suggestion

suggestion

[Patrick Gundlach]

Hi,

concerning the suggestion Hans has made, I'd like to add some 
comments:

We have to analyse the questions asked on the list. In my 
opinion it does not make sens just to copy the question and the 
correct answer and make a digest. This would not do any good, 
because we then just have a mere copy of the mailinglist 
(stripped down to the essentials, indeed)

More important is to "rate" the questions:

1) is it a question to wich the answer can be found in the 
manual? Then there is already a documentation for it and we do 
not need to answer it again.

2) is it a question that has not yet been documented? Say for 
example "how can I draw a line below the headline?". (I actually 
do not know if this is in the manual). In this case, we (Hans :->
) should see this as an opportunity to add a few lines to the 
manual, so the next time this questions will not be asked again.

3) a questions that is related to the installation. For example 
the texhash or mktexlsr thing. Or the cont-sys.ori/cont-sys.tex 
stuff. I think these are worth being documented in some extra 
document.

4) bug reports. We do not need to collect them, since one hour 
later 96% of them are already fixed. Just search the archive if 
you have some trouble.

5) Questions regarding fonts/encodings. Yuck. I have no clue what to do 
with them. There is really something that has to be done. I know 
that there is are docs. But there are a many questions on the 
list concerning this subject.

6) request for improvements. They are probably documented in 
Hans' privat todo list... I there a need to collect them? I 
think yes.

7) Questions like "How can this feature xyz (just think of gb's 
indefinate long page that got cut off after each chapter) be 
achieved? These questions are often very esoteric. But imho they 
are worth being collected.

So what is my conclusion? Ignore some questions, improve the 
documentation where necessary, collect some stuff for an extra 
doc. We do not need an faq.

Viele Grüße,

  Patrick Gundlach

Re: suggestion

[Hans Hagen]

At 11:59 AM 1/28/2002 +0100, Patrick Gundlach wrote:

>More important is to "rate" the questions:
>
>1) is it a question to wich the answer can be found in the
>manual? Then there is already a documentation for it and we do
>not need to answer it again.
>
>2) is it a question that has not yet been documented? Say for
>example "how can I draw a line below the headline?". (I actually
>do not know if this is in the manual). In this case, we (Hans :->
>) should see this as an opportunity to add a few lines to the
>manual, so the next time this questions will not be asked again.
>
>3) a questions that is related to the installation. For example
>the texhash or mktexlsr thing. Or the cont-sys.ori/cont-sys.tex
>stuff. I think these are worth being documented in some extra
>document.

or some flow chart or if-then thing; people tend to oversee such things 
when reading a manual

>4) bug reports. We do not need to collect them, since one hour
>later 96% of them are already fixed. Just search the archive if
>you have some trouble.

-)

>5) Questions regarding fonts/encodings. Yuck. I have no clue what to do
>with them. There is really something that has to be done. I know
>that there is are docs. But there are a many questions on the
>list concerning this subject.

this is also related to "if it can be done then people will use it" or if 
you see otehr users use it ... ; this is therefore also a combined user 
effort: providing examples

>6) request for improvements. They are probably documented in
>Hans' privat todo list... I there a need to collect them? I
>think yes.

right, i wonder if we can use bugzilla for this (tobias is looking into 
that for (real big) bugs)

>7) Questions like "How can this feature xyz (just think of gb's
>indefinate long page that got cut off after each chapter) be
>achieved? These questions are often very esoteric. But imho they
>are worth being collected.

right, which makes me wonder why gb is so silent, he must have run out of 
feature requests

>So what is my conclusion? Ignore some questions, improve the
>documentation where necessary, collect some stuff for an extra
>doc. We do not need an faq.

not a faq in the traditional sense; we may need a way to organize examples 
made by users (based on q/a's)

Hans
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Re[2]: suggestion

[Giuseppe Bilotta]

Monday, January 28, 2002 Hans Hagen wrote:

>>7) Questions like "How can this feature xyz (just think of gb's
>>indefinate long page that got cut off after each chapter) be
>>achieved? These questions are often very esoteric. But imho they
>>are worth being collected.

HH> right, which makes me wonder why gb is so silent, he must have run out of 
HH> feature requests

ROTFLASTC

I'm being silent because I'm studying ... and waiting.

