I know the discussion on whether to use Forrest or Maven to generate theI prefer Maven because it provides builds, testing, QA tools, and site generation in one tool.
Struts website was a few weeks back, but unfortunately, at the time, I was
too busy to participate. I'd like to lay out a case for Forrest, not to
insist Struts uses it, but rather to make sure the decision is made with
all the available information.
The repository of binaries makes building a distribution or maven enabled site as easy as typeing,
'maven' for new users.
Changing the look/skin is straight forward, though as I say below I wouldn't invest alot of time
tweaking it.
My main question to the items below is 'which of these features would we use for the struts site'
In short, Forrest offers these benefits over Maven's website generation:Maven has been doing this for a while now..
- Multiple output formats including PDF and HTML
- SVG to PNG renderingMaven currently handles RRS, Docbook, and a few other formats, including the ability to take a
- Built for handling and aggregating multiple XML sources like RRS (soon
wiki and Docbook)
preexisting framed html like JavaDoc and take it apart and assemble it again with a .maven wrapper.
What's the wiki thing, and why do you think that would be usefull ?.
Could you give an example how multiple XML sources
would be aggregated and used as a single source. How is this capability an advantage for
the struts web site.
- Power and features of Cocoon including charting, web servicesCharting is nice. What types of charting do we get for free or almost free that would help
integration, scripting support, etc.
with our site. I believe Maven can provide charts about bugs reports,
which I don't EVEN want to see ;-). How does web services/scripting fit into our needs?
Further, deciding between Forrest and Maven isn't an either/or situation.
There exists a Forrest plugin for Maven and it would be easy to integrate
Maven's reports into a Forrest site build.
I am assuming this plugin uses the maven xml doc files and generates forrest docs ?
To me, the key feature of Forrest is the first one listed, multipleMaven does this.
outputs. This is especially useful for documentation as PDF is much
better than HTML for printing for the many users that like hard copies.
Finally, Forrest content is built to be presented in not only multipleWe only need one look, though I don't like the default Maven look, but not enough bothering changing it.
output formats, but multiple skins. To demonstrate this, I've quickly
redone the Struts site into Forrest format (which is very similiar to the
current format thanks to the xhtml work of late). I've only converted the
menu and the main page, which should be sufficient.
We may customize it but we won't be changing it dynamically.
Please note, this examples are not polished and only serve to demonstrate the skinability of Forrest.
Krysalis style: http://www.twdata.org/dakine/site/ Avalon/Tigris style: http://www.twdata.org/dakine/site1/ Forrest/XML Apache style: http://www.twdata.org/dakine/site2/
If we did decide to go with Forrest, I'm willing to convert the old site over and help handle any integration. I'm most definately not an expert at Forrest, but am familiar with Cocoon and thankfully, Forrest is pretty easy.
Don
-Rob
--------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
