suggestions for context documentation

suggestions for context documentation

[Michael Saunders]

> You mean like the beginner's manual
>
> http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/ms-cb-en.pdf
>
> and the user manual
>
> http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/cont-eni.pdf
>
...
>
> amongst 46 others by Pragma


No, not like those.  I mean like a real manual.  I read the book
about Hasselt---a few examples without explanations.
I've looked at most of the fifty or so documents over which
this virtual manual is supposed to be spread.  They are about
as informative.  Most of these documents seem to be 5--12
years old.  The wiki is even more patchy.  The idea that a
computer manual is something that exists implicitly in the
discussions of a mailing list is a new idea to me.

You can't be serious about "mk.pdf" being a manual.  Even it
admits, "This document is not so much a users manual as a
history of the development."  Little after that point is intelligible.

Compared with the clear, abundant documentation of the
LaTeX world, Context seems like a secret that a small club is
trying to keep.  It's not even clear from the manuals that
development is ongoing, much less that there is some advantage
in using it.

So, will there ever be a manual to MK IV?  In how many years?
___________________________________________________________________________________
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___________________________________________________________________________________

Re: suggestions for context documentation

[James Fisher]

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Just to clarify, I pretty much agree with everything you say.

On Fri, Mar 5, 2010 at 2:22 AM, James Fisher <jameshfisher@gmail.com> wrote:

> "...the book about Hasselt". That actually made me laugh out loud.  What a
> loser I am.
>
> Ok, goodnight now. :)
>
>
> On Fri, Mar 5, 2010 at 2:10 AM, Michael Saunders <odradek5@gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> > You mean like the beginner's manual
>> >
>> > http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/ms-cb-en.pdf
>> >
>> > and the user manual
>> >
>> > http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/cont-eni.pdf
>> >
>> ...
>> >
>> > amongst 46 others by Pragma
>>
>>
>> No, not like those.  I mean like a real manual.  I read the book
>> about Hasselt---a few examples without explanations.
>> I've looked at most of the fifty or so documents over which
>> this virtual manual is supposed to be spread.  They are about
>> as informative.  Most of these documents seem to be 5--12
>> years old.  The wiki is even more patchy.  The idea that a
>> computer manual is something that exists implicitly in the
>> discussions of a mailing list is a new idea to me.
>>
>> You can't be serious about "mk.pdf" being a manual.  Even it
>> admits, "This document is not so much a users manual as a
>> history of the development."  Little after that point is intelligible.
>>
>> Compared with the clear, abundant documentation of the
>> LaTeX world, Context seems like a secret that a small club is
>> trying to keep.  It's not even clear from the manuals that
>> development is ongoing, much less that there is some advantage
>> in using it.
>>
>> So, will there ever be a manual to MK IV?  In how many years?
>>
>> ___________________________________________________________________________________
>> If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to
>> the Wiki!
>>
>> maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl /
>> http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
>> webpage  : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://tex.aanhet.net
>> archive  : http://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/
>> wiki     : http://contextgarden.net
>>
>> ___________________________________________________________________________________
>>
>
>

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___________________________________________________________________________________
If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
webpage  : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://tex.aanhet.net
archive  : http://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/
wiki     : http://contextgarden.net
___________________________________________________________________________________

Re: suggestions for context documentation

[Wolfgang Schuster]

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Am 05.03.10 03:10, schrieb Michael Saunders:
> I've looked at most of the fifty or so documents over which
> this virtual manual is supposed to be spread.  They are about
> as informative.  Most of these documents seem to be 5--12
> years old.
>    
*The LaTeX manual* is 16 years old.

http://www.pearsonhighered.com/educator/product/LaTeX-A-Document-Preparation-System/9780201529838.page

\bye

Wolfgang


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___________________________________________________________________________________
If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
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archive  : http://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/
wiki     : http://contextgarden.net
___________________________________________________________________________________

Re: suggestions for context documentation

[Khaled Hosny]

On Fri, Mar 05, 2010 at 05:34:39AM +0100, Wolfgang Schuster wrote:
> Am 05.03.10 03:10, schrieb Michael Saunders:
> 
>     I've looked at most of the fifty or so documents over which
>     this virtual manual is supposed to be spread.  They are about
>     as informative.  Most of these documents seem to be 5--12
>     years old.
> 
> 
> *The LaTeX manual* is 16 years old.
> 
> http://www.pearsonhighered.com/educator/product/
> LaTeX-A-Document-Preparation-System/9780201529838.page
> 

But LaTeX didn't change since then, unlike ConTeXt (even MkII is under
documented).

