Re: [Inkscape-translator] [Inkscape-devel] Inkscape Project Status
On 2/28/07 jiho wrote:
Having an official manual distributed with Inkscape would greatly enhance its dissemination.
You are right: an official manual should be available. I wouldn't like to undermine Tavmjong's effort, however, and I see nothing bad in Kevin's usinginkscape.com. But:
a) a user manual should be available without Internet access; b) a user manual should be available in as many languages as possible. c) a user manual has to be written in such a way that it could be used for context sensitive help; d) a user manual browser should have a search function; e) a user manual should be "aware" of existing tutorials.
The e) is an issue maker, since our tutorials are SVG files, not just illustrated hypertext. The idea behind SVG is great. But what is the real situation? Do users actually appreciate it? I've heard quite a dozen of times users complaining that opening a tutorial takes too much time and noone ever mentioned how much fun it is to be able to draw right in a tutorial.
So, if we want Inkscape's documentation to rock the world, we need to know:
1. Do we have human resources to maintain a good thorough user manual? If we do, what would be the best way to organize this work? 2. Do we have human resources to maintain translations (Cedric's & Kevin's XML file in SVN is about 500 Kbyte large)? If we do, what would be the best way to organize their work? 3. Is it possible to reuse GIMP's approach to context help? 4. What should we use as user manual's browser?
My thoughts on some of the above.
1. We do not have such human resources as of now. We have neither one single coordinator of the documentation effort, nor instant contributors. If I am wrong, please stand up high and blame me :)
2 . We _might_ have human resources to provide translation of the manual into _some_ languages. I know that at least German and Brazilian communities are quite active, dunno for others. There is no way a single person can instantly maintain such a huge translation, stay sane and be able to work to pay the bills :) A team of 2-3 people is a minimum. That's what I know from my experience with translation of GIMP's docs.
Please share your thoughts.
Cheers, Alexandre
If you make a good manual I would translate it. I don't like the idea of use SVG for docs. Please use another format.
Thanks, Leandro Regueiro
On 2/28/07, Alexandre Prokoudine <alexandre.prokoudine@...5...> wrote:
On 2/28/07 jiho wrote:
Having an official manual distributed with Inkscape would greatly enhance its dissemination.
You are right: an official manual should be available. I wouldn't like to undermine Tavmjong's effort, however, and I see nothing bad in Kevin's usinginkscape.com. But:
a) a user manual should be available without Internet access; b) a user manual should be available in as many languages as possible. c) a user manual has to be written in such a way that it could be used for context sensitive help; d) a user manual browser should have a search function; e) a user manual should be "aware" of existing tutorials.
The e) is an issue maker, since our tutorials are SVG files, not just illustrated hypertext. The idea behind SVG is great. But what is the real situation? Do users actually appreciate it? I've heard quite a dozen of times users complaining that opening a tutorial takes too much time and noone ever mentioned how much fun it is to be able to draw right in a tutorial.
So, if we want Inkscape's documentation to rock the world, we need to know:
- Do we have human resources to maintain a good thorough user manual?
If we do, what would be the best way to organize this work? 2. Do we have human resources to maintain translations (Cedric's & Kevin's XML file in SVN is about 500 Kbyte large)? If we do, what would be the best way to organize their work? 3. Is it possible to reuse GIMP's approach to context help? 4. What should we use as user manual's browser?
My thoughts on some of the above.
- We do not have such human resources as of now. We have neither one
single coordinator of the documentation effort, nor instant contributors. If I am wrong, please stand up high and blame me :)
2 . We _might_ have human resources to provide translation of the manual into _some_ languages. I know that at least German and Brazilian communities are quite active, dunno for others. There is no way a single person can instantly maintain such a huge translation, stay sane and be able to work to pay the bills :) A team of 2-3 people is a minimum. That's what I know from my experience with translation of GIMP's docs.
Please share your thoughts.
Cheers, Alexandre
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"Leandro Regueiro" <leandro.regueiro@...5...> writes:
If you make a good manual I would translate it. I don't like the idea of use SVG for docs. Please use another format.
