Re: [OT] Re: how do i make my program better?
On Sun, Nov 19, 2000 at 05:49:10PM +0100, Tollef Fog Heen typed:
} * An Thi-Nguyen Le
} | There's a tool called Rosetta Man, or rman, that converts manpages to
} | html and other formats. Yes, there are navigation links to each section,
} | and navigation links to other manpages. Groff can also convert a manpage
} | to postscript or text. So what's the problem?
}
} Asking out of curiosity: Is rman reliable?
I believe dwww or some package that relates to dwww or something uses
it. rman is used in tkman, and at least one other GUI manpage viewer,
so yeah, it's probably reliable.
} By all means - I'm not saying that man pages are useless - far from
} it. And I don't say that having documentation as info or docbook
} automatically makes it better. (And you didn't say that I did :)
Right. Don't mind me. :) Sysadmin work on a weekend and all that.
} But docbook (which is the thing I've been using the most) RefEntries
} allows one to put in lots of _structured_ information, which makes it
} possible to automatically process the man pages in a much wider way
} than whats possible to do reliably with plain man pages. Suppose I'd
} like to make a book (both online and on paper) with all the man pages
} on my system. This is easier to do than to parse man pages with a
} program.
But docbook is just a document format that is parsed by a program.
I don't imagine it being easier to deal with than troff. And the camel
book is merely manpages on paper, I believe. And how much more structure
do you need than sections and tables and lists?
} The whole point here is the right to choose - if you want everything
} lumped together in one big man page, be my guest. If somebody wants
} this as info documents - that's their call. If somebody wants to have
} it as HTML.. I think you get the idea.
Ah, yes. Choice is good.
} | I want a pager like less when I read my docs, or possibly reed if I
} | have time. I'm also not going to be very fond of docbook output at
} | this stage.
}
} Not even if you get the output of docbook as a man page?
That would be keen, actually.
--
An Thi-Nguyen Le
|The trouble with superheros is what to do between phone booths.
| -- Ken Kesey
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