This is the log for the 27 June 2009 DocumentationTeam meeting. {{{ 19:04 j1mc Meeting Agenda is up at: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DocumentationTeam/MeetingAgenda 19:04 technomensch j1, I'm trying to recall. whats your wiki id? 19:05 j1mc https://wiki.ubuntu.com/j1mc 19:05 technomensch ah....... 19:06 j1mc ok, i know it's a small group here today, but we can still cover some items. 19:06 j1mc we'll try to be brief. 19:06 philbull he he, no chance 19:06 j1mc first - is anyone here new to the group? 19:06 mwcrowley I'm new 19:06 j1mc hi mwcrowley 19:07 mwcrowley hi all 19:07 j1mc care to briefly introduce yourself? 19:07 technomensch wait 19:07 technomensch j1 19:07 technomensch want to start the meeting bot? 19:07 BrunoXLambert I am new there 19:07 minderaser I'm new as well 19:07 j1mc technomensch: let's not worry aboutit. 19:08 philbull welcome, guys! 19:08 j1mc if you are new... welcome. :) 19:08 j1mc please just go ahead and introduce yourself in a sentence or two. :) 19:08 mwcrowley brief intro, I started using debian about five years ago, switched to Ubuntu on the desktop and I have some writing skills. So I'd like to find a place where I can give back. 19:08 j1mc coolness. 19:09 j1mc others? don't be shy. :) 19:09 BrunoXLambert I'm usung ubuntu since breezy. working at Revolution Linux with stgraber. I'm a support and trainnign guy 19:09 j1mc awesome. :) 19:09 minderaser My real name is Mark Strawser, I live in central PA and have been using Linux for about 10 years, non-continuously. So far I've just been getting my feet wet changing CategoryCleanups to Tags 19:10 j1mc great. :) 19:10 avi1 I'm Avi. I've switched into professional technical writing from public relations, and am excited to be a contributor to the new Karmic installation guide. I'm a relative linux newbie, but hope to bring the "average user" experience to the table. Wrote an installation guide to Intrepid and updated the Wubi wiki. 19:10 j1mc cool... welcome, avi1 * DougieRichardson waves to j1mc - kids needed feeding 19:11 j1mc DougieRichardson: o/ 19:11 missaugustina I'm Augustina! I've been active on the list but this is my first meeting. 19:11 technomensch welcome 19:11 j1mc great! lots of new people. 19:11 technomensch glad you could make it 19:11 j1mc anyone else? * DougieRichardson o/ 19:12 technomensch missaugstina, don't worry, this is only the second meeting we've had within the last few months..... 19:12 j1mc someone had mentioned that they wanted to know different ways people could get involved w/ the project. 19:12 j1mc some info is here: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DocumentationTeam/Organization 19:13 j1mc but chances are, if you're at this meeting, you're already familiar with some of what we do. 19:13 j1mc but you can get involved through the system documentation, work on the wiki, and even work on translations. 19:13 technomensch or any of the many guides such as the server guide 19:14 j1mc working on the documentation is a good way to build writing skills, learn some xml and wiki markup, and also learn about the ubuntu toolchain (launchpad, bzr, etc.) 19:14 j1mc did anyone have any particular questions for now? 19:15 technomensch j1, I propose a secondary meeting to educate on launchpad and bzr....etc...., maybe a mini-class 19:15 shankhs hi 19:15 mwcrowley mini-class would be good 19:16 DougieRichardson what about the one from the openweek? 19:16 j1mc technomensch: cool - we had an ubuntu open week session that covered a lot of stuff from bzr and launchpad. 19:16 j1mc DougieRichardson: right 19:16 BrunoXLambert I'm in for a mini-class 19:16 mwcrowley any suggestions for a best first step. Are there any areas that need immediate help? 19:16 technomensch the problem with open week, are the international times 19:17 DougieRichardson technomensch: doesn't stop us reusing the material though ;-) 19:17 j1mc here's a log of our session on bzr: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MeetingLogs/openweekJaunty/DocsBzr 19:17 j1mc and here's the log of the session on docbook: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MeetingLogs/openweekJaunty/DocsDocbook 19:17 technomensch those are good enough for me :) 19:18 j1mc emmajane did a good job with the docbook, and the bzr session was really good, too. 19:18 j1mc anything else for now? * DougieRichardson shakes head 19:19 mwcrowley those links are a good place to start. 19:19 shaunm j1mc: sorry, are you going through an agenda? 