Open Stack

On Fri, May 23, 2014 at 08:09:06AM -0500, Anne Gentle wrote:
> On Fri, May 23, 2014 at 6:19 AM, Steven Hardy <shardy at redhat.com> wrote:
> 
> > On Fri, May 23, 2014 at 12:38:40PM +0200, Andreas Jaeger wrote:
> > > On 05/23/2014 12:13 PM, Steven Hardy wrote:
> > > > [...]
> > > > I'll hold my hand up as one developer who tried to contribute but ran
> > away
> > > > screaming due to all the XML-java-ness of the current process.
> > > >
> > > > I don't think markup complexity is a major barrier to contribution.
> > Needing
> > > > to use a closed source editor and download unfathomably huge amounts of
> > > > java to build locally definitely are though IMO/IME.
> > >
> > > You do not need a closed sourced editor for XML - I'm using emacs and
> > > others in the team use vi for it.
> >
> > Sure, maybe "need" was the wrong word to use, my apologies.  Regardless,
> > the docs refer to a closed source tool being "encouraged", which
> > immediately discouraged me when trying to figure out the workflow.
> >
> > I've tried editing XML in vim a few times, and although it's obviously
> > possible, it's far less painful when I'm dealing with other more
> > human-friendly formats.
> >
> > > Yes, it downloads a lot Java once. We also now build the documents as
> > > part of the gate, so you can also check changes by clicking the
> > > "checkbuild" target, it will show you the converted books,
> >
> > Sure, that's good, but my (and I'd guess many others) preference is for
> > formats which can be easily built locally with only distro-provided tools,
> > not a huge pile of third party java.
> >
> > Not trying to start a format-advocacy argument here, just trying to provide
> > a data-point that, if the success criteria is developer participation in
> > the docs process, then the current toolchain is definitely a barrier to
> > participation for some potential contributors.
> >
> 
> 
> Thanks for the discussions -- let's keep a tone of civility. Understand
> that doc writers have specific tools that work well for them. That said, we
> do want to collaborate more with our end users specifically.

My apologies if my remarks have been interpreted as uncivil, that was
definitely not my intention.

The only point I really wanted to convey was +1 on trying out an easier
markup, and thanks for bringing up the topic of a user orientated
orchestration guide - I would definitely like to contribute to the effort.

Steve