding back valuable contributions is plain daft. Chinese anyone? ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Heather, Your post is not clear to me on a couple of points: On Oct 27, 2005, at 11:06 AM, Heather Nagey wrote: Dear list members, Regarding the recent debate about extracting the current revdocs and putting them on a public wiki. We have discussed this here, and we feel that at this moment in time such effort would be largely wasted, as the docs are under active review right now. However at a later date we plan to make space available on our server for a documentation wiki, if people are still keen to work on that. This is a bit of a tepid endorsement, that someday RunRev might be willing to host a doc wiki if interest remains high. Could you be a bit more committal about this. We have the momentum starting here. A delaying tactic inserted into this effort is likely to smother it with complacency. It would be better to take a leadership role NOW to set up the wiki (sever location is not critical, but RunRev would be preferred) with the direct input of the community so that the framework will work for now and for the future changes in the docs. After all that is the point of the wiki --to be able to dynamically upgrade the docs incrementally. We should not have to wait for another slow release of doc corrections at RunRev to get this started. Lets just work together to satisfy everyones needs. Also I do not believe that it is a wasted effort, if the effort is automated. The plans and upgrading of the docs are not the company jewels --they are the sales tools! If and when a wiki is set up, it will be necessary to have a copyright notice incorporated, as the documentation is copyright Runtime Revolution. Are you saying If and when RunRev sets up a wiki OR If and when the list members sets up a wiki? If the latter, are you saying that RunRev will allow the new or old docs to be put into a public wiki as long as a RunRev copyright notice is displayed? Having the list members start this effort (with RunRev input) could greatly facilitate RunRev's ease and success in taking over the wiki if that is what you desire. Work WITH us on this, and we will work with you. Dennis ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Another possibility is that we don't try to duplicate the existing docs which we all have available anyway. Duplicating the existing docs was just a good anchor point for the corrections and expansions. However, the real value is in capturing the contributions to this list in a way that makes the information easily available for the future. Dennis On Oct 27, 2005, at 12:09 PM, Lynch, Jonathan wrote: One possibility is that if we create a revdoc wiki with the new documentation, then when RunRev is ready to create their own wiki, the user-created wiki could be ported to RunRev for your use. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Using the existing docs as a starting point would be optimal, in my view. From there things could branch out. Mark On Oct 27, 2005, at 10:52 AM, Dennis Brown wrote: Duplicating the existing docs was just a good anchor point for the corrections and expansions. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On Oct 27, 2005, at 2:23 PM, Mark Swindell wrote: Using the existing docs as a starting point would be optimal, in my view. Exactly, otherwise there will be a wiki with many blank or placeholder pages which cannot completely support the user's inquiries - which ultimately results in a tool which is not used. It would also be best if each page in the official documentation could link directly to the wiki page for the same term or item. If you can't easily get to the information from within the Rev environment there will be far less users of the system. -- Troy RPSystems, Ltd. http://www.rpsystems.net ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Perhaps I don't know enough about wiki's, but it would sure be nice if they could organize data in a form which could be printed in a real-book format (and had an 'export to PDF' button which did just that, including TOC and index). While they do provide a nice 'random-access' interface (search find), I'm not sure they can really take the place of good serial documentation, which has a beginning, middle and end. And it sure seems like *that* is most needed as well. In fact, I believe the original RevDocs (mostly written by Jeanne DeVoto) were written to accomplish both ways of accessing information. Perhaps Dan Shafer or Jeaane DeVoto might weigh in on this topic as both are accomplished documentation writers. -- Chipp Walters www.altuit.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
By the same token, having a link to the wiki from the built-in docs, would obviate the need to duplicate the same info in the wiki. Only the additional information need be in the wiki. However, if the internal docs could download a corrected definition from the wiki, then there is a good reason to have the complete definition included. Could bring up the possibility of an auto update/notification: Message: There is an updated definition for isNumber. Would you like to download it now? Yes No View Dennis On Oct 27, 2005, at 2:51 PM, Troy Rollins wrote: On Oct 27, 2005, at 2:23 PM, Mark Swindell wrote: Using the existing docs as a starting point would be optimal, in my view. Exactly, otherwise there will be a wiki with many blank or placeholder pages which cannot completely support the user's inquiries - which ultimately results in a tool which is not used. It would also be best if each page in the official documentation could link directly to the wiki page for the same term or item. If you can't easily get to the information from within the Rev environment there will be far less users of the system. -- Troy RPSystems, Ltd. http://www.rpsystems.net ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