19:19 philbull https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DocumentationTeam/MeetingAgenda 19:20 j1mc shaunm: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DocumentationTeam/MeetingAgenda 19:20 j1mc agenda ^^ 19:20 shaunm gracias 19:20 j1mc on to "Ye Olde Business" 19:20 j1mc someone put up, "How best to collaborate with translators" 19:20 j1mc but I think that might be a meeting topic on its own. 19:21 j1mc or, worthy of a meeting on its own... thoughts? 19:22 DougieRichardson I wasn't aware there were any issues with translations at the moment? 19:23 philbull if no-one has any specific issues we should move on * DougieRichardson nods 19:23 j1mc Maybe it would be better to talk about this when Milo or some of the other translation folks are present. 19:23 j1mc yeah 19:24 j1mc DougieRichardson: anything on the Learning Initiative? 19:24 DougieRichardson j1mc: not really no, they're still quite focussed on structure 19:25 DougieRichardson they also keep holding meetings at really inconvenient times! 19:25 j1mc :) "structure" being the documentation structure, or . . . something else? 19:25 DougieRichardson I think we need to look at the project and see how it suits us 19:25 philbull do you have any links? 19:25 DougieRichardson j1mc: team structure 19:25 philbull I'm not familiar with this 19:25 DougieRichardson philbull: yes wait one 19:26 DougieRichardson https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Learning 19:26 DougieRichardson sabdfl is very enthusiastic 19:27 DougieRichardson initially it looked to integrate with the idea of classrooms/tutorials and so on quite well, its in Moodle 19:28 technomensch I've been wanting to learn moodle, so I wouldn't mind getting involved with that 19:28 j1mc so you are the doc team liason for the project? i suppose they'll let us know where they need help, or are they looking for us to be more active participants? 19:28 DougieRichardson Matthew and I had a long chat with them, I offered to liase between the to initatives and there are some voices in canonical that are quite keen on the idea 19:28 DougieRichardson j1mc:they want active participation 19:29 philbull any word on integration with the docs? 19:29 missaugustina I'm particularly interested in helping out with the Developer Documentation/tutorials since there seems to be a lack of it 19:29 philbull training material goes alongside help resources 19:29 DougieRichardson philbull: in what way? 19:29 philbull well, via h.u.c or via links in Yelp? 19:29 DougieRichardson I envisaged it as being a resource to train our members 19:30 DougieRichardson there's no reason not to be able to integrate it in some way in that respect. 19:30 philbull I was thinking more to do with the "How to use Ubuntu" bit 19:30 philbull (i.e. for users) 19:30 DougieRichardson I know, mdke was quite concerned with duplication of effort * j1mc nods 19:31 philbull there are lots of user assistance type projects floating around ubuntu at the moment 19:31 DougieRichardson If I'm honest, I think the project might be a little ambitious and I have concerns about that section 19:31 philbull we perhaps need to communicate with other initiatives more 19:31 j1mc missaugustina: have you seen the MOTU/GettingStarted wiki documentation? 19:31 j1mc missaugustina: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MOTU/GettingStarted 19:32 DougieRichardson motu are also involved in this initiative, although I haven't heard anything from them 19:32 j1mc DougieRichardson: i had hear a little about the learning team, but didn't get the scope of what they were doing, so i'm glad you brought this up. 19:33 technomensch query: would these be using the playbooks we're working on? 19:33 DougieRichardson technomensch: possibly 19:33 j1mc missaugustina: you may also want to touch base with Nathan Handler (nhandler), as he has been doing some work on developer documentation. 19:34 DougieRichardson The idea is a fair one - a centralised training resource. The execution, not so sure. This isn't just crossover with us but with Desktop Training course (which I and I know a few others here have worked on). 19:35 technomensch that would be quite an ambitious project 19:35 DougieRichardson I have worries 19:36 technomensch I thiink that would be an understatement doug 19:36 j1mc it looks like i need to read through their meeting logs and mailing list to see what they're up to. 19:36 DougieRichardson 1. there's a heavy forums influence on the project 19:36 DougieRichardson 2. it duplicates, or has the potential to duplicate our efforts 19:36 DougieRichardson 3. moodle / docbook integration needs work 19:37 philbull DocBook? Why DocBook? 