Re: [docbook-apps] Docbook for industrial usage

[Stefan Kost <ensonic@hora-obscura.de>]

Hi,

On 07.09.2010 12:45, Sabine Cretella wrote:
> Hi, yesterday I talked with Camille on IRC about getting docbook used
> more in industry. I am searching for companies that already use it and
> that could give a good example about what they do with docbook and why
> they use it. And I also got one first contact I am going to write to.
>
> The reason is: I am originally a translator and did quite some
> manuals. I am just getting back into doing things (after a longer
> family pause = kids ;-) and noted that in almost 8 years nothing has
> changed: manuals are still written with wordprocessors, images are
> still modified applying texboxes. Formats during translation get lost
> and require a lot of post-editing. All this does not happen when the
> translation is, for example, carried out in docbook format. Besides
> just the layout questions there are also some more which are related
> terminology consistance and the overall quality of a manual.
>
> I hope that by getting together some real good usage examples in
> industry and writing an article about why to use docbook and not a
> word processor (getting this then to companies) we can at least make
> some more people aware of docbook. It would help all of us to do
> better jobs.

The gnome desktop uses docbook in api reference manuals [1]. The
reference is made with a tool called gtk-doc [2]. It extract comments
from the sources and produces docbook xml. The generated docbook xml is
xi:included into handwritten docbook xml.

In the past also user manuals were written in docbook. Those are now
written in mallard [3].

Stefan

[1] http://library.gnome.org/devel/references
[2] http://www.gtk.org/gtk-doc/
[3] http://projectmallard.org/

> One side I never did myself, but would like to try out on my own is to
> convert a docbook file to pdf - all I found on the web seems to be
> rather old and from before docbook 5 - is there any new documentation
> on this? You know one thing is having just read it's possible and
> another is having it done at least once. (I am on OpenSuse btw.)
>
> Thanks for any help :-)
>
> Cheers, Bina
>
>