I'm studying for something rather unrelated to TeX (i.e. my
doctorate --exams on 2002.02.18), so I don't have too much time to
play with ConTeXt.

And I'm waiting for the new math module to come out with all the
stuff, so that I can convert my pre-existing AMS-LaTex documents
to ConTeXt and start writing the Universal Mathematical Book Of
The University Of Catania (UMBOTUOC, LOL) --which of course is of
no interest for anybody but me and the other students, but will of
course raise a thousand and one requests for new features ;-)

I'm also waiting for the module interface to TeXUtil, and finally,
I'm working myself on implenting/improving one of my feature
requests (the xdesc module, to be now augmented with better
enumerations).

I need to study better the referencing mechanism, especially the
part about "chain" references (a group of things which refer to
each other). If you have suggestions on what's the better way to
implement this, please tell me.

--
Giuseppe "Oblomov" Bilotta

Re: suggestion

[Hans Hagen]

Hi,

2) is it a question that has not yet been documented? Say for
>example "how can I draw a line below the headline?". (I actually
>do not know if this is in the manual). In this case, we (Hans :->
>) should see this as an opportunity to add a few lines to the
>manual, so the next time this questions will not be asked again.

let's make sure of that; i uploaded a beta version that permits usage of 
before/after, although with some limitations; i hope that this change 
(extension) does not break existing code

%D Although it is far better to use backgrounds for this
%D purpose, one can add a rule in the following way. This
%D method makes the rules disappear in case of an empty text
%D line. Consider this a feature.
%D
%D \starttypen
%D \setupheadertexts[left][right]
%D
%D \setupheader[text][after=\hrule,style=bold]
%D
%D \starttext
%D   \input tufte \page
%D   \setupheader[state=empty]
%D   \input tufte \page
%D \stoptext
%D \stoptypen

Hans
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                                   Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE | pragma@wxs.nl
                       Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
  tel: +31 (0)38 477 53 69 | fax: +31 (0)38 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
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Re: suggestion

[Taco Hoekwater]

On Mon, 28 Jan 2002 11:59:27 +0100
"Patrick Gundlach" <gundlach@irb.cs.uni-dortmund.de> wrote:

> 4) bug reports. We do not need to collect them, since one hour 
> later 96% of them are already fixed. Just search the archive if 
> you have some trouble.

These DO need to be documented. Otherwise, we spend a lot of
time answering questions to people that run into bugs in the
outdated version of context they are using. 

-- 
groeten,

Taco

Re: suggestion

[Eckhart Guthöhrlein]

Patrick Gundlach wrote:

> We have to analyse the questions asked on the list. In my 
> opinion it does not make sens just to copy the question and the 
> correct answer and make a digest. This would not do any good, 
> because we then just have a mere copy of the mailinglist 
> (stripped down to the essentials, indeed)

 >

> More important is to "rate" the questions:
> 

I agree with you. As Hans suggested, everybody could compile a QA for his particular case. But for a sensible faq - if we want it - one person will probably have to edit and sort them.

> 1) is it a question to wich the answer can be found in the 
> manual? Then there is already a documentation for it and we do 
> not need to answer it again.

Optimistic.

> 
> 2) is it a question that has not yet been documented? Say for 
> example "how can I draw a line below the headline?". (I actually 
> do not know if this is in the manual). In this case, we (Hans :->
> ) should see this as an opportunity to add a few lines to the 
> manual, so the next time this questions will not be asked again.
> 
> 3) a questions that is related to the installation. For example 
> the texhash or mktexlsr thing. Or the cont-sys.ori/cont-sys.tex 
> stuff. I think these are worth being documented in some extra 
> document.
> 
> 4) bug reports. We do not need to collect them, since one hour 
> later 96% of them are already fixed. Just search the archive if 
> you have some trouble.
> 
> 5) Questions regarding fonts/encodings. Yuck. I have no clue what to do 
> with them. There is really something that has to be done. I know 
> that there is are docs. But there are a many questions on the 
> list concerning this subject.
> 
> 6) request for improvements. They are probably documented in 
> Hans' privat todo list... I there a need to collect them? I 
> think yes.
> 
> 7) Questions like "How can this feature xyz (just think of gb's 
> indefinate long page that got cut off after each chapter) be 
> achieved? These questions are often very esoteric. But imho they 
> are worth being collected.
> 
> So what is my conclusion? Ignore some questions, improve the 
> documentation where necessary, collect some stuff for an extra 
> doc. We do not need an faq.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Viele Grüße,
> 
>   Patrick Gundlach
> 
> 
> 
> 

Re: suggestion

[Eckhart Guthöhrlein]

Sorry, accidentally pressed the send button ;-) Completed version follows.

