Re: updating templates

[Patrick Costello Sun COM]

Hi Sasha, 

Thanks for your pertinent points about the title page proposal. See my arrowed answers below. 

Pat

Sasha wrote: 

>This is almost fine with me. I do have some minor problems, though. It is
>probably too late to influence SUN docs, but still....
> 
>0. Pat: could you also provide html of the main body of the document,
>   just to see how it is linked to title page?
>>>
I'll send you the sgml files that I sent to Eric, who also wanted to know how the files link together. You do not need to regard the way that we are currently linking the files as the optimum way, if you can tell us of a more efficient way to achieve the desired result, then great. To reiterate, the desired result is to have the title page information callable from a single Title Page blue link on the manual TOC. The link would be at the bottom left of the TOC Page, in the place where the Previous link appears on successive pages. 
>>>
>
>1. I would like the legal stuff to be approved by someone other than
>   just us - e.g. by GNOME foundation. Not that I see any problem with
>   this, of course,  if both RMS and SUN legal dept agree :). But
>   still, formally neither SUN nor RMS are authorized to make
>   decisions for GNOME, and I want to be real careful here. Dan: you
>   are the board member - can you bring it up?
>>>
You are absolutely right about the above point, and the intention of the Sun documentation and legal team is to proceed the topic as far along as we could and then get board and community approval. We are almost at that stage now. There are some small wording changes to the existing GFDL to allow for accompanying Liability and Warranty clauses, so the wording changes as well as the clauses need to be approved. Also, the Sun legal team want to finalize the Liability and Warranty clauses to dovetail with the wording changes of the GFDL, so there is still a little bit of work to do before we can ask for board and community approval. We are nearly there, though, so if everyone is in agreement I'll keep on badgering this issue for a little while longer before asking for the broader approval. 
>>>
>2. I do not see any mention of the license for the app itself
>   (i.e. GPL) on the title page. Is it intentional? 
>>>
Good point. In our original proposal we did have a section called Product Licensing. I took this section out only last week, reasoning that the title page was all about the manual, and that statements about the GPL would reside with the source code for the applet or application. Notwithstanding that, if there is a general desire to have a mention of the GPL in the title page, then I don't think that there would be any objections from within Sun. If someone wants to give me the sort of text that would be suitable, then I'll include a GPL section.
>
>3. The only contact addresses given are those of the authors. I would
>   very much like to give reference to bugzilla, or better yet, to the
>   doc on submitting feedback (such a doc has been written). Most
>   app authors do not want to have  bug reports sent to their email
>   address. 
>>>
This is also a good point. I do believe it is worthwhile including the author contact information, as it is useful to discuss technical points for understanding with earlier authors. However, you are right in saying that authors do not want to be the gatekeepers for feedback. So, yes, let's include this section. Again, could someone give me the information that would be suitable, preferably with the link to the existing feedback document. 
>>>
>4.If I understand correctly, SUN uses 2 DocBook files for each doc: one
>  for title page stuff, the other one for everything else. Is this so?
>  Is there a way to produce the same HTML output from one XML file,
>  just by modifying stylesheets?
>>>
Go back to Point 0 for the answer to this question. We don't really care what file structure we use, just so long as: 

- We don't break the community build in those cases where the community prefers to use the Sun version of a piece of documentation. 
- We produce the desired result of a single Title Page blue link on the TOC where non-technical information is discreetly available, without been too intrusive to users. 

Like I said above, is someone can create this type of structure for us in a simpler fashion than we already have, then we'll be happy to comply. I'll send you along our current files shortly. 

>>>
>Sasha
>

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