RE: Revdocs on a wiki
Yup, I also agree. When reading a comment, we need to be able to refer back to the original text that is commented upon. Here is an example of what such a page would look like - this entry is for the altID function: http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/runtime_revolution_docs/altid_property.cfm? wpid=213569 And before anyone asks - no, that site is not meant to be the official thing (unless it becomes the only option) - just meant to be used as an example to whet appetites. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Troy Rollins Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2005 2:51 PM To: How to use Revolution Subject: Re: Revdocs on a wiki On Oct 27, 2005, at 2:23 PM, Mark Swindell wrote: Using the existing docs as a starting point would be optimal, in my view. Exactly, otherwise there will be a wiki with many blank or placeholder pages which cannot completely support the user's inquiries - which ultimately results in a tool which is not used. It would also be best if each page in the official documentation could link directly to the wiki page for the same term or item. If you can't easily get to the information from within the Rev environment there will be far less users of the system. -- Troy RPSystems, Ltd. http://www.rpsystems.net ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On Oct 27, 2005, at 3:08 PM, Dennis Brown wrote: By the same token, having a link to the wiki from the built-in docs, would obviate the need to duplicate the same info in the wiki. Good point, but this assumes that the only mechanism for browsing the wiki is the internal docs, doesn't it? Internal linking in the wiki would be useless, since see also links would inevitably end up at pages which were not populated. If this would be the case, then it would be better to simply fix whatever is wrong with the web docs system that is already built into Rev and start seriously supporting that with all this community energy. -- Troy RPSystems, Ltd. http://www.rpsystems.net ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Troy Rollins wrote: If this would be the case, then it would be better to simply fix whatever is wrong with the web docs system that is already built into Rev and start seriously supporting that with all this community energy. Troy, I agree. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Of course, the downside to that is most potential contributors will consider it a DocZilla operation rather than a collaboration/sharing. Am I missing the point? Jim Ault Las Vegas On 10/27/05 12:44 PM, Chipp Walters [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Troy Rollins wrote: If this would be the case, then it would be better to simply fix whatever is wrong with the web docs system that is already built into Rev and start seriously supporting that with all this community energy. Troy, I agree. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Troy, You are right about this. I keep thinking in the back of my mind that the embedded docs system can be upgraded to interact with a wiki by Rev or another developer, because I have seen examples of this in Constellation and others also. If RunRev gets behind this effort, then a hybrid approach or a stand alone approach are equally possible. If it is a user community only approach, then it becomes more complex to have a hybrid approach because of the custom plugin that would need to be written and supported. I agree, a simple self contained wiki is the best way to get things started. Dennis On Oct 27, 2005, at 3:30 PM, Troy Rollins wrote: On Oct 27, 2005, at 3:08 PM, Dennis Brown wrote: By the same token, having a link to the wiki from the built-in docs, would obviate the need to duplicate the same info in the wiki. Good point, but this assumes that the only mechanism for browsing the wiki is the internal docs, doesn't it? Internal linking in the wiki would be useless, since see also links would inevitably end up at pages which were not populated. If this would be the case, then it would be better to simply fix whatever is wrong with the web docs system that is already built into Rev and start seriously supporting that with all this community energy. -- Troy RPSystems, Ltd. http://www.rpsystems.net ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
RE: Revdocs on a wiki
But with a wiki, we can do more than we can with web notes. We can add our own sections, our own how-to articles, our own function scripts with an explanation on how to use it, etc... -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Chipp Walters Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2005 3:45 PM To: How to use Revolution Subject: Re: Revdocs on a wiki Troy Rollins wrote: If this would be the case, then it would be better to simply fix whatever is wrong with the web docs system that is already built into Rev and start seriously supporting that with all this community energy. Troy, I agree. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
On Oct 27, 2005, at 4:05 PM, Lynch, Jonathan wrote: But with a wiki, we can do more than we can with web notes. We can add our own sections, our own how-to articles, our own function scripts with an explanation on how to use it, etc... Maybe RunRev could make it so that the wiki IS the internal documentation via an update of some kind. I just think this is an opportunity to integrate all of it into one thing, rather than add yet another source for dribs and drabs of haphazardly organized information. RunRev is obviously aware of the community desire to participate in documentation. If they as smart as we know they are, they will take advantage of it by providing a mechanism of whatever kind. -- Troy RPSystems, Ltd. http://www.rpsystems.net ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