Patrick Gundlach wrote:

> We have to analyse the questions asked on the list. In my 
> opinion it does not make sens just to copy the question and the 
> correct answer and make a digest. This would not do any good, 
> because we then just have a mere copy of the mailinglist 
> (stripped down to the essentials, indeed)
> 
> More important is to "rate" the questions:

I agree with you. As Hans suggested, everybody could compile a QA for 
his particular case. But for a sensible faq - if we want it - one person 
will probably have to edit and sort them.

> 1) is it a question to wich the answer can be found in the 
> manual? Then there is already a documentation for it and we do 
> not need to answer it again.

Optimistic.

> 2) is it a question that has not yet been documented? Say for 
> example "how can I draw a line below the headline?". (I actually 
> do not know if this is in the manual). In this case, we (Hans :->
> ) should see this as an opportunity to add a few lines to the 
> manual, so the next time this questions will not be asked again.

I don't know if Hans has enough time to update the documentation 
continually... Perhaps an entry in our list, which can be removed by the 
maintainer if updated documentation becomes available.

> 3) a questions that is related to the installation. For example 
> the texhash or mktexlsr thing. Or the cont-sys.ori/cont-sys.tex 
> stuff. I think these are worth being documented in some extra 
> document.

Shouldn't this go into the existing installation instructions? (Or to 
the faq, in the meantime...)

> 4) bug reports. We do not need to collect them, since one hour 
> later 96% of them are already fixed. Just search the archive if 
> you have some trouble.

One of the greatest things about context, isn't it?

> 5) Questions regarding fonts/encodings. Yuck. I have no clue what to do 
> with them. There is really something that has to be done. I know 
> that there is are docs. But there are a many questions on the 
> list concerning this subject.

Can't say too much about this. But probably mfonts.pdf is not very 
explicit / understandable / complete if there remain so many questions?

> 6) request for improvements. They are probably documented in 
> Hans' privat todo list... I there a need to collect them? I 
> think yes.

We would have to decide what wishes should be put on the todo list. I 
think not everything a single person might want to have can actually be 
included, that's why a todo list with priorities would be useful. One of 
the key factors for determining this priority are certainly Hans' own 
needs and projects, so the best place for the list is in his hands - 
where it is.

> 7) Questions like "How can this feature xyz (just think of gb's 
> indefinate long page that got cut off after each chapter) be 
> achieved? These questions are often very esoteric. But imho they 
> are worth being collected.

That is at least some kind of a faq, isn't it?

> So what is my conclusion? Ignore some questions, improve the 
> documentation where necessary, collect some stuff for an extra 
> doc. We do not need an faq.

Ok, let's call it 'Miscellaneous Madness' instead of faq, in honour of 
its esoteric parts.

Eckhart

Re: suggestion

[Hans Hagen]

At 02:02 PM 1/28/2002 +0100, Eckhart Guthöhrlein wrote:

>>6) request for improvements. They are probably documented in Hans' privat 
>>todo list... I there a need to collect them? I think yes.
>
>
>We would have to decide what wishes should be put on the todo list. I 
>think not everything a single person might want to have can actually be 
>included, that's why a todo list with priorities would be useful. One of 
>the key factors for determining this priority are certainly Hans' own 
>needs and projects, so the best place for the list is in his hands - where 
>it is.

currently when someone expresses a wish, i kind of decide on the fly to add 
it or not; some extensions are just adding a couple of lines, but more 
complex wishes, which demand an overhaul (or depend on other work in 
progress) go onto the todo list;

i indeed do have a todo list somewhere (stacks of notes) so you may expect 
extensions for the next couple of years.

fortunately we have a couple of demanding projects which result in new 
mechanisms; unfortunately the docu lags behind then

Hans
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                                   Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE | pragma@wxs.nl
                       Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
  tel: +31 (0)38 477 53 69 | fax: +31 (0)38 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
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Re: suggestion

[Daniel Pittman]

On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, Patrick Gundlach wrote:

[...]