19:37 DougieRichardson I think really, we need to read over all their logs and discuss it on list 19:37 j1mc can we decide on any action items concerning this for now? 19:37 DougieRichardson Does anyone have any concerns? 19:37 philbull Yep, I'd like to discuss this more on the list 19:38 DougieRichardson philbull: because we use docbook and they use moodle 19:38 j1mc philbull: yeah, same here. 19:38 DougieRichardson philbull: ^-^ 19:38 philbull DougieRichardson: Ah, gotcha 19:39 philbull OK, next item? 19:39 j1mc sure 19:39 j1mc that's you, phil: "introducing rigorous planning as a requirement..." 19:40 technomensch talk about a mouthful 19:40 philbull Yes. I think that we should start planning things properly before we start writing them 19:40 technomensch second 19:40 avi1 Regarding the issue of Docbook and Moodle, would this be a reason to try to get multiple teams on DITA (which we will discuss later, I know) so that we can maximize reusable content. 19:40 philbull I don't think that we do that enough at the moment 19:40 avi1 including reusable content b/w teams 19:40 DougieRichardson we need to discuss DITA seperately. 19:41 avi1 ok, just keep this in mind for that discussion 19:41 philbull I'm using the Installation Guide as a bit of a test run for more intensive planning/design 19:42 j1mc philbull: do you have any references that you can point us to for what you had in mind about doc planning? 19:42 philbull Well, Lynda's stuff from WOSCON is useful 19:42 philbull I should post it somewhere 19:42 j1mc that would be helpful 19:43 philbull It doesn't have to be anything fancy 19:43 philbull Just as long as we make sure that what we're writing is suitable and useful for our users... 19:43 philbull ...before we write it. 19:44 DougieRichardson are we talking about managing resources or defining prior to encoding? 19:44 philbull For example, most of the topics in the system docs were added because they seemed like a good idea to the author 19:44 technomensch in otherwords, outlining and brainstorming, and maybe psydocoding.... 19:45 philbull Pretty much. We should have a structure and a design brief in place before we produce any content 19:45 philbull Look at the system docs 19:45 DougieRichardson maybe we need to envisage a more object approach to help. There should then be an help for each action available on the desktop. 19:45 philbull "Adding, Removing and Updating Applications" => "What are restricted and non-free software?" 19:46 philbull Does anyone care about that topic? Has anyone ever read it? 19:46 technomensch and why would it be under that section to begin with.... 19:46 philbull DougieRichardson: do you mean a task-based approach? 19:46 DougieRichardson philbull: yes, but more structured and defined 19:47 DougieRichardson philbull: this would integrate with DITA and building simple tools (because a standard format could be used) 19:48 DougieRichardson it could also mean a form of error checking. * DougieRichardson draws breath and surveys the silence 19:49 j1mc :) 19:49 philbull sorry, had to get the washing in! 19:49 philbull back now 19:49 technomensch bueller? bueller? 19:50 philbull DougieRichardson: I'm interested in doing lots more user testing 19:50 avi1 I'm certainly in favor of topic-based authoring, as opposed to menu-based 19:50 philbull we should use this to inform the way we write 19:50 j1mc philbull: regarding your 'restricted & non-free' comment, i have had new users who think that 'non-free' means that they have to pay for the software. 19:50 DougieRichardson philbull: me to but we need to accept that if its visible, we need to explain it 19:51 philbull not necessarily 19:51 DougieRichardson free is the most misunderstood word in OSS 19:51 philbull some things are obvious 19:51 philbull some things, people don't care about 19:51 mwcrowley try out the docs on non linux users in the family 19:51 philbull mwcrowley: exactly 19:51 DougieRichardson I wish RMS had chosen to use something else 19:53 j1mc philbull: it sounds like you have a decent idea of what you had in mind with regards to planning... were you thinking of putting those notes up on the wiki? 19:53 j1mc that would probably be helpful. 