RE: Revdocs on a wiki
Well... Yes - I surely agree with integrating it like that... But I don't know that they have the resources to support it - RunRev won't release figures about their number of customers, but from what I understand there just isn't a huge number of us revOlutionaries out here. Either way - I just want it to get done. If they cannot do it in a timely manner, then we can get it started for them. If they can do it soon - then great! -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Troy Rollins Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2005 4:43 PM To: How to use Revolution Subject: Re: Revdocs on a wiki On Oct 27, 2005, at 4:05 PM, Lynch, Jonathan wrote: But with a wiki, we can do more than we can with web notes. We can add our own sections, our own how-to articles, our own function scripts with an explanation on how to use it, etc... Maybe RunRev could make it so that the wiki IS the internal documentation via an update of some kind. I just think this is an opportunity to integrate all of it into one thing, rather than add yet another source for dribs and drabs of haphazardly organized information. RunRev is obviously aware of the community desire to participate in documentation. If they as smart as we know they are, they will take advantage of it by providing a mechanism of whatever kind. -- Troy RPSystems, Ltd. http://www.rpsystems.net ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Heather, when you do get round to this... here is a super package... advantage: no back end dbase required, all flat files, *very* well supported and easy to admin. www.pmwiki.org Sivakatirswami On Oct 27, 2005, at 5:06 AM, Heather Nagey wrote: Dear list members, Regarding the recent debate about extracting the current revdocs and putting them on a public wiki. We have discussed this here, and we feel that at this moment in time such effort would be largely wasted, as the docs are under active review right now. However at a later date we plan to make space available on our server for a documentation wiki, if people are still keen to work on that. If and when a wiki is set up, it will be necessary to have a copyright notice incorporated, as the documentation is copyright Runtime Revolution. Warm Regards, Heather Heather Nagey, Customer Support Manager Runtime Revolution Ltd www.runrev.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
www.pmwiki.org offers some solutions to most of these problems...check it out the cookbook recipes for PDF export of the wiki pages. On Oct 27, 2005, at 9:02 AM, Chipp Walters wrote: Perhaps I don't know enough about wiki's, but it would sure be nice if they could organize data in a form which could be printed in a real-book format (and had an 'export to PDF' button which did just that, including TOC and index). While they do provide a nice 'random-access' interface (search find), I'm not sure they can really take the place of good serial documentation, which has a beginning, middle and end. And it sure seems like *that* is most needed as well. In fact, I believe the original RevDocs (mostly written by Jeanne DeVoto) were written to accomplish both ways of accessing information. Perhaps Dan Shafer or Jeaane DeVoto might weigh in on this topic as both are accomplished documentation writers. -- Chipp Walters www.altuit.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
I have mixed feelings about what I'm about to say. I expect that the new docs will be a big improvement. They might be excellent. Rev deserves a lot of credit for efforts to enhance the docs. I don't want to see that deprecated. I suspect Rev cares about their users more than most technology companies I could name. OTOH, in my opinion, it's time for the concept of continuous quality improvement came to the world of technical documentation. And, being a Rev loyalist, I'd love to see Rev do it first, maybe with a Rev interface, if feasible. (It would be totally cool if a commercial product, intended for this purpose, could be built mostly with Rev. It would have to be extensible and flexible. But this seems feasible -- not that I know diddly squat about that sort of thing.) With a wiki, continuous quality improvement could mean, it gets a little better every five seconds. (For that matter, the Wikipedia, today, might get a little better every five *milliseconds*!) Some published docs are better than others, but none get anywhere near optimal. Technical documentation is inevitably obsolete the day it is published. There's always room for updated information, clearer explanations, different contexts, more examples, more see also links, better search capacity, and so on. All those little improvements really add up over time. In addition, hyperlink technology (ahh... my old friend, HyperCard) can greatly enhance convenience and real-world useability. Multiple forms of indexing, for instance. Terse, less terse and verbose versions of the same topic, for another. (The beginner will likely want the verbose version. The experienced user will not want or need to wade through it.) I've never seen hyperlink technology live up to its potential, even though it's been in use for fifteen years or more. A docWiki like the one proposed could be the first time. (Wikipedia is already pretty good, I guess. I don't use it that much.) I have some doubt about whether it would ever be profitable for a private company to write docs like those that could arise spontaneously from a wiki. Printed on