> More important is to "rate" the questions:
> 
> 1) is it a question to wich the answer can be found in the 
> manual? Then there is already a documentation for it and we do 
> not need to answer it again.

Heh. My question, about why my table content didn't lay out correctly,
was documented in the manual. Sure, it was my stupidity, but I managed
to miss the vital detail when reading.

The FAQ is an /alternate/ indexing system, as much as anything, for this
sort of question. :)

        Daniel

-- 
As an adolescent I aspired to lasting fame, I craved factual certainty, and I
thirsted for a meaningful vision of human life -- so I became a scientist.
This is like becoming an archbishop so you can meet girls.
        -- Matt Cartmill

suggestion

[Hans Hagen]

Hi,

Does it make sense to summarize questions and answers (often more than 
one)? Of course this should be done by the one asking the question -)

Hans
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                       Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
  tel: +31 (0)38 477 53 69 | fax: +31 (0)38 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
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Re: suggestion

[Berend de Boer]

Hans Hagen <pragma@wxs.nl> writes:

> Does it make sense to summarize questions and answers (often more than
> one)? Of course this should be done by the one asking the question
> -)

If you have someone who can gather these summarizations and publish
them once a month or so, you can get some FAQ after some time.

-- 
Groetjes,

Berend. (-:

Re: suggestion

[Frans Goddijn]

I'm sure a selection of simple and practically applicable
Q&A's would be published in MAPS and these might even be
made available on a web page...

----- Original Message -----
From: Berend de Boer
To: Hans Hagen
Cc: ntg-context@ntg.nl
Sent: Friday, January 25, 2002 3:23 PM
Subject: Re: suggestion

Hans Hagen <pragma@wxs.nl> writes:

> Does it make sense to summarize questions and answers
(often more than
> one)? Of course this should be done by the one asking the
question
> -)

If you have someone who can gather these summarizations and
publish
them once a month or so, you can get some FAQ after some
time.

Re: suggestion

[Eckhart Guthöhrlein]

Berend de Boer wrote:

> Hans Hagen <pragma@wxs.nl> writes:
> 
> 
>>Does it make sense to summarize questions and answers (often more than
>>one)? Of course this should be done by the one asking the question
>>-)
>>
> 
> If you have someone who can gather these summarizations and publish
> them once a month or so, you can get some FAQ after some time.
> 
> 

It would surely be very useful to have a faq. The mail archives are 
surely valuable too, but a digest would definitely make sense. So, you 
just have to find a person who is sufficiently qualified, and this 
person has to have enough spare time which he/she is willing to donate 
to the task.

Eckhart

p.s.: I fulfil neither criterium, I think ;-)

Re: suggestion

[Frans Goddijn]

> So, you just have to find a person 

> p.s.: I fulfil neither criterium, I think ;-)

But you are qualified to FIND that person!

;=}} groet, Frans

Re: suggestion

[Hans Hagen]

At 07:46 PM 1/25/2002 +0100, Frans Goddijn wrote:
> > So, you just have to find a person
>
> > p.s.: I fulfil neither criterium, I think ;-)
>
>But you are qualified to FIND that person!

since it comes down to:

-  summarize the question
-  collect the answers and make a few examples

i think that any user can do it, preferably the one who asked the question; 
that way we only need to set up the structure to collect and index them

Hans
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                                   Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE | pragma@wxs.nl
                       Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
  tel: +31 (0)38 477 53 69 | fax: +31 (0)38 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
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                                   fall-back web server: 
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Re: suggestion

[Daniel Pittman]

On Fri, 25 Jan 2002, Hans Hagen wrote:
> Does it make sense to summarize questions and answers (often more than
> one)? 

Almost certainly. I tried to find a FAQ first, myself, and read the
documentation on ConTeXt to try to understand why it wasn't working
quite right.

> Of course this should be done by the one asking the question -)

Well, here is my contribution:

* Why isn't a row in my table or tabulate being drawn correctly, but
  rather shows only the first line and cuts off the rest.

You MUST specify all of the column /and/ row markers for each row in a
table. If you fail to give the end of row marker (\NR) then the height
of the row is not correctly calculated and only a single line will be
displayed.

Er, I suspect that the question might need to be rephrased, but that's
the best I can come up with. :)

        Daniel
-- 
What is art but a way of seeing?
        -- Thomas Berger