Re: Re: Possible WM Documentation Project

On Tue, Mar 08, 2005 at 02:08:40PM -0800, Alex Perez wrote:
> Peter Dembinski wrote:
> >On Tue, Mar 08, 2005 at 03:28:01PM -0500, cga wrote:
> >
> >>Russ Button wrote:
> >>
> >>[...]
> >>
> >>
> >>>One of the things I'd like to see are docs relating to all the weird 
> >>>little control files
> >>>and such.  
> >>
> >>Are there any plans to convert these to an xml-based format?
> >
> >
> >I didn't make any comparisons, but IMO XML parsers are bigger and slower
> >than libproplist.  Moreover, proplists seem to be good enough for storing 
> >configuration info.  Why to change the piece of software that does its work
> >and does it well?  Because XML is trendy at the moment?
> 
> I agree that XML is absolutely over-used in so many situations. 

I should have read the previous post more carefully.  All my divagations
were about switching from proplist format to XML-based format 
of configuration files.  

> That said, if you think XML is a "trendy fad" that is going to simply go 
> away, you're delusional. 

Well, maybe.  But, as you wrote before, many people use it inappriopriately.

> There are /good/ reasons for using XML. DocBook 
> has become a good de-facto documentation standard, for which there are 
> dozens of utilities to easily export to other formats such as XML and 
> PDF. It's established. If anything, writing plist documentation seems a 
> bit laughable to me, because it's so amazingly nonstandard. Who else do 
> you know who uses XML plist docs? Heh.

Yes, DocBook is good for technical documentation.  PropLists are not meant 
to be used in documentation.  Why do you think anyone would like to document 
anything using PropLists?

[...]

> If the WM authors wanted to improve WM desktop interoperability, they'd 
> actually apply my trivial patches instead of ignoring them every time I 
> resend them to wm-dev. 

Maybe they don't like you and your code :>

> They've clearly demonstrated on more than one occasion that they can't 
> be bothered, which is a shame, because I would like to continue to 
> improve WMaker's desktop interoperability, but I can't be bothered 
> to make new patches for other problems when the first one I ever made 
> was blatantly and repeatedly ignored. 

Where these patches can be found?

> That's no way to encourage community involvement. 

Well, in some of open source projects, there is a situation, where 
the original creator makes the most important decisions without consulting
them with the community (compare Python, Linux kernel, GNU emacs etc.)

IMO you should rather try to convince Alfredo about usefulness of your 
patch instead of just revealing your frustration on this mailing list.
heh, what do _you_ make to encourage community to test WM?

> There's a need for people/reviewers with CVS commit access who don't 
> disappear for 11 months out of every year.

Well, I disappeared from WM .po-files translation work for nearly 5 years, 
hoping that someone will take over my work and continue it.  Unfortunately,
noone appeared to be eager to continue my translation work, so it seems that
I have to do by myself.  I believe this is very common story in free software 
development.
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