paper, they might fill 10,000 pages, and would still lack the convenience of hyperlinks, search capacity, and so on. When docs arise spontaneously from a wiki, they will be much cheaper to produce -- almost free, after the early drafts, except for keeping out vandalism and ignorance. And users might also police the vandalism and ignorance at no cost (possibly). For the manufacturer, how good could it get?! Even if a company tried to write optimal docs and practice continuous quality improvement in the docs, users, given the opportunity, could always improve whatever the engineering and technical writing staff came up with, with no publication delay. Just my .02 cents worth. Have a nice day. Tim Dear list members, Regarding the recent debate about extracting the current revdocs and putting them on a public wiki. We have discussed this here, and we feel that at this moment in time such effort would be largely wasted, as the docs are under active review right now. However at a later date we plan to make space available on our server for a documentation wiki, if people are still keen to work on that. If and when a wiki is set up, it will be necessary to have a copyright notice incorporated, as the documentation is copyright Runtime Revolution. Warm Regards, Heather Heather Nagey, Customer Support Manager Runtime Revolution Ltd www.runrev.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Sivakatirswami, H. http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/Cookbook/PublishPDF Had a heck of a time trying to find that link! I think this may be a problems with wiki's in general..navigating to want you want. There is no 'forced' organization and as such no one ever seems to know where everything is. But that link is very interesting. In fact I've got a complete GUI written around the openSource version of HTMLDOC. Currently it only works on Windows, but I seem to remember handing off the Mac/Linux port to Klaus? I'm not sure as it's been awhile. In any case, Altuit's HTML2PDF plugin for Hemingway uses HTMLDOC to successfully convert Hemingway websites into PDF documentation, including linked Table of Contents. I believe Dan Shafer is using this process to build his eBooks. The problem with HTMLDOC is that it only handles very few markup tags. So, one couldn't produce a magazine quality PDF document from it, but it's great for documentation. For instance: I wrote a simple stack which parsed the XML help stack and built a website out of it, and then converted the website to a PDF document: It's not inclusive, but you can get the idea here: http://www.altuit.com/webs/altuit2/Transcript/default.htm Question: How would one manage 'wiki-bloat' where different people post so much commentary about a function or handler or feature, that it becomes impossible to navigate through? Would special 'editors' need be appointed? If a wiki could be converted into a PDF, I'm not so sure I like the idea of a single PDF document with *everyones* thoughts on a topic. I'm sure this topic has come up before. best, Chipp Sivakatirswami wrote: www.pmwiki.org offers some solutions to most of these problems...check it out the cookbook recipes for PDF export of the wiki pages. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
well, the search function helps on wikis: enter: PDF But PMwiki.org has things going for that a Rev wiki would not #1 Professor Patrick Michaud (PM) is incredibly dedicated to PMwiki which is a product albeit open source. In it's own right, the issue of site maintenance are handled immediately if he is not traveling. He releases updates to PMwiki at phenomenal rates... #2 a large number of the contributers are web-wiki admins themselves whose job it is, or part of it is to maintain wikis and they are very active on the site. But why it's a good model is that it is the documentation site for PMwiki. It's surprising to see that most people respect that and there is very little wiki bloat from people simply waxing on and on... lesson: the Rev Wiki wants to be constrained to being a documentation tool and not become a giant blog. Surprisingly though PM has this site pretty much wide open (anyone can edit anything, but he has spamme controls built in) very little OT blogging goes on at all. But it obviously requires a bit of dedication in terms of real time online by several people. I guess I find PM wiki so useful is mostly because a) I don't know PHP, but I have a full blown wiki and farm on our site that I can admin the site with very little input. b) no dBase back end... (and that doesn't make it slower...) I not that that community also suffers from the other issue where a large part of the solutions and useful dialogs are all still found in the user email forum, and much of that would never, ever see the light of day on the wiki... were it not for Patricks dedication to updating the docs... On Oct 27, 2005, at 1:26 PM, Chipp Walters wrote: Sivakatirswami, H. http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/Cookbook/PublishPDF Had a heck of a time trying to find that link! I think this may be a problems with wiki's in general..navigating to want you want. There is no 'forced' organization and as such no one ever seems to know where everything is. But that link is very interesting. In fact I've got a complete GUI written around the openSource version of HTMLDOC. Currently it only works on Windows, but I seem to remember handing off the Mac/Linux port to Klaus? I'm not sure as it's been awhile. In any case, Altuit's HTML2PDF plugin for Hemingway uses HTMLDOC to successfully convert Hemingway websites into PDF documentation, including linked Table of Contents. I believe Dan Shafer is using this process to build his eBooks. The problem