From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from euclid.skiles.gatech.edu (list@euclid.skiles.gatech.edu [130.207.146.50]) by melb.werple.net.au (8.7.4/8.7.3) with ESMTP id UAA28898 for ; Mon, 18 Mar 1996 20:13:03 +1100 (EST) Received: (from list@localhost) by euclid.skiles.gatech.edu (8.7.3/8.7.3) id DAA08629; Mon, 18 Mar 1996 03:48:49 -0500 (EST) Resent-Date: Mon, 18 Mar 1996 03:48:49 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <9603180847.AA00813@hydra.ifh.de> To: zsh-workers@math.gatech.edu Subject: Re: ZSH presence on WWW cf. Perl In-Reply-To: "bas@astro.uva.nl"'s message of "Mon, 18 Mar 1996 09:30:02 MET." <199603180830.DAA08444@euclid.skiles.gatech.edu> Date: Mon, 18 Mar 1996 09:47:55 +0100 From: Peter Stephenson Resent-Message-ID: <"JmZMi.0.l62.mDIJn"@euclid> Resent-From: zsh-workers@math.gatech.edu X-Mailing-List: archive/latest/837 X-Loop: zsh-workers@math.gatech.edu Precedence: list Resent-Sender: zsh-workers-request@math.gatech.edu bas@astro.uva.nl wrote: > "Richard J Coleman" writes: > > > I agree that nroff is terrible. I've been thinking maybe it's time > > to scrap man pages altogether. Put all the documentation into a > > latex file, and create a nice zsh manual. > > I like to have documentation on-line as well. But every time I > proposed keeping only the texinfo file, there were loud protests from > various people. I don't remember exactly why, probably because they > had nothing to read info with. One of the things I hate about systems that other people have set up is finding there's no detailed documentation for (say) elm because the only thing that got installed was a minimal manual page which points you somewhere else, which might be on the machine in the directory /usr/local/.hidden/.even_more_hidden/doc/dunno_where_to_put_this/elm but might not be. Only ordinary manual pages have a reasonable probability of being installed by the average system administrator, who has typically got better things to do than create new directory structures for non-standard manual formats. Even if you arrange for info files to be installed automatically you have to rely on the administrator not only providing an info reader but also changing the `dir' file or even writing a new one --- although a decent script should be able to handle this. On the other hand, nroff is the worst format I can think of for a standard. It would be much better to have something which converts easily into nroff. I don't know of anything reliable and powerful enough at the moment. -- Peter Stephenson Tel: +49 33762 77366 WWW: http://www.ifh.de/~pws/ Fax: +49 33762 77330 Deutches Electronen-Synchrotron --- Institut fuer Hochenergiephysik Zeuthen DESY-IfH, 15735 Zeuthen, Germany.