Re: [Nautilus-list] Help Functionality In Nautilus

[Ali Abdin <aliabdin aucegypt edu>]

* Jon Allen (joncallen hotmail com) wrote at 01:34 on 29/07/00:
> Hello All:
> 
> Warning:  I haven't looked around at all the eazel/nautilus/gnome-related 
> sites for this answer, so please forgive me if this is an ignorant question. 
>   Please feel free to reply to joncallen hotmail com if replies would just 
> clog the mailing list.

Asking on this mailing list is fine (specifically regarding help in Nautilus), 
but if you want to ask about 'help in general' or 'help in GNOME' try the
gnome-doc mailing list :)
 
> I was wondering how "Help" will be handled in Nautilus.  Will it simply be 
> man and info pages hooked up to a browser interface?  Or, are people working 
> on a Help system for beginner-intermediate users?  I think a Help interface, 
> with documentation written for the new user audience, would be useful.

There is the ability to browse man and info pages. There also will be the
ability to browse GNOME docbook files (so instead of having to generate the
HTML files during compilation using jade - you can just install the SGML
file). 

I am not sure how 'polished' the help browser is - Until now the work has been
trying to fix bugs and get it to work. When there is a public 'Preview'
release of Nautilus we would certainly be looking for suggestions (I have been
avoiding suggestions till now because help just plain wasn't working and that
was my main focus).

I am the primary person working on the code-side of the help stuff. I am not
an Eazel employee though, and I just work on it part-time, so progress is kind
of slow (in my opinion). Hopefully it will accelerate though cos I have a one
month vacation coming up :)

For the actual content of the documentation - Well that is done by the
GDP crew. I believe Eazel have somebody hired who is tasked with writing
Nautilus-specific documentation though.
 
> Is there a documentation/help project somewhere that's working on this?

The GDP is resonsible writing the documentation and help stuff. They currently
plan on writing a few new docs for GNOME-1.4 (I think an 'Introduction to
GNOME' kind of thing (as opposed to the big bad users guide).

To get in contact with them try #docs channel on irc.gnome.org - or go to
http://developer.gnome.org and look for the GDP project.

> If Nautilus will be implemented "in a way that appeals to today's Linux 
> users and to mere mortals" I think Help documentation geared towards 
> beginners is essential.

The help documentation exists (or will exist). My concern is if it can be
presented to the user effectively :)

> Like I said, if there are sites/faqs/etc. that have all this info I'll be 
> happy to read up on this stuff.  Any comments/info is greatly appreciated!

Try the GDP pages :)