19:53 DougieRichardson one other thing on planning 19:53 philbull j1mc: yes, will do 19:53 DougieRichardson we should make a better appreciation of timing 19:53 philbull DougieRichardson: how so? 19:53 technomensch are you thinking about this planning just for system docs and guides, or the wiki itself? 19:53 dsas_ describing everything is the approach taken in the gnome manuals, that are going to be rewritten. 19:53 j1mc technomensch: good question 19:54 DougieRichardson like the old thirds (planning) to one third (execution) idea. Otherwise we spend cycles discussing changes and not implementing 19:54 j1mc shaunm: any comment on dsas_'s note above? 19:55 DougieRichardson dsas_:describing != documenting, even if its just a pointer to another area, a user should never not know what the button they are looking at does. 19:55 philbull DougieRichardson: I'm not convinced that users will actually read that sort of documentation 19:55 philbull they *should*, perhaps... 19:56 philbull but I don't think that they will 19:56 j1mc i've looked at apple's docs... they mostly just have screenshots with arrows pointing to the different buttons. :) 19:56 j1mc but that's apple for you. :) 19:56 avi1 This is where a style guide would be useful. Perhaps the installation style guide to be created can become a more general style guide. 19:56 DougieRichardson apple only does it one way though 19:57 philbull the IG style guide should *not* be a general style guide 19:57 philbull there are other styleguide efforts going on 19:57 philbull see http://writingopensource.com/node/14 19:57 technomensch here's a question.....this "style guide"...... 19:57 j1mc avi1: you make a decent point, though, in that this is a style consideration. 19:58 technomensch are we talking about "writing styles" such as "how to refer to certain things that have a variety of different terms?" 19:58 j1mc we're kind of getting off topic, though... 19:58 technomensch there is style guide, installation guide, wiki guide 19:58 technomensch too many guides in the kitchen 19:58 philbull technomensch: see my link above 19:59 philbull the WOS styleguide should be able to solve this problem 19:59 philbull but it's not written yet 19:59 technomensch it probably would be a big help in my writing of the playbook 20:00 technomensch there are several things I keep flip-flopping about what to present, and how to present it 20:00 j1mc given that we've been here for an hour now, can we table the style discussion for now? 20:01 j1mc i guess it's kind of its own animal 20:01 j1mc philbull: you'll put your planning notes up on the wiki? 20:01 shaunm j1mc: sorry, I'm in an out, working on build stuff. asking for a comment on gnome's approach of describing everything? 20:01 philbull j1mc: agreed 20:01 j1mc shaunm: yeah - what about it didn't work? 20:01 shaunm I think there's general agreement in the gnome docs community that our docs suck 20:02 shaunm j1mc: it's just not useful 20:02 shaunm everything gets described, but no real questions get answered 20:03 j1mc thanks, shaunm 20:03 j1mc moving on for now, then... wiki playbook & Hardware Database Documentation Connectivity 20:03 philbull j1mc: shall we push on? 20:04 technomensch well, the wiki playbook has kinda weaved its way into multiple items from this meeting, so I guess it's fairly appropriate 20:04 technomensch has everyone at least gotten my link to view it through google docs? 20:04 j1mc technomensch: can you approve my access? 20:04 j1mc check your inbox 20:04 philbull technomensch: I don't seem to have one 20:05 j1mc philbull: check the wiki 20:05 j1mc there's a link from the meeting agenda 20:05 technomensch done 20:06 technomensch access granted 20:06 philbull OK, thanks. I've requested access * DougieRichardson clicky clicky 20:07 j1mc technomensch: this looks really good. :) 20:07 technomensch done 20:07 technomensch thanks....still needs some work 20:08 technomensch and I really need to fine tune a way to showcase how to "categorize" new and existing articles 20:08 j1mc i like how it includes both content considerations and syntax help on one page so that everything is available in one spot. 20:08 technomensch that was the plan.... 20:08 DougieRichardson I like that 20:08 technomensch I am trying to do away with the multiple pages.... 20:09 philbull awesome, nice work technomensch 20:09 technomensch when it goes into a PDF, I'll try to add bookmarks to each section 20:09 DougieRichardson split it 20:09 technomensch how so dougie? 