SVG can be converted to po with xml2po, so translators would have it as easy as with docbook. (I still like docbook for a task like a manual more.)
Cheers Colin
Of course I expect to translate using gettext or another handy system for translating. About the little helps and introductions in svg, I think that are helpful, but them don't replace a good manual in another format, unless the svg can be protected against changes by the readers. About the links to example in svg, I think that are the best solution. Sorry about my english, I am best translating from than to english :)
Bye, Leandro Regueiro
On 3/1/07, Colin Marquardt <colin@...57...> wrote:
"Leandro Regueiro" <leandro.regueiro@...5...> writes:
If you make a good manual I would translate it. I don't like the idea of use SVG for docs. Please use another format.
SVG can be converted to po with xml2po, so translators would have it as easy as with docbook. (I still like docbook for a task like a manual more.)
Cheers Colin
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Well, what about doubling the help files in some sort of html/wiki and putting it online. Searchable and indexable by the search engines. This maybe more convenient (keeping in mind the long lessons) for user in practice who just want to know fast one thing at a moment (for example how to round corners) and could bring some extra potential users by Google and links who didn't know about Inkscape and its capabilities.
Can I make this at least for my language (Bulgarian) and are the lessons GPL as well?
Victor Dachev
Leandro Regueiro написа:
Of course I expect to translate using gettext or another handy system for translating. About the little helps and introductions in svg, I think that are helpful, but them don't replace a good manual in another format, unless the svg can be protected against changes by the readers. About the links to example in svg, I think that are the best solution. Sorry about my english, I am best translating from than to english :)
Bye, Leandro Regueiro
On 3/1/07, Colin Marquardt <colin@...57...> wrote:
"Leandro Regueiro" <leandro.regueiro@...5...> writes:
If you make a good manual I would translate it. I don't like the idea of use SVG for docs. Please use another format.
SVG can be converted to po with xml2po, so translators would have it as easy as with docbook. (I still like docbook for a task like a manual more.)
Cheers Colin
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Victor Dachev <vdachev@...5...> writes:
Well, what about doubling the help files in some sort of html/wiki and putting it online. Searchable and indexable by the search engines.
FWIW, the current tutorials are available as HTML: http://inkscape.org/doc/
Can I make this at least for my language (Bulgarian)
Sure.
and are the lessons GPL as well?
The tutorials are GPL, yes. More info on the translation process is here: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/Translation_information http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/DocumentationTranslation#Tutorial_Tr... http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/DocumentationTranslation#Transformin...
Cheers Colin
On Fri, Mar 02, 2007 at 10:00:04AM +0100, Leandro Regueiro wrote:
On 3/1/07, Colin Marquardt <colin@...57...> wrote:
If you make a good manual I would translate it. I don't like the idea of use SVG for docs. Please use another format.
SVG can be converted to po with xml2po, so translators would have it as easy as with docbook. (I still like docbook for a task like a manual more.)
Of course I expect to translate using gettext or another handy system for translating. About the little helps and introductions in svg, I think that are helpful, but them don't replace a good manual in another format, unless the svg can be protected against changes by the readers. About the links to example in svg, I think that are the best solution.
I think there may be some confusion propagating here. In general I think the leading proposal is to use SVG only for example images, and to use Kevin's drupal system for the actual editing.
An idea being kicked around is that perhaps we could include a way to export to docbook, and from that into SVG just as we do with tutorials. Then it would be possible for people to read the manual in Inkscape just like the tutorials. But the SVG in this case would strictly be read-only, and no one would be editing content in SVG directly.
There is another idea (which I originated) to set up webdav on the server, to make it easier for people to edit and upload example svg images. It was acknowledged that text handling in Inkscape/SVG is not too good, especially as regards translation; for this reason it's not really worth giving serious consideration to the idea of editing the whole manual in SVG. It'd just be too painful.
Bryce
participants (5)
-
Alexandre Prokoudine -
Bryce Harrington -
Colin Marquardt -
Leandro Regueiro -
Victor Dachev