with HTMLDOC is that it only handles very few markup tags. So, one couldn't produce a magazine quality PDF document from it, but it's great for documentation. For instance: I wrote a simple stack which parsed the XML help stack and built a website out of it, and then converted the website to a PDF document: It's not inclusive, but you can get the idea here: http://www.altuit.com/webs/altuit2/Transcript/default.htm Question: How would one manage 'wiki-bloat' where different people post so much commentary about a function or handler or feature, that it becomes impossible to navigate through? Would special 'editors' need be appointed? If a wiki could be converted into a PDF, I'm not so sure I like the idea of a single PDF document with *everyones* thoughts on a topic. I'm sure this topic has come up before. best, Chipp Sivakatirswami wrote: www.pmwiki.org offers some solutions to most of these problems...check it out the cookbook recipes for PDF export of the wiki pages. ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Tim. I've kept my counsel as this thread unwound, determined not to become embroiled in yet another discussion about the Rev docs, which remain among the best of any software development tool I've seen. But your post dragged me out of the bushes. While I agree with much of what you say, your below comment is one I couldn't let just slip by without comment. :-) On Oct 27, 2005, at 4:12 PM, Timothy Miller wrote: users, given the opportunity, could always improve whatever the engineering and technical writing staff came up with, with no publication delay. rant I wonder why it is that everyone thinks s/he can write better documentation than the professionals but scarcely anyone thinks they can write better software than the engineering team. Writing good docs is a skill that takes years to develop. The tech writer must be part engineer, part programmer, part writer, part user. I know most people don't realize how much software QA and debugging is done by the doc staff at major tech companies, but I can assure you it's a huge contributor. In trying to describe how something works or when to use some feature, the writer has to stand in for the uneducated user and try things that the engineers never thought a user would do. So while it is absolutely true that users can add a great deal to the information base from which a tech writer works and while it's certainly often true that end users could suggest things the tech writer didn't think about, the idea that users should be allowed to *edit* (as opposed to comment on) documentation makes as little sense to me as the idea of allowing the engineers at customers' companies to edit the source code of the product. /rant Several years ago, I headed up a project which involved an extensive documentation effort and this same issue was raised. I like the way we solved it. Furthermore, I happen to have access to the tool and a server where it could be deployed and would make both freely available if: (a) at least one or two others would be willing to share site management and editing chores; and (b) the community thinks it's a good idea. The approach we used was akin to a discussion board. Each section of the docs was a topic on the board. Everyone who was a member (and that term could be loosely defined, of course) could add their comments to a section of the docs. There was also a general topic area where people could post questions and suggestions about the docs in their totality. Periodically, an editor assigned to a given section would go through the comments, incorporate the suggestions that made sense, edit the topic, create a new topic on that section, hibernate the old, and move comments that remained relevant to the new topic area. At the same time there was a way for any interested party to: (a) see the docs without the comments; (b) navigate using only the official docs; and (c) view and print (and save as PDF) all or some of the currently official documentation. This model is called managed open collaboration and I think it presents the best of all possible worlds in terms of encouraging and incorporating useful input without disrupting the accuracy or utility of the original and modified documentation. FWIW. ~~ Dan Shafer, Information Product Consultant and Author http://www.shafermedia.com Get my book, Revolution: Software at the Speed of Thought From http://www.shafermediastore.com/tech_main.html ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Several years ago, I headed up a project which involved an extensive documentation effort and this same issue was raised. I like the way we solved it. Furthermore, I happen to have access to the tool and a server where it could be deployed and would make both freely available if: (a) at least one or two others would be willing to share site management and editing chores; and (b) the community thinks it's a good idea. The approach we used was akin to a discussion board. Each section of the docs was a topic on the board. Everyone who was a member (and that term could be loosely defined, of course) could add their comments to a section of the docs. There was also a general topic area where people could post questions and suggestions about the docs in their totality. Periodically, an editor assigned to a given section would go through the comments, incorporate the suggestions that made sense, edit the topic, create a new topic on that section, hibernate the old, and move comments that remained relevant to the new topic area. This functionality would be achieved if the existing docs web notes worked properly. While I haven't tried adding to them, it sounds as if there are problems at the moment. However solving these problems would give a mechanism for adding user's comments to the docs, while allowing RunRev to moderate or incorporate as they see fit. It also provides the mechanism for having these user comments as part of the Revolution IDE rather than having to remember to start up another application and go to a web page to check whether there are any existing comments. Cheers, Sarah ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
