RE: [docbook-apps] RE: [docbook] RE: [docbook-apps] db 5 and Dita anyone?

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

Another +1 for a non-xinclude conref feature. 

No one talks about the hidden cost of xincludes, which is that they are expensive in terms of the time they take in a large Java-based doc build process. The more xincludes our doc set accrues, the longer the doc build takes. 


-----Original Message-----
From: Johnson, Eric [mailto:Eric.Johnson@iona.com] 
Sent: Friday, May 09, 2008 3:40 PM
To: docbook@lists.oasis-open.org
Cc: docbook-apps@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: [docbook-apps] RE: [docbook] RE: [docbook-apps] db 5 and Dita anyone?

 
+1 to DITA-like conref support.

It would be nice to have a way to easily reuse pieces of content without
having to import their containing element. There are many times I have
had a chapter in a small book that I would like to have used as a
section in a large book without importing the chapter section by section
using xinclude.

-----Original Message-----
From: Fabrice (GMail) [mailto:fabrice.talbot@gmail.com] 
Sent: Friday, May 09, 2008 3:11 PM
To: 'Dick Hamilton'; 'Dave Pawson'; docbook@lists.oasis-open.org
Cc: docbook-apps@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: [docbook] RE: [docbook-apps] db 5 and Dita anyone?

IMHO, specialization would be an interesting feature to add, though
targeted at advanced users. Since Docbook is explicitly designed for
books, a large number of Docbook users should be able to achieve their
goals with the current DTD/schema. My guess is that 10% to 20% of
Docbook users would really benefit from it. More feedback on this from
the community would help.

I see more value in adding "DITA-like conref" support. Content re-use is
one of the key benefits you get when moving to single-source. Adding a
simple way for authors to re-use small piece of content in Docbook would
make a big difference!

Cheers
Fabrice

-----Original Message-----
From: Dick Hamilton [mailto:rlhamilton@frii.com]
Sent: Thursday, May 01, 2008 10:53 AM
To: 'Dave Pawson'; docbook@lists.oasis-open.org
Cc: docbook-apps@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: RE: [docbook-apps] db 5 and Dita anyone?

Dave,

You make a good point; I suspect Eliot is not familiar with Norm's
article, "DITA for DocBook" (http://norman.walsh.name/2005/10/21/dita),
which shows how to specialize DocBook, and provides a customization to
the stylesheets to support specialization.  I posted a reply to his blog
entry suggesting he take a look at it and comment.

The question this does raise is whether it makes sense to include a
means of specialization as part of the standard.  While I like the idea
of being able to specialize, I'm sure that making it a normative part of
the spec is not trivial, even if we simply formalize Norm's strategy.

I'd be interested in hearing what others on the list think about
formalizing specialization.  To that end, I'm copying this to the
docbook list, which is probably the best place for that discussion.

Dick Hamilton
http://rlhamilton.net


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Dave Pawson [mailto:davep@dpawson.co.uk]
> Sent: Saturday, April 19, 2008 2:25 AM
> To: Docbook Apps
> Subject: [docbook-apps] db 5 and Dita anyone?
> 
> 
> Eliot is running comments on DITA and docbook when choosing an XML 
> vocabulary, concluding
> 
> DITA is the best answer for any XML-based document-centric application

> I've seen.
> 
http://drmacros-xml-rants.blogspot.com/2008/04/choosing-xml-schema-docbo
ok-or-dita.html

His last para is interesting.

why doesn't DocBook simply adopt DITA's specialization mechanism? It
would cost DocBook almost nothing to add and add tremendous value. It
would not require DocBook changing anything about its current markup
design, except to possibly back-form some base types that are currently
not explicit in DocBook but would be useful as a specialization base. 
But that would only make DocBook cleaner.


I'm not a DITA user. It appears Eliot hasn't looked at db5 either.


regards

--
Dave Pawson
XSLT XSL-FO FAQ.
http://www.dpawson.co.uk

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