Regards,
 Khaled


-- 
 Khaled Hosny
 Arabic localiser and member of Arabeyes.org team
 Free font developer
___________________________________________________________________________________
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___________________________________________________________________________________

Re: suggestions for context documentation

[Vnpenguin]

On Fri, Mar 5, 2010 at 03:10, Michael Saunders <odradek5@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> You can't be serious about "mk.pdf" being a manual.  Even it
> admits, "This document is not so much a users manual as a
> history of the development."  Little after that point is intelligible.
>

Yes, I agree with you on this point !
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___________________________________________________________________________________

Re: suggestions for context documentation

[luigi scarso]

On Fri, Mar 5, 2010 at 3:10 AM, Michael Saunders <odradek5@gmail.com> wrote:
>> You mean like the beginner's manual
>>
>> http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/ms-cb-en.pdf
>>
>> and the user manual
>>
>> http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/cont-eni.pdf
>>
> ...
>>
>> amongst 46 others by Pragma
>
>
> No, not like those.  I mean like a real manual.  I read the book
> about Hasselt---a few examples without explanations.
> I've looked at most of the fifty or so documents over which
> this virtual manual is supposed to be spread.  They are about
> as informative.  Most of these documents seem to be 5--12
> years old.  The wiki is even more patchy.  The idea that a
> computer manual is something that exists implicitly in the
> discussions of a mailing list is a new idea to me.
cont-en & metafun are real manuals for mkii.
And yes, mkii is almost 10years old , and  maybe some options of
some macros are changed
What do you mean as "real manual" ?

>
> You can't be serious about "mk.pdf" being a manual.  Even it
> admits, "This document is not so much a users manual as a
> history of the development."  Little after that point is intelligible.
mkiv is still in development.
If one knows mkii,
then  mk.pdf and luatexref-x.pdf are important to help in
understanding mkiv, but it's not enough .
One must also knowns   lua, fontforge  , opentype,
unicode utf-8 TeX internal, xml ...
Actually mkiv is not for end user but it will be for sure in the
future , ~2012 estimated.

>
> Compared with the clear, abundant documentation of the
> LaTeX world, Context seems like a secret that a small club is
> trying to keep.  It's not even clear from the manuals that
> development is ongoing, much less that there is some advantage
> in using it.
One important point of mkiv are opentype fonts.
It's really hard in LaTeX to manage opentype fonts (remember the Adobe
produce only opentype fonts), and it's also hard in mkii --- but better.
mkiv actually already manage opentype fonts in a decent way, if one
compares with mkii.

Another point is Lua (a "traditional" programming language)  as a tool
for macro writer,
and I can assure that it' more fun/productive to use Lua than TeX in
some situations (eg parsing)
even if  TeX side of ConTeXt is  still indispensable (and will remain).



Context is not and doesn't seem a secret club:
"normal" programming is hard, programming with TeX is harder than
"normal" programming ,
typographic programming is a kind  of magic -- no books other than TexBook.
But in the end one must sit down and write his own code, and the
codebase is the best source for learning.
ConTeXt is a format for typographic programming --- maybe not user
friendly for and end user;
LaTeX is a format for end user --- not so good for general typographic
programming .


-- 
luigi
___________________________________________________________________________________
If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
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wiki     : http://contextgarden.net
___________________________________________________________________________________

Re: suggestions for context documentation

[R. Bastian]

On Thu, 4 Mar 2010 20:10:43 -0600
Michael Saunders <odradek5@gmail.com> scribit:

> > You mean like the beginner's manual
> >
> > http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/ms-cb-en.pdf
> >
> > and the user manual
> >
> > http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/cont-eni.pdf
> >
> ...
> >
> > amongst 46 others by Pragma
> 
> 
> No, not like those.  I mean like a real manual.  I read the book
> about Hasselt---a few examples without explanations.
> I've looked at most of the fifty or so documents over which
> this virtual manual is supposed to be spread.  They are about
> as informative.  Most of these documents seem to be 5--12
> years old.  The wiki is even more patchy.  The idea that a
> computer manual is something that exists implicitly in the
> discussions of a mailing list is a new idea to me.
> 
> You can't be serious about "mk.pdf" being a manual.  Even it
> admits, "This document is not so much a users manual as a
> history of the development."  Little after that point is intelligible.
> 
> Compared with the clear, abundant documentation of the
> LaTeX world, ...

LoL

I have a good meter of books about Latex. But Latex is 'congenitally'
unable to do what I want to obtain. 