I really believe the functionality desired would not be served by Web Notes as currently conceived --even if thy did work. To capture much of the wisdom that is shared on this list requires the ability to add new topics and links. Web Notes is just a place to make a coment about an existing dictionary entry or topic. I like the basic concept proposed by Dan below. It is a good place to start a discussion because he has a wealth of prior knowledge with the practical implementation of the desired goals, and he is a first rate documentation guy to boot! On Oct 27, 2005, at 9:48 PM, Sarah Reichelt wrote: Several years ago, I headed up a project which involved an extensive documentation effort and this same issue was raised. I like the way we solved it. Furthermore, I happen to have access to the tool and a server where it could be deployed and would make both freely available if: (a) at least one or two others would be willing to share site management and editing chores; and (b) the community thinks it's a good idea. The approach we used was akin to a discussion board. Each section of the docs was a topic on the board. Everyone who was a member (and that term could be loosely defined, of course) could add their comments to a section of the docs. There was also a general topic area where people could post questions and suggestions about the docs in their totality. Periodically, an editor assigned to a given section would go through the comments, incorporate the suggestions that made sense, edit the topic, create a new topic on that section, hibernate the old, and move comments that remained relevant to the new topic area. This functionality would be achieved if the existing docs web notes worked properly. While I haven't tried adding to them, it sounds as if there are problems at the moment. However solving these problems would give a mechanism for adding user's comments to the docs, while allowing RunRev to moderate or incorporate as they see fit. It also provides the mechanism for having these user comments as part of the Revolution IDE rather than having to remember to start up another application and go to a web page to check whether there are any existing comments. Cheers, Sarah ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Dan, Thank you for joining this discussion with this worth while proposal. Having read the list of desired features on this thread, which features do you think would have to be compromised with the solution you are proposing? Dennis On Oct 27, 2005, at 8:53 PM, Dan Shafer wrote: Several years ago, I headed up a project which involved an extensive documentation effort and this same issue was raised. I like the way we solved it. Furthermore, I happen to have access to the tool and a server where it could be deployed and would make both freely available if: (a) at least one or two others would be willing to share site management and editing chores; and (b) the community thinks it's a good idea. The approach we used was akin to a discussion board. Each section of the docs was a topic on the board. Everyone who was a member (and that term could be loosely defined, of course) could add their comments to a section of the docs. There was also a general topic area where people could post questions and suggestions about the docs in their totality. Periodically, an editor assigned to a given section would go through the comments, incorporate the suggestions that made sense, edit the topic, create a new topic on that section, hibernate the old, and move comments that remained relevant to the new topic area. At the same time there was a way for any interested party to: (a) see the docs without the comments; (b) navigate using only the official docs; and (c) view and print (and save as PDF) all or some of the currently official documentation. This model is called managed open collaboration and I think it presents the best of all possible worlds in terms of encouraging and incorporating useful input without disrupting the accuracy or utility of the original and modified documentation. FWIW. ~~ Dan Shafer, Information Product Consultant and Author http://www.shafermedia.com Get my book, Revolution: Software at the Speed of Thought From http://www.shafermediastore.com/tech_main.html ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
I wonder if the process of working out the details of this project might be well served on a dedicated list, perhaps the RevDocs list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RevDocs/ -- Richard Gaskin Fourth World Media Corporation __ Rev tools and more: http://www.fourthworld.com/rev ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Hi Dan, Sorry you think it was a rant. I guess it might have been. It's embarrassing to rant, when that wasn't your intention. :-| --snip-- I wonder why it is that everyone thinks s/he can write better documentation than the professionals Good comment, but it's not quite what I intended to say. The engineering team must certainly begin the documentation process. If it's a simple application, then maybe the docs written by the engineers are as good as they can be. But if it's a very complex application, or development tool, or whatever, then the documentation is *never* optimal. If the engineering department had unlimited resources, and