Re: [docbook] Recommendation on V4.5 DTD vs. V5.0 RELAX NG

["Michael(tm) Smith" <smith@sideshowbarker.net>]

Joachim Ziegler <ziegler@mpi-sb.mpg.de>, 2007-09-17 16:17 +0200:

> I want to start a new DocBook project from scratch, using the usual Unix 
> toolchain (Emacs, XSLT stylesheets, xsltproc, Apache's FOP etc.).
>
> Which version of DocBook should I use? The DTD or the schema?

If it's a new project, you have little to lose and a lot to gain
by using DocBook 5 (and the namespaced DocBook XSL-NS stylesheets)
instead of DocBook 4.

> I have successfully worked on a DocBook project some yeas ago, where I used 
> V4.3 and the toolchain as mentioned above. Is it worth to upgrade my 
> knowledge? Are the tools stable enough to not get in trouble with my 
> customer?

It's worth remembering that the non-namespaced DocBook 4 DTD/
schema has basically been end-of-lifed. There will be no DocBook
4.6; all work on new markup features will go into DocBook 5+. So
starting your project with DocBook 5 now means that you could be
saving time and money you'd need to spend later to migrate your
legacy DocBook 4 documents to DocBook 5 (for example, to take
advantage of new markup features supported only in DocBook 5).

The one potential downside of going with DocBook 5 is if you or
others who will be working with the documents want to use tools
and processing applications that don't support namespaces or that
are hard-coded in some way to handle only some version of DocBook
4 (for example, Adobe FrameMaker). But if you aren't using such
tools yourself already and don't anticipate that others who work
with your documents will be, then that's a non-problem.

  --Mike

-- 
Michael(tm) Smith
http://people.w3.org/mike/
http://sideshowbarker.net/

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