20:09 j1mc so that the document link doesn't get lost after the meeting agenda changes: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dfm5m8jn_15gx7ttgd3&invite= 20:09 DougieRichardson one for those who want to make a change (the first time occasional user) 20:09 DougieRichardson one for those getting more regularly involved. 20:10 technomensch I think that those wanting to look for a specific method should be able to use the "Find' in either pdf or odt 20:10 j1mc i don't know... i think that having it all together might be more helpful. 20:10 DougieRichardson just my 0.05 20:10 technomensch that is my thinking j1 20:11 technomensch in actuality, this whole playbook comes from my frustration during MY work on the wiki 20:11 DougieRichardson if there's difficulty in condensing it to a single sheet. 20:11 technomensch thinking of how I'd like to see the docs 20:11 technomensch well, how about this dougie? 20:11 technomensch one cheatsheet for formatting wiki docs 20:12 technomensch and one cheat sheet for wiki structure, like the tags, creating new pages 20:12 j1mc DougieRichardson: ok. if the size of the doc gets cumbersome... then, yeah, split it up. 20:12 technomensch categorizing, etc.... 20:12 technomensch would this be acceptable for everyone? 20:12 DougieRichardson yeah that seems about right Marc 20:12 minderaser technomensch, I've requested access to the playbook but can't get it yet 20:13 j1mc BrunoXLambert: did you get a look at the file? 20:13 j1mc mwcrowley: what about you? :) 20:13 minderaser technomensch, working now, thanks 20:13 technomensch just approved 2 more 20:14 technomensch I like this. using google docs for this type of collaboration does actually make sense 20:14 j1mc technomensch: if people have comments or suggestions, should they just post them to the mailing list? 20:14 technomensch yes, please. 20:14 technomensch well, jim, you phil, and dougie have been collaborator access 20:15 j1mc ok... for anyone who wasn't able to attend today, pls request access to the google doc, and post any comments or suggestions. 20:15 technomensch so if you need to make a glaring change, feel free 20:15 j1mc technomensch: thanks 20:15 technomensch everyone else post to the mailing list 20:15 DougieRichardson cheers Marc, I'll probably mail you though ;-) 20:15 BrunoXLambert j1mc, asked access for it now 20:15 j1mc technomensch: on to the Hardware Database topic? 20:16 technomensch well, it's kinda self explainatory. this was more just to keep everyone in the loop 20:16 j1mc BrunoXLambert: cool. as a new member of the team, please let us know if this is helpful, or if you find that you still need help with some items 20:16 technomensch yes, definitely 20:16 technomensch it would be good to get a fresh perspective * DougieRichardson really likes Dropbox 20:17 j1mc for future reference, here's the link to the speck about the hardware database topic: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/specs/KernelKarmicHWdbWorkshop 20:17 j1mc ok... on to new business? 20:17 technomensch well 20:17 technomensch there is one item 20:17 j1mc ok 20:17 technomensch about that 20:18 technomensch and that is the part where they say they don't have enough manpower 20:18 technomensch to create a web front end once the api is available 20:18 technomensch if we have a good webdesigner, it might be nice to have something we can show/propose to them 20:18 technomensch kinda get a headstart on it 20:18 DougieRichardson we could if someone would upload the front page... * DougieRichardson good humoured dig at mdke 20:19 DougieRichardson What is the proposed API 20:19 dsas_ technomensch: Might be worth asking on ubuntu-website to get a web front end person in 20:20 technomensch ok, thanks for the suggestion. 20:20 technomensch great idea 20:20 DougieRichardson dsas_ technomensch I agree - I know I haven't the time 20:20 technomensch neither do I. 20:20 technomensch even if I did have the skillz 20:21 j1mc ok... anything else on this for now? do we have any action-item take-aways for this? 20:21 j1mc anything to be done? 20:21 DougieRichardson not for now 20:22 j1mc ok - technomensch, i guess you'll keep us updated if things change? 20:23 technomensch ::nod:: 20:23 j1mc ok... next topic then 20:23 j1mc DITA and Mallard 20:23 j1mc I wish that mdke and dinda were able to make this meeting 20:23 j1mc but i'll just jump into a quick mention of DITA 20:24 j1mc as a reference, here are a couple of links about the technical side of DITA: 20:24 j1mc the architectural specification: http://docs.oasis-open.org/dita/v1.1/OS/archspec/archspec.html 20:24 j1mc the language specification: http://docs.oasis-open.org/dita/v1.1/CS01/langspec/ditaref-type.html 20:24 j1mc i've been looking those over, and there's a lot to digest. 