From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Lennart Borgman Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: On being web-friendly and why info must die Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2014 02:06:26 +0100 Message-ID: References: <20141205123549.GA29331@thyrsus.com> <87ppbqb6s1.fsf@gnu.org> <87h9x2f9me.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> <87a92uf8ik.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> <8761dif6ib.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1418346442 27702 80.91.229.3 (12 Dec 2014 01:07:22 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2014 01:07:22 +0000 (UTC) Cc: Emacs-Devel devel To: David Kastrup Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri Dec 12 02:07:15 2014 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1XzEhO-00016t-EF for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 02:07:14 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:54918 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1XzEhN-0008AN-Te for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 11 Dec 2014 20:07:13 -0500 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:35985) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1XzEhK-0008AG-OW for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 11 Dec 2014 20:07:11 -0500 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1XzEhJ-0004aL-CD for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 11 Dec 2014 20:07:10 -0500 Original-Received: from mail-la0-x234.google.com ([2a00:1450:4010:c03::234]:37931) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1XzEhH-0004Zv-JY; Thu, 11 Dec 2014 20:07:07 -0500 Original-Received: by mail-la0-f52.google.com with SMTP id hs14so5363734lab.11 for ; Thu, 11 Dec 2014 17:07:06 -0800 (PST) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=20120113; h=mime-version:in-reply-to:references:from:date:message-id:subject:to :cc:content-type; bh=9QZxvwIwsl1zM+LeB5sVQzgHmbr1V4qydyITYDByu2E=; b=pUgJGaUDn1ylvk9OJAknp4ahf2qZnGsLtiP1S9PlpxtAzcJ+wyAT98676mNjN2F0AC zEijUPDunQpURnUx7i08JfiaaKCS7+iYq0nV30D4AtmCDIMUqWdlhpu7ZbahbucIj+Us TiGXQQ/jxsIBY4XZBWXbvqyzj5RjxU4AIWSS5mgckfwkNb+Lx0eP2opo9CFtZ7SyVd6I oGjrOfiSzMPVxBNUlCVk1pBygBrgk7hcmILm6vTpqFbWwCMvGDw2NOJwO1WoX5H/S9ir sMdwI6po0/f4D8gRJqhQu7fb9IqJuXECYO+tDvXWNvLzEd+ysm7UhZS8Fu3+pK3IMRzt kZxw== X-Received: by 10.152.8.225 with SMTP id u1mr10580385laa.21.1418346426698; Thu, 11 Dec 2014 17:07:06 -0800 (PST) Original-Received: by 10.25.43.73 with HTTP; Thu, 11 Dec 2014 17:06:26 -0800 (PST) In-Reply-To: <8761dif6ib.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Error: Malformed IPv6 address (bad octet value). X-Received-From: 2a00:1450:4010:c03::234 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:179856 Archived-At: On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 6:20 PM, David Kastrup wrote: > Lennart Borgman writes: > >> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 5:36 PM, David Kastrup wrote: >>> Lennart Borgman writes: >>> >>>> My point is maybe a bit unclear. It matters a lot what search engine >>>> you have and how you feed it with information. In the small project I >>>> linked to I have had rather minimal success with Google CSE. So I >>>> switched to OpenSearchServer and there I can do a lot of things I just >>>> could imagine before. (This is just a small free time project, but >>>> still a bit important, perhaps.) >>> >>> I don't buy that. It will have its best case scenario for stuff not >>> actually written/maintained in Texinfo (or something providing similar >>> information amounts) and consequently completely missing any useful >>> index. With that starting point, a search engine is better than >>> nothing. Against a reasonably well-maintained manual index, however: no >>> comparison. >> >> I don't understand your argument. What has the well-maintained manual >> index to do with the format the user sees? The index just does not >> disappear if you are using a web browser. Or, does it? ;-) > > You were proposing to replace the Info search possibilities with a > search engine. So it's up to you to explain what you mean. > > As for the index not disappearing: it's not accessible from arbitrary > nodes since it is not even loaded into the browser unless you load the > "one big page HTML" and then _all_ navigation becomes cumbersome, > including but not limited to the index. So that was the argument. OK. ;-) Yes, without a search engine you can't search the html pages. (Or, you could build an index in JavaScript, but that is a very tough job if you want to do something useful.) Of course you have to search the docs divided into several pages if a search engine should be of any use. Otherwise you will just get the same hit all the time. ;-) OpenSearchServer (based on Apache Lucene) is very flexible. Maybe you can't get exactly the incremental search that Info uses now, but you can get a list of suggestions for every character you type. You can customize that list. And Info does not have a search capability that is close to the usual web search (implicit) AND operator. But there is more you can use, like searching in fields (if the documents are structured with some fields, of course).