Within 6 months, with the Seroul book & the Context Manual & the help of
this list, I made more and better than in 10 years of Latex.

With Latex you must accept to do what Latex wants to be done. With
Context (and even with the older Tex), you are free (not free in an
denglish sense ('gratuit', 'kostenfrei'), but 'libre' or 'frei').



> Context seems like a secret that a small club is
> trying to keep.  It's not even clear from the manuals that
> development is ongoing, much less that there is some advantage
> in using it.
> 
> So, will there ever be a manual to MK IV?  In how many years?
> 

I think that the usersd need that the '[...,...,...]' should be replaced or referenced by
lists of parameters and we need a wiki-glossary of the params.

So we need a wiki to which users can access. I tried to access t the
contextgarden, but my access was forbidden. 

So it is true that Context is much more better than the way its access
is managed.



-- 
René Bastian
www.pythoneon.org
www.musiques-rb.org
http://www.soundsurvey.org.uk/


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___________________________________________________________________________________

Concerning the Wiki

[Philipp Gesang]

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On 2010-03-04 <20:10:43>, Michael Saunders wrote:
> > You mean like the beginner's manual
> >
> > http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/ms-cb-en.pdf
> ...
> > amongst 46 others by Pragma
> 
>  Most of these documents seem to be 5--12
> years old.  The wiki is even more patchy. -- 

Suggestion: Add <mkii>, <mkiv> and <both> tags to the wiki that somehow
(maybe using colored bars spanning the tagged text to the left …)
identify the version that a paragraph's text pertains to.

Right now it's pain reading through obsolete info about mkii for minutes
only to find a paragraph at the end of the page that says “And in MKIV
things work completely otherwise … please refer to ‘feature-mkiv.pdf’.”
(Yes, I exaggerated that one a bit.)

Finally, when those tags exist, untagged content should default to
<none> and have a Wikipedia-style begging label on top of the tagless
part, saying “This article needs help.  If you know about the
differences between MKII and MKIV please flag the existing statements.”


Philipp


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___________________________________________________________________________________
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maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
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___________________________________________________________________________________

Re: suggestions for context documentation

[Marcin Borkowski]

Dnia Thu, Mar 04, 2010 at 08:10:43PM -0600, Michael Saunders napisał(a):
> > You mean like the beginner's manual
> >
> > http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/ms-cb-en.pdf
> >
> > and the user manual
> >
> > http://www.pragma-ade.com/general/manuals/cont-eni.pdf
> >
> ...
> >
> > amongst 46 others by Pragma
> 
> 
> No, not like those.  I mean like a real manual.  I read the book
> about Hasselt---a few examples without explanations.
> I've looked at most of the fifty or so documents over which
> this virtual manual is supposed to be spread.  They are about
> as informative.  Most of these documents seem to be 5--12
> years old.  The wiki is even more patchy.  The idea that a
> computer manual is something that exists implicitly in the
> discussions of a mailing list is a new idea to me.
> 
> You can't be serious about "mk.pdf" being a manual.  Even it
> admits, "This document is not so much a users manual as a
> history of the development."  Little after that point is intelligible.
> 
> Compared with the clear, abundant documentation of the
> LaTeX world, Context seems like a secret that a small club is
> trying to keep.  It's not even clear from the manuals that
> development is ongoing, much less that there is some advantage
> in using it.
> 
> So, will there ever be a manual to MK IV?  In how many years?

Hi,

this is a strong (but fair, I believe) criticism.  I guess that we all
know that the main problem with ConTeXt is documentation; my feelings
are similar, and although I started using ConTeXt using the "user
manual" and asking on the list - and that helped a lot - having a good
user manual would be great.

I have to disagree, though, with the "clear, abundant documentation of
the LaTeX world".  This is far from true: the docs for LaTeX are spread
over numerous package documentations, not-so-well written books and
terribly written beginners' books (the LaTeX book on wikibooks is
awful, for example).  So the situation is pretty much similar to
ConTeXt.  The difference is that the LaTeX core is rather primitive
(compared to ConTeXt), and even a bad manual can do - and the mainstream
packages are usually well documented.  In case of ConTeXt, most
functionality one needs is in the core, which is documented as badly as
LaTeX's.

Regards

-- 
Marcin Borkowski (http://mbork.pl)

This program is written in Perl.  While stronger people find reading
Perl code character-building, it should not be shown to people in their
formative years.  The author will not accept any responsibility for any
moral grief caused.

	    (The McKornik Jr. Public License)
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