20:24 j1mc but basically... why would we consider using DITA? 20:25 j1mc DITA has a lot of uptake in the professional tech writing community, it's an open source project, and it allows for content re-use and conditional text. 20:26 j1mc conditional text being... you can create one document and include text specific to kubuntu, ubuntu, and xubuntu... and then generate flavor-specific docs from that one doc set. 20:26 j1mc (if that makes sense) 20:26 j1mc thing is... it's a new toolchain (using ANT build files...), no other distros use it currently... * DougieRichardson nods 20:27 dsas_ aren't we stuck with using whatever yelp supports? 20:27 j1mc would introduce an additional syntax for new users to learn. 20:27 j1mc dsas_: well, the yelp developer is in on this meeting now (shaunm) 20:27 DougieRichardson dsas_ dita can be used to generate docbook 20:27 j1mc he knows about it 20:28 j1mc so . . . i have an interest in it, and dinda has expressed an interest in it, but i'm not sure how feasible it is for this release. it's not even packaged in ubuntu yet 20:28 DougieRichardson Its not feasible for Karmic. 20:29 j1mc yeah 20:29 DougieRichardson It is a good idea however and should probably be something we invest time in 20:29 j1mc but ... with regards to the Learning Team... being able to share content across the official docs, the learning team, and the training team (canonical training stuff...) 20:29 j1mc that would be helpful. 20:30 DougieRichardson I read the specs (thanks Jim), we should consider investigating this more thouroughly 20:30 shaunm I started looking into what it would take to do dita->mallard, which I think would give a more faithful representation of dita than dita->docbook 20:30 shaunm but I'm pressed for time, and I can't make that a top priority right now 20:30 j1mc shaunm: understood. (focus!) :-) 20:31 shaunm heh 20:31 DougieRichardson shaunm: mallard information seems a little, sparse at the moment - what time frame are you guys working to 20:31 j1mc ok... so... for this release, i'll just see about getting it packaged into ubuntu 20:31 j1mc "it" being DITA 20:31 DougieRichardson j1mc: packaging it isn't a major issue 20:31 shaunm so if you really want to pursue dita in yelp, there are three possible approaches: dita->docbook, dita->mallard, or dita support directly in yelp 20:32 shaunm DougieRichardson: the spec isn't fully fleshed out, but I don't consider the existing functionality at all sparse 20:32 j1mc philbull: any comments on DITA for now? 20:32 DougieRichardson shaunm: don't take offense, from Gnome.org it does 20:32 shaunm I know j1mc has asked about profiling. what else are people interested in that isn't there? 20:32 shaunm DougieRichardson: wasn't offended 20:33 j1mc shaunm: "profiling"? could you explain a bit more about that? 20:33 philbull j1mc: not from me yet 20:33 shaunm just wondering what things people need 20:33 shaunm j1mc: sorry, profiling == conditional processing 20:33 shaunm no idea why people call it profiling, but they do 20:33 j1mc :) 20:33 shaunm probably something to do with tailoring a document to different profiles or something 20:34 j1mc ok... seeing as we're already kind of doing it, we'll officially move on to discussing Mallard 20:34 shaunm oh sorry, didn't mean to hijack the conversation 20:34 j1mc here's a link the language specification for it: http://www.gnome.org/~shaunm/mallard/spec.html 20:34 j1mc np 20:34 philbull I had some notes, but to save time: 20:34 philbull http://philbull.googlepages.com/MALLARD.txt 20:34 DougieRichardson shaunm: how automated can the conditioning be? Take UNR, can we in some way allow the help to identify which interface is in use? 20:36 j1mc philbull: that's a pretty good summary. thanks. 