Chris Johnson wrote:
>
> As you recommended in a previous reply, I have downloaded and taken a
> look at the XML source for the XML_Mind help files. I'm working on the
> index and glossary for my current project, and I have a few questions.
>
> 1. Marking up a glossary was, well, a bit clunky - I ended up doing it
> in a text editor. When I view the glossary as a managed entity
> reference, the default styling is easy to interact with. When I edit the
> glossary file itself, the tree view is very unwieldy, and when I try to
> enter some text for the <glossterm>, the curser focus keeps moving back
> to the <para> in the previous <glossterm> element. In other words,
> XML_Mind does not let me access the text node of the <glossterm>
> element, nor does it allow me to access the text node of the <para> in
> the <glossdef>.
I cannot reproduce this behavior.
Note that the glossary, when included inside the master document
(example: a book), cannot be edited at all. You need to open the
glossary file as a stand-alone document (using File|Open) in order to be
able to edit it.
> 2. I couldn't see any <indexterm> elements in any of help files - have
> you worked on any docBook projects that required a lot of manual
> indexing, and if not, what indexing tool do you use outside of XML_Mind?
> I'm looking for examples of *real* documents that have been indexed...
See answer below.
---
I really don't understand what is happening to you...
A few recommendations, just in case:
[1] Please take the time to read the tutorial.
[2] Please do not use the tree view or an external editor because this
is a symptom that you loosing your time with XXE.
[3] Make sure that the document you are editing is valid: you should not
see a red icon at the bottom left of the window.
[4] <glossxxx> elements and <indexterm> elements have no special meaning
for XXE. They are styled and edited like any other XML elements.
This means:
[a] If you have problems with them, you probably have problems with all
the other elements.
[b] XXE, which is not a DocBook editor (that is, which doesn't know the
semantics of DocBook elements), has the following default behavior:
When you insert an element, say a <glossentry>, XXE chooses the simplest
possible content model, which is for a <glossentry>:
---
<glossentry>
<glossterm></glossterm>
<glosssee></glosssee>
</glossentry>
---
Of course, this is *very annoying* because common sense would mandate:
---
<glossentry>
<glossterm></glossterm>
<glossdef>
<para></para>
</glossdef>
</glossentry>
---
But <glossdef> which contains a <para> is more complex than <glosssee>
which just contains a #text.
Replacing <glosssee> by <glossdef> is easy to do using command
Edit|Replace, but why not automate all this?
Edit <XXE_install_dir>/config/docbook/docbook.xxe and add a template for
the <glossentry> element:
---
<elementTemplate name="with_glossdef" selectable="override">
<glossentry xmlns="">
<glossterm></glossterm>
<glossdef>
<para></para>
</glossdef>
</glossentry>
</elementTemplate>
---
All this is described in the Power User's Guide. See
http://www.xmlmind.com/xmleditor/_distrib/docs/poweruser/ar01s04s09.html
We can ensure that you can write large DocBook books using XXE Standard
Edition, without never having to use the tree view or an external
editor, more efficiently than with any other tool, but *not with the
bundled DocBook configuration alone*.
In order to reach maximum efficiency, you need to tune the DocBook
configuration to your taste and habits.
