Re: [docbook-apps] Using OpenOffice as a DocBook editor

[Sean Wheller <sean@enbaya.co.za>]

On Thursday 08 September 2005 14:53, Bruce D'Arcus wrote:
> On 9/8/05, Wolfgang Keller <wolfgang.keller.nospam@gmx.de> wrote:
> > OO  is just yet another "nice" example of a GUI that's basically an MS
> > Word clone and consequently totally unsuitable for efficient authoring
> > of structured documents (not just docbook).
>
> OOo is not "just" that.  It's also open source, using a document
> format overseen by a technical committee that actually takes feedback,
>  Just the other day I was telling some of them that they need to think
> about supporting nested paragraphs (a la DocBook) and explaining why.
>
> I suggest if people have complaints, they at least register them with
> the OOo community.  For this specific issue, one useful addition to
> OOo would be the ability to constrain the styles available to users,
> which IIRC Word supports.
>
> So two places to go would be:
>
> http://xml.openoffice.org
> http://sw.openoffice.org
>
> Also, Dave Pawson has been experimenting with an OOo-based XML workflow.

Somehow, I don't think any of that helps. The problem with most tools such as 
OOo W is that they give amazing formatting features at the click of a button. 
The result is an XML that has all nature of information that is just over 
kill.

No matter how much you tell Johnny, "Don't use the the styles in this list or 
apply local formatting." Johnny is just unable to contain himself. Walla you 
sit for hours normalizing files before putting them through ooo2dbk or after 
the have been run through ooo2dbk.

Oh well, we live in interesting times.
-- 
Sean Wheller
sean@enbaya.co.za
http://www.enbaya.co.za