bug#18308: 24.4.50; Info viewer cannot follow menu entry for '(texinfo) @- @hyphenation'

[Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>]

[[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider    ]]]
[[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
[[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]

    > I think the real fix for this sort of thing is to develop
    > a replacement for the Info reader which uses HTML.
    > That's why I was enthusiastic about that project when it was announced.

    Somebody would have to define how HTML should be used for Texinfo manuals, e.g.:

    * Naming of HTML files for references between nodes and files
    * How indices should be expressed
    * What version of HTML, what constructs are allowed.
    * Where these files are to be stored in the filesystem

That's true -- these tasks are part of the job.

    I don't see the point in writing a browser to read a dialect of HTML
    used for Texinfo manuals when there are already many web browsers out
    there.

This was discussed a few weeks ago.  Ordinary browsers operating on
HTML lack some of the features of Info.  It is not easy to get those
features out of a web browser just by designing the HTML.  We need to
build them onto the ordinary browser facilities.

    Are there reasons to use HTML other than compatiblity?

1. It would interoperate with web browsers.  They would not provide
the added commands/features of Info, but they would be able to display
the manual and you could navigate in it.

2. HTML provides lots of markup and display facilities that Info
lacks.  We could define a new format of our own, but that would
be gratuitous incompatibility -- why not use HTML?


-- 
Dr Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation
51 Franklin St
Boston MA 02110
USA
www.fsf.org  www.gnu.org
Skype: No way! That's nonfree (freedom-denying) software.
  Use Ekiga or an ordinary phone call.