the desire to engage in continuous quality improvement, then they would likely write better documentation than users on a wiki. But no engineering department has unlimited resources. Beyond that, continuous quality improvement on documentation is an infinite task that would not appeal to many engineers. Writing more than one version of the same entry, adjusting to the sophistication of the user -- I don't think many engineers would like that. A very large number of users (if there are lots of sophisticated users, and few pimply faced vandals) can edit each other, in large degree. That's the beauty of the wiki model. As I understand it, wikiPedia is working out pretty well, with very little editorial oversight. The number of intelligent users with good intentions overwhelms the much smaller number of vandals and misguided users. (Some degree of editorial oversight is probably needed on many wikis, nonetheless.) Sure, some users would bloat entries. But then, other users would prune them. When I look at the wikipedia, the entries I see are remarkably concise. E.g., I looked up iChat today. It was a very good entry, with all the links a guy could wish for. It eliminated the need for several dumb questions on some peer support group. In other words, the users *aren't* as knowledgeable or skilled as the engineers, but their lack of knowledge is overbalanced by the size of the user community. Beyond that, engineers don't always write well, and writing documentation clearly is a very difficult task. No matter how carefully documentation is edited, users will always find passages that should be clearer, or more extensive. Optionally extensive -- via hyperlinks. E.g., Click here for a more detailed explanation of this topic. I know most people don't realize how much software QA and debugging is done by the doc staff at major tech companies, but I can assure you it's a huge contributor. That makes sense. A docWiki starting from scratch for Rev has always seemed like a dubious proposition, to me. Better to start with good material. Doesn't necessarily need to be Rev's copyrighted documentation, though. Rev might figure out a way to allow a wiki community to supplement and clarify the copyrighted docs, in a format convenient for all users, without giving up the copyright. In trying to describe how something works or when to use some feature, the writer has to stand in for the uneducated user and try things that the engineers never thought a user would do. Novice users can speak for themselves, in many cases. If a novice user misunderstands, makes mistakes the engineers never anticipated, solves the problem, eventually understands better -- then the user can go back to the docs, figure out which part was misleading or incomplete, and improve it a bit. Repeat times many. Seems like this process would eventually out-perform the best possible team of engineer/writers. So while it is absolutely true that users can add a great deal to the information base from which a tech writer works and while it's certainly often true that end users could suggest things the tech writer didn't think about, the idea that users should be allowed to *edit* (as opposed to comment on) documentation makes as little sense to me as the idea of allowing the engineers at customers' companies to edit the source code of the product. I've never meant to suggest that novice users should have unlimited editing privileges. I agree with the above paragraph, more or less. (It's possible that more experienced users would edit bad edits -- but that doesn't seem certain.) It probably makes more sense for novices to comment only, as you say. More sophisticated volunteer users would probably be able to take the comments submitted by novices and turn them into good edits and additions. One possible model -- Participants could earn higher levels of access. Sort of like MVPs on microsoft's peer support groups. I don't claim this is the best possible model. Could be too complicated. /rant Several years ago, I headed up a project which involved an extensive documentation effort and this same issue was raised. I like the way we solved it. Furthermore, I happen to have access to the tool and a server where it could be deployed
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Timothy Miller wrote: The engineering team must certainly begin the documentation process. If it's a simple application, then maybe the docs written by the engineers are as good as they can be. But if it's a very complex application, or development tool, or whatever, then the documentation is *never* optimal. If the engineering department had unlimited resources, and the desire to engage in continuous quality improvement, then they would likely write better documentation than users on a wiki. But no engineering department has unlimited resources. Beyond that, continuous quality improvement on documentation is an infinite task that would not appeal to many engineers. Writing more than one version of the same entry, adjusting to the sophistication of the user -- I don't think many engineers would like that. Tim, You might want to reread what Dan was 'ranting' about. He's talking about professional writers, not engineers. Jeanne DeVoto (the original revDocs writers) and Dan Shafer are both professional writers, each with multiple technical books and manuals published. Back in the HyperCard days, they were both well-published and well-read authors. I'm not sure I know *any* engineers who can write as well. Though, after seeing Sivakatirswami's post regarding PMwiki and PDF's, I might be more inclined to consider a Rev backed wiki experiment. The few wiki's I've been involved with in the past were: 1) Way too slow 2) Not well