Re: [docbook] On topics

["Keith Fahlgren" <abdelazer@gmail.com>]

On 2/21/07, Norman Walsh <ndw@nwalsh.com> wrote:
> As a general rule, if someone asks for markup "X" and DocBook already
> has markup "Y" that can be used for the same purpose without too much
> tag abuse, we tend to encourage the requestor to use "Y" instead.

I think a lot of the pain of adopting this approach in the past has
been the restrictive content models for some of the most obvious
elements (dedication, for example). DocBook 5 seems to have remove
most of this unnecessary restrictiveness, so perhaps element
re-purposing will be easier for many folks once they make the jump to
DocBook 5.

On the other hand, I certainly understand the unease that many people
have with even light tag abuse. We can't really expect people who are
forcing semantic markup down others throats (exaggeration, but you
know what I mean) to not care about "oh, we'll just call our XXX
frontmatter <preface role="very-specialized" label="XXX">")...



Keith