From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: main.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: "Robert J. Chassell" Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Enhancements to options menu (was Re: Reveal mode) Date: Wed, 8 May 2002 16:31:55 +0000 (UTC) Sender: emacs-devel-admin@gnu.org Message-ID: References: Reply-To: bob@rattlesnake.com NNTP-Posting-Host: localhost.gmane.org X-Trace: main.gmane.org 1020878327 31170 127.0.0.1 (8 May 2002 17:18:47 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@main.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 8 May 2002 17:18:47 +0000 (UTC) Cc: eliz@is.elta.co.il, monnier+gnu/emacs@rum.cs.yale.edu, ttn@glug.org, karl@freefriends.org, emacs-devel@gnu.org, bob@rattlesnake.com Return-path: Original-Received: from quimby.gnus.org ([80.91.224.244]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 3.33 #1 (Debian)) id 175V5T-00086c-00 for ; Wed, 08 May 2002 19:18:47 +0200 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([199.232.76.164]) by quimby.gnus.org with esmtp (Exim 3.12 #1 (Debian)) id 175VDg-0001Td-00 for ; Wed, 08 May 2002 19:27:16 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=fencepost.gnu.org) by fencepost.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 3.34 #1 (Debian)) id 175UP2-0007tz-00; Wed, 08 May 2002 12:34:56 -0400 Original-Received: from megalith.rattlesnake.com ([140.186.114.245] helo=localhost) by fencepost.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 3.34 #1 (Debian)) id 175UMe-0007ZT-00 for ; Wed, 08 May 2002 12:32:29 -0400 Original-Received: by rattlesnake.com via sendmail from stdin id (Debian Smail3.2.0.114) Wed, 8 May 2002 16:31:55 +0000 (UTC) Original-To: jas@extundo.com In-Reply-To: (message from Simon Josefsson on Wed, 08 May 2002 17:28:04 +0200) Errors-To: emacs-devel-admin@gnu.org X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.0.9 Precedence: bulk List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: , List-Id: Emacs development discussions. List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: Xref: main.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:3747 X-Report-Spam: http://spam.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.devel:3747 ... Perhaps HTML isn't the best format, ... As a documentation format, HTML is broken intrinsically. HTML does not distinguish between references to another document somewhere else on the Internet and references to another part of the same document. This means that you cannot design a program to search conveniently through an HTML document that consists of more than one Web page. Info, on the other hand, lets you navigate very conveniently through a document using a regexp search. It is still, after more than 15 years, the single most efficient on-line documentation format in existence, surprising as that is, and all because you can undertake a regexp search within the document. You could design a special format for writing an HTML document that enables you to navigate conveniently through a document. This would be an add-on to HTML. HTML's built-in failure was designed as a feature: it was based on the assumption that you would never create a document more than one Web page long; and that that document should be able to link to any other document on the World Wide Web. But what about DocBook? You can create Info documents from DocBook; thus you gain efficient navigation, which you lose when you convert the same document to HTML. However, people who write in DocBook often fail to consider the various output formats that are available. For example, they may not consider writing for a person who is driving a car and listening to their work. The authors tend to write as if every reader will *look* at the page. This is not a problem of the format, but of the sociology of the document writing process. A very good rule of thumb: write your document so that a blind person can follow it easily. Then, even if no blind person ever reads it, the document will be easily followed by a sighted person who is looking at the document. (Incidentally, this rule of thumb also applies to Web page design.) When you figure out how to show images in an Emacs session running over a fast local network with a windowing system, please also, at the same time, figure out how to show the same document to someone running in a character-only mode over a slow network (my recent experience has taken me below 300 baud), and at the same time, figure out how to present the same document to someone who is `situationally blind' while driving a car, or permanently blind. -- Robert J. Chassell bob@rattlesnake.com Rattlesnake Enterprises http://www.rattlesnake.com