20:36 shaunm ok, so conditional processing. typically, formats provide loose semantics on this, and people use their own tailored processing tools to do exactly the conditional processing they need, at build time 20:36 technomensch that would be extremely cool if it could dougie 20:36 shaunm we display source documents in yelp, at run time 20:37 shaunm which means for me to do conditional processing, I need very exactly specified behavior 20:37 shaunm note that yelp doesn't do any conditional processing on docbook files, and people have been doing conditional processing for years 20:38 shaunm also, what's UNR? 20:38 j1mc ubuntu netbook remix 20:38 DougieRichardson ubuntu netbook remox 20:38 shaunm (be patient with me. I don't know all the ubuntu lingo) 20:38 DougieRichardson in s t e r e o ;-) 20:38 j1mc :) 20:38 shaunm heh 20:38 mwcrowley sorry, I've got to run, but I'll stay in contact, 20:38 j1mc mwcrowley: thanks for sticking around :) 20:39 shaunm so it might just be that build-time conditional processing is sufficient for you 20:39 dsas_ ubuntu/gnome with a different launcher, different default apps and some window management stuff 20:39 shaunm i.e. you install pages with conditional information stripped. yelp does nothing special. at build time, you construct the pages based on conditions in a source page file 20:40 j1mc shaunm: from your perspective, what are the "missing features" in mallard that are needed for you to say, "this is ready to use." 20:40 DougieRichardson UNR has two interfaces that a user can switch between at runtime 20:40 j1mc philbull mentioned i18n and "other missing features" 20:41 shaunm j1mc: the schema as it exists right now is more or less what I'm planning to be 1.0 20:41 j1mc even if not all of the "nice to haves" are in place... 20:41 shaunm I need to flesh out the spec and the implementation 20:42 j1mc for those who aren't at the meeting now, or for those completely new to mallard - do you have a link to the spec / implementation info? 20:43 shaunm http://www.gnome.org/~shaunm/mallard/ 20:43 shaunm http://www.gnome.org/~shaunm/mallard/mallard.rng 20:43 shaunm (or .rnc if you want the compact syntax) 20:44 j1mc cool 20:44 j1mc philbull: did you have any other comments you wanted to make at this time? 20:44 shaunm note that the spec itself is written in mallard, so you're looking at example html build from mallard 20:44 j1mc w00t 20:45 shaunm so... 20:45 philbull not really, most of it should be in that summary I posted 20:45 shaunm I'm planning for the spec to be 1.0 for gnome 3.0 20:45 shaunm I have a short list of things I'm planning for 1.2, which I intend to release six months later with gnome 3.2 20:46 dsas_ which is march 2010? 20:46 shaunm (the spec version won't always increment with gnome releases) 20:46 shaunm dsas_: tentatively, yes 20:46 j1mc ok. thanks shaunm :) 20:47 shaunm conditional processing could be on the 1.2 list, if I can get some people to sit down with me and hammer out concrete details 20:47 technomensch <<< is kinda glad he's sticking on the wiki side of things for a while 20:48 j1mc if people wanted to learn more about this schema stuff... where could they look? i mean, to learn about how schemas are set up... 20:48 j1mc is it xml stuff? xsl? schema-o-rama.com? 20:49 shaunm relax-ng * j1mc goes to register schema-o-rama.com :) 20:49 j1mc ok... cool. 20:49 j1mc philbull: installation guide! 20:49 shaunm if there's demand, I don't mind creating an xsd as well. but the rng is canonical 20:49 j1mc canonical with a lowercase "c" :) 20:50 shaunm heh, yes 20:50 philbull OK, installation guide: 20:50 philbull The Installation Guide (IG) team was selected this week. 20:50 philbull We have a great bunch of people, and I'm really excited about the project. 20:50 philbull It's a much more structured approach to running a docs project than I'm used to, so we'll see how it goes. 20:50 philbull A list of the members of the team is available at: 20:50 philbull https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Specs/KarmicInstallationGuide/TeamRoles 20:50 philbull Jim and Dougie are also going to advise on what set of tools we should use to write the guide. 20:50 philbull It may or may not be DITA or Mallard, depending on what seems the most feasible. 20:50 philbull Next week we should hopefully start getting down to the nitty-gritty. 20:50 philbull DB and the writers (Augustina, Avi and Kelvin) are sorting out a style guide. 20:50 philbull Adam should be getting in touch with the ubiquity devs to get a roadmap out of them. 20:50 philbull I think they're making a lot of changes this cycle, which will obviously affect us. 20:51 philbull I've asked Nathan to look at planning a user testing programme. 20:51 philbull User testing is a *big* deal to me at the moment. I think we should be doing it everywhere. 20:51 philbull I have a few ideas on how we can extract information on usage patterns etc. 20:51 philbull That's about it for the IG for now. Any questions/flames? 20:51 philbull . 