organized 3) Way too slow 4) Never really got to a finished state where they were really helpful Did I mention how slow they were? :-) But, with the dedicated users here on this list, and some basic housekeeping rules (that means limited TAOO references Xavier! ;-), it might be interesting to see what happens. Perhaps with the shared enthusiasm, Kevin et al might greenlight a test wiki. Even if RR did, I suspect there would be a lot of time doing front end analysis of how to organize the content so that it can be reused. One of the good things about the docs in the current XML state (not the doc viewer, but the underlying data structure) is that it can be repurposed quickly. This is great because many different users including Jerry Daniels, Richard Gaskin, Wouter, Geoff Canyon and myself have been able to use the XML to create different ways at looking at the documentation. Some of these are free, others cost. But the beauty in XML is that it doesn't 'lock' the content inside a display presentation format. I assume wiki's can do the same thing. best, Chipp ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
RE: Revdocs on a wiki
Chipp im working on something with TAOO as the front end for a better Documentation platform which will import XML and export to HTML, tiki ml and more... But nothing that's in a hurry due to heavy housekeeping ;) cheers Xavier http://monsieurx.com/taoo -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Chipp Walters Sent: Friday, October 28, 2005 5:48 AM To: How to use Revolution Subject: Re: Revdocs on a wiki Timothy Miller wrote: The engineering team must certainly begin the documentation process. If it's a simple application, then maybe the docs written by the engineers are as good as they can be. But if it's a very complex application, or development tool, or whatever, then the documentation is *never* optimal. If the engineering department had unlimited resources, and the desire to engage in continuous quality improvement, then they would likely write better documentation than users on a wiki. But no engineering department has unlimited resources. Beyond that, continuous quality improvement on documentation is an infinite task that would not appeal to many engineers. Writing more than one version of the same entry, adjusting to the sophistication of the user -- I don't think many engineers would like that. Tim, You might want to reread what Dan was 'ranting' about. He's talking about professional writers, not engineers. Jeanne DeVoto (the original revDocs writers) and Dan Shafer are both professional writers, each with multiple technical books and manuals published. Back in the HyperCard days, they were both well-published and well-read authors. I'm not sure I know *any* engineers who can write as well. Though, after seeing Sivakatirswami's post regarding PMwiki and PDF's, I might be more inclined to consider a Rev backed wiki experiment. The few wiki's I've been involved with in the past were: 1) Way too slow 2) Not well organized 3) Way too slow 4) Never really got to a finished state where they were really helpful Did I mention how slow they were? :-) But, with the dedicated users here on this list, and some basic housekeeping rules (that means limited TAOO references Xavier! ;-), it might be interesting to see what happens. Perhaps with the shared enthusiasm, Kevin et al might greenlight a test wiki. Even if RR did, I suspect there would be a lot of time doing front end analysis of how to organize the content so that it can be reused. One of the good things about the docs in the current XML state (not the doc viewer, but the underlying data structure) is that it can be repurposed quickly. This is great because many different users including Jerry Daniels, Richard Gaskin, Wouter, Geoff Canyon and myself have been able to use the XML to create different ways at looking at the documentation. Some of these are free, others cost. But the beauty in XML is that it doesn't 'lock' the content inside a display presentation format. I assume wiki's can do the same thing. best, Chipp ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
I don't know, Dennis. Frankly, I haven't read the thread in its entirety. So my proposal is made in a semi-vacuum. If there are features people see as crucial that seem not to be envisioned by what I propose, I'd be happy to look into them individually. On Oct 27, 2005, at 7:11 PM, Dennis Brown wrote: Having read the list of desired features on this thread, which features do you think would have to be compromised with the solution you are proposing? ~~ Dan Shafer, Information Product Consultant and Author http://www.shafermedia.com Get my book, Revolution: Software at the Speed of Thought From http://www.shafermediastore.com/tech_main.html ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
You missed the point. MY comment was marked as a rant, not yours! On Oct 27, 2005, at 8:29 PM, Timothy Miller wrote: Sorry you think it was a rant. ~~ Dan Shafer, Information Product Consultant and Author http://www.shafermedia.com Get my book, Revolution: Software at the Speed of Thought From http://www.shafermediastore.com/tech_main.html ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
Re: Revdocs on a wiki
Timothy Miller wrote: Sure, some users would bloat entries. But then, other users would prune them. When I look at the wikipedia, the entries I see are remarkably concise. Just to play devil's advocate: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/18/wikipedia_quality_problem/ -- Jacqueline Landman Gay | [EMAIL PROTECTED] HyperActive Software | http://www.hyperactivesw.com ___ use-revolution mailing list use-revolution@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
