Webhelp improvements during the Google Summer of Code

[Peter Desjardins <peter.desjardins.us@gmail.com>]

Hello,

This year we are lucky to have two students working on the DocBook
webhelp output as part of the Google Summer of Code program
(http://www.google-melange.com/gsoc/homepage/google/gsoc2012). Arun
Bharadwaj and Visitha Baddegama will be learning about DocBook and
making improvements to webhelp over the course of the summer.

Arun and Visitha will begin coding in the next few weeks and are
expected to continue until late August. They will work independently
of each other but they will need to coordinate closely and are
encouraged to help each other and share ideas. As the features they
develop are completed and reviewed, they will be integrated into the
DocBook stylesheet code. I've included the list of features they will
be working on in this message.

Kasun Gajasinghe (a former Google Summer of Code DocBook participant),
David Cramer, Stefan Hinz, and I will be working with Arun and Visitha
as mentors. I'm looking forward to working with them and seeing what
they produce!

Planned Improvements by Arun
********************************************

Improve the performance of the Javascript table of contents for
documents with large numbers of headings.

Improve compatibility with Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Allow content in the HTML head/title element that does not appear in
search result links.

Allow users to adjust the width of the table of contents.

Develop an alternative packaging for webhelp output as a web
application to run in a Java application server. Use Apache Lucene as
the search engine to take advantage of more powerful search
functionality and allow searching when Javascript is disabled.

Add an autocomplete feature to the search input text field. Display
indexed search terms that match what a user has typed in the field.

Planned Improvements by Visitha
*********************************************

Develop an alternative build process for webhelp using GNU Make and
the xsltproc XSLT processor. Remove all dependencies on Apache Ant
when using this alternative process.

Remove the directory named "content" from webhelp output. Place HTML
output files at the top level of the output directory.

Allow users to specify the list of files to exclude from indexing in a
parameter.

Adjust resource file paths, such as for image files, for documents
that include content using xi:include. Copy files and alter file paths
as needed.

Display a message about Javascript requirements to users who have
disabled Javascript.

Allow users to search for terms that include punctuation, such as file
names, file paths, and code elements.

Make it easier to configure webhelp and understand the code in the
XSL, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files.