20:53 j1mc thanks philbull 20:53 philbull sorry for the massive textdump 20:53 j1mc DougieRichardson: i sent a note to you and philbull ... i'm not feeling super hot about using DITA for this release of the guide. 20:54 DougieRichardson j1mc: not if its for Karmic and ultimately, if we move to DITA then we would have to merge other documentation in any evnet 20:54 DougieRichardson ^^event 20:54 philbull j1mc: I'll get back to you about that tomorrow. I still need to get a test installation of the open toolkit working 20:54 DougieRichardson philbull: the start scripts good isn't it. lol 20:55 philbull heh 20:55 j1mc the installation script installs it to the user's home directory 20:55 j1mc opensuse packages it so that it goes into /usr/... something 20:55 DougieRichardson once you take out the ^M carriage returns 20:56 j1mc just in looking over the syntax, it would take time to decide which elements to use 20:56 j1mc in what situations... 20:56 philbull j1mc: we could just use a set similar to Mallard's 20:57 philbull that would make conversion much easier 20:57 j1mc i'd rather we prepare this version using known tools, then we could easily port it to DITA if we decide that's what we want to do later. 20:57 philbull That seems reasonable 20:57 DougieRichardson I'm in agreement 20:57 philbull If we use DocBook, would you or Dougie mind helping me with the DocBook->PDF stuff? 20:58 philbull My attempts always look like ass 20:58 philbull I want the guide to be pretty! 20:58 j1mc philbull: sure. iirc, even mdke has some difficulty with converting to PDF 20:58 j1mc opensuse uses a proprietary docbook > pdf converter called "renderx" (i think that's what it is called). 20:59 j1mc i think it is generally known to produce prettier output 20:59 j1mc :/ 20:59 DougieRichardson dblatex is not very configurable 20:59 DougieRichardson the best we could manage is available in the desktop training branch 20:59 philbull Maybe we can do DocBook->HTML->Layout tool 21:01 DougieRichardson I'm beginning to lean to DB->ODF->PDF 21:01 philbull That would be good too. 21:01 philbull At least OO is scriptable 21:01 j1mc i'm certainly willing to help with it, though 21:01 philbull Thanks guys 21:01 philbull Shall we move on? 21:02 technomensch btw, semisidebar 21:02 j1mc it sounds like, at this time, we're going to go ahead with docbook for the Install Guide then 21:02 technomensch after I finish my guide, what am I going to do with it? 21:02 philbull j1mc: agreed 21:02 technomensch I mean the playbook 21:02 philbull technomensch: we can attach a PDF to a page on the wiki 21:03 technomensch quick, easy, simple 21:03 technomensch I like it 21:03 j1mc i think it should also be available (in some form) on the wiki itself 21:03 j1mc ^^ referring to technomensch's document 21:04 philbull technomensch: Google Docs can export to ODF, can't it? 21:04 j1mc yes 21:04 j1mc philbull: it can even save as pdf 21:05 technomensch that was a project I was working on previously, trying to clean up all the formatting docs 21:05 philbull awesome 21:05 technomensch once I have this playbook, I think that it could almost replace the existing info 21:05 technomensch eventually...... 21:06 technomensch I just figured this docbook discussion might be a good time to slip that question in :) 21:06 j1mc ok... Kubuntu and Xubuntu 21:06 j1mc I don't think anyone is here from Kubuntu 21:07 j1mc and Xubuntu docs need a lot of lurve 21:07 j1mc so I need to get my groove on 21:07 j1mc that's all on that for now, I guess. :) 21:08 j1mc well, I guess I'll say that I'm going to get a Xubunt team member to update our CSS for how our docs are displayed 21:08 j1mc Next topic (almost done) 21:08 j1mc Discussion about licensing for wiki.ubuntu.com 21:09 philbull does it need licensing? 21:09 philbull is anyone going to reuse any of the material there? 21:09 j1mc mdke: sent a note to the ML about it. 21:09 j1mc "The team wiki isn't licensed. I think that having been prompted by a 21:09 j1mc blog posts around about this, the CC will address it soon." 21:10 j1mc seeing as mdke is on the Community Council, we'll wait to hear how it is addressed. If people have comments... we have a thread on the ML about the topic. 21:11 j1mc i think my brain hurts 21:11 j1mc last topic? 21:12 philbull It's too big to discuss now 21:12 j1mc ok 21:12 philbull I'll bring it up on the ML 21:12 j1mc sounds good 21:12 j1mc any other comments before we wrap up? 21:14 j1mc *crickets* 21:14 j1mc ok, well, thanks for participating today, everyone }}}