Re: [docbook-apps] website dtd processing on win32

[Dan Gilleland <dagilleland at shaw dot ca>]

Hi Volker,

I've been working with DocBook on & off in a WinXP environment for over a
year now, and after all my search I would say that, no, there is no *free*
out-of-the-box solution for processing website DocBook documents. There are
some commercial solutions, but I am loathe to pay $500+ for the tools (esp.
since the biggest area of concern for me is the editing of DocBook
documents).

Here's what I see as critical for getting DocBook accepted & more widely
used on the Win2K/XP platforms:
1) A better (and free) editor of DocBook documents. This is critical for the
authors of the documents.
    Interestingly, the best article I've seen on creating a good free editor
that any non-tech author could use was found on the Microsoft library
(msdn.microsoft.com). I plan on using it to create my own WYSIHTML editor
for DocBook & other schema-based documents. (It will be free when it's done,
but that probably will take about a year to do, as I would be creating it on
my own as a part time task.)
2) A decent publishing tool chain.
    Ok. Let's get real. Who wants to use batch files & multi-step,
non-integrated tools to produce the final output (regardless of the type of
output wanted)? And how many people *really* want to go to all the effort of
correctly setting up environment variables, class paths, Java, catalogs,
etc. - all to produce their final documents? If tool-chains don't start
coming out that are easy & one-step for the Windows environment, DocBook
will remain relegated to a small circle of users.

Just my 2 cents. By the way, don't get me wrong. I love DocBook, and am
covertly pushing it at my place of employment (a tech school) as the best
way to do curriculum. If the DocBook community ever got more serious about
a) creating good free Windows tools (absolutely necessary for wide-spread
acceptance) and b) integrating DocBook more readily with such items as
Dublin Core, etc., then they could make a serious bid for de-facto
curriculum development (especially in the Technical schools). These two goal
s are my personal dreams, and as I am able, I will work on them (at least,
until something better than DocBook comes along, which might happen
considering the upcoming ratification of xslt2.0, etc.). [additional aside:
Will there be xslt2.0 stylesheets for DocBook??? I sure hope so!]


Take care!

Dan Gilleland
p.s. - hope this starts some discussion - without flaming me of course :)




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Volker Bernhard Duetsch" <vbd@linuxsource.de>
To: <docbook-apps@lists.oasis-open.org>
Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2004 6:11 AM
Subject: [docbook-apps] website dtd processing on win32


> Hello,
>
> any out of the box solution(s) for processiong website docbook documents
> on a W2k-box? Or how to set up something todo so within 1 hour?
> I'm in need to process a prototyp asap to get a decision from my
> management to use docbook or something proprietary.
>
> Any hint and help appreciated
> Volker
>
>
>
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