To answer Bryce, i would be glad to merge efforts with other people. If those people who wants to contribute are mainly for a wiki solution, i'm ready to take if there is a possibility to transform it in more standard format.
So my proposal/question would be : 1. make test on transforming wiki to docbook as mentionned 2. clear our mind on the subject 3. open a real space on inkscape.org for this 4. should work from scratch or on basis of mine or kevin's work ? 5. make some ToC to show where we should go 6. have our own release note in purpose to match as soon as possible inkscape releases (was until 0.44 for me in frech) 7. define internationalisation strategy and process
My vision of the manual is not giving tutorials (inkscape has already that) but more something like a help file that give precise infos on functionnalities. Core Developers would be first interested in helping the manual or keep close to manual writers (with a reciprocity, of course ;) ) These functionnalities can be illustrate with examples or step by step description if needed.
About tav's manual, it is evidently very good and i encourage it as any articles on inkscape (i write myslef some in magazins, soon one in Linux+DVD). But as discussed with Colin Marquee, it would be nice to have an inner help browserthat could be distributed in a different package (see gimp). Some words in the wiki about it.
Hope it helps
Cedric