RE: [docbook-apps] Graphic formats for screenshots

["Barton Wright" <barton.wright@streambase.com>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Karen Schneider [mailto:kgschneider@gmail.com] 
> Sent: Thursday, August 06, 2009 12:52 PM
> To: docbook-apps
> Subject: [docbook-apps] Graphic formats for screenshots
> 
> As we work on our styleguide, proof of concept, and other stuff that
> our Documentation Interest Group is doing to lay the groundwork for
> our project, we wondered if DocBook users had strong feelings about
> image formats. We will be working with screenshots, and our expected
> DocBook output is HTML, PDF, and possibly Word (for libraries that
> want to tailor documents locally but aren't XML-savvy).
> 
> I understand that IE has never really implemented PNG really well.
> That may not be a showstopper (given that we're an open source
> community, so IE is not exactly the favored browser). Any other
> cautions/advice are welcome (I just saw the thread about PNG and FO).
> My gut reaction going in is to focus on one format and make it work,
> with a tendency to want to use PNG because the list traffic for
> docbook-apps lists it so frequently.
> 
> Also -- not quite as important -- last night, while reading up on
> DocBook (how else to spend a summer evening?) I encountered this:
> 
> http://docbook.org/tdg5/en/html/appe.html
> 
> "The CD-ROM is like a spoon" ??? :-)

We standardized on PNG format for all images, and all IE users can see all the images just fine. I believe the issue with IE not handling PNGs refers to a problem handling PNG's transparency layer in IE versions 5.5 and 6.0, but not in recent versions. Thankfully, the era of IE 6 is almost over, and we don't have to make exceptions for IE 6 diehards any more.

As for the mysterious spoon reference in the TDG5 book: until we can prove definitively that the CD-ROM is NOT like a spoon, I think we just have to take the statement at face value ...