Ubuntu Wiki

Ubuntu Manual Blueprints

All Blueprints are attached to the "main" series for now, although this may change at a later date as we decide on more series' when the project becomes larger and it becomes a requirement to have more than one.

What follows is a breakdown of every single blueprint currently registered to our Project.

https://blueprints.launchpad.net/ubuntu-manual

Major Releases

There are four release blueprints already set up with the milestones attached. They all have 'Essential' priority as these are the overall releases. They are assigned to and drafted by the Ubuntu Manual Team, and also have the Ubuntu Manual Team as the approver.

• alpha-release
• beta-release
• release-candidate
• final-release-lucid

Any bugs reported should be attached to the correct release blueprint.

Chapter Assignments

Chapter Blueprints are created whenever someone takes on the task of writing a chapter. The priority is set according to chapter priority, with High being the highest possible. Essential is reserved for the main releases and core blueprints that are required for the project success. The assignee is the person responsible for writing the chapter.

When creating a chapter, follow the naming convention of chapterX - where X is the chapter number.

To give you an idea on how the priority is set, here's an example: Chapter 3 is set to a high priority, because it deals with getting and installing Ubuntu which is a core part of the manual. Chapter 9, however, deals with extra applications that are recommended by the Team - it isn't a core aspect of the manual, therefore has a medium priority.

Low priority is generally reserved for things outside of the 10 main chapters - ie, Contents, Credits, Glossary etc

Editing

The editors of the project are in charge of ensuring that there are no spelling or grammar mistakes, as well as altering sentence structure and phrasing where necessary. Any minor changes do not require the original authors consent, however if you feel there are major changes required (such as re-arranging a whole sentence or paragraph), then it is best to make your suggestions to the original author either by emailing them directly, or filing a bug report on the project's Launchpad page. The editors should also check that their assigned section makes sense and follows the overall goals for the manual (i.e. easy to read and so forth).

On the chapter blueprints in Launchpad (see "Chapter Assignments" above), the editor responsible for each chapter is marked as the approver.

Further information regarding writing and editing requirements is available in the ubuntu-manual style guide.

Artwork

This person, or group of people, are responsible for inserting graphics where appropriate for the manual. They are also responsible for maintaining screenshots to keep them as up-to-date as possible, as well as making sure that image formatting consistency is kept throughout the entire manual. Screenshots will be sourced by everyone, however.

Formatting

Formatting of the manual involves maintaining the LaTeX template styles to control things like font styles, colour, size, indentation, bullet points, titles and headers and footers. The formatting will need to be updated as the Team decides on new styles.

Glossary of Unfamiliar Terms

Ubuntu and other Linux distributions often use a number of terms that are unfamiliar to Windows or Mac users. We must include a glossary of all such terms in the end. Also, it might help to italicize these terms when they appear for the first time.

References and Links

This person, or group of people, need to comb the manual and find places where factual data or references to actual people and places are mentioned, find the relevant web-page and hyperlink where necessary. Of course, it helps if authors insert a note where they would like a reference, or even just find it themselves.

In the future, links will need to be re-checked that they still exist and don't present a 404 to the reader.

Table of Contents

The assignee must keep track of the table of contents as it changes over time and ensure it is properly formatted.

Credits

This is the credits, where contributors are recognized for their efforts. The person assigned to this blueprint must keep track of all contributors and finalize the list to be inserted at the end of the manual.

Here's an idea of the format the credits may take:

Writers

• Benjamin Humphrey
• Josh Holland
• Joe Burgess
• Kelvin Gardiner
• Alistair Munro
• Ryan Macnish
• Deon Spengler
• Gilbert Mendoza

Artwork

• Wolter Hellmund
• Vish (real name please!)
• Kris Klunder
• Benjamin Humphrey

Editing, Formatting and Reference Checking

• Anmol Sarma
• Jamin Day
• Parry (real name please!)

LaTeX and bzr Maintenance

• Josh Holland
• Joe Burgess
• Benjamin Humphrey

Wiki, IRC and Launchpad Maintenance

• Benjamin Humphrey
• Joe Burgess

Title Page

We need a snazzy title page.

LaTeX Template and Maintenance

General LaTeX maintenance, making sure everything functions correctly and the makefile is in order. Also in charge of making changes to the style template when the style changes.

List of Common Problems for Chapter 10

NOTE: I created a whole separate page for this chapter, https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-manual/Troubleshooting This stuff needs to be moved there.

This is not necessarily the order and format in which the these topics will appear. Comments and suggestions are encouraged.

• How do I recover my desktop user password?
• How do I clear and recreate my desktop and application profile?
• How do I check and monitor my laptop temperature?
• How do I check if I am running out of file system space?
• I installed a software package, but it doesn't show up in my menu. Where did it go?
• more to follow....

Individual Chapters

Below are details on individual chapters' blueprints.

Default Applications

This chapter's purpose is to go over the default applications, and the use cases for them. Please see /DefaultApps for more information.