DevApp Content Life-cycle [was: Re: Wiki ideas]

[Corey Burger]

On Apr 1, 2005 11:50 AM, Jeff Schering <jeffschering at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Apr 1, 2005 3:55 AM, Sean Wheller <sean at inwords.co.za> wrote:
> > On Friday 01 April 2005 11:11, Mark Shuttleworth wrote:
> > > Let's see what we can get done at UDU, but in parallel, let's see what
> > > you guys come up with.
> >
> > Hello Mark, Corey,
> >
> snip snip...
> 
> > this. We have an itch for a system that combines the power docbook >with the
> > ease of use and low barrier to entry experienced under web-based apps,
> 
> Hi Sean
> 
> A wiki page with docbook source.
> A wiki page with a comments section.
> 
> If contributors don't want to jump the docbook barrier, then they
> simply add a comment to the wiki page. The comments could be as simple
> as "It's 5.04, not 5.40". They could also be a bit more complicated,
> such as "The paragraph 'blah blah blah...' should be changed to 'yadda
> yadda yadda...' ". Someone knowledgable in docbook will then
> incorporate the comments into the docbook source, and then transfer
> the comment to the history page.
> 
> Maybe call the comments "Document Change Notice" (DCN). Give each DCN
> a serial number, have it added to a list of things to do (or emailed
> to the doc list perhaps?), and if contributors leave an email address,
> then send them a happy thank-you message when their change is
> incorporated.
> 
> A whole process could be worked up to maintain good configuration
> management and version control of the docs. The only part that can't
> be automated is the incorporation of wiki page comments into the
> docbook source.
> 
> The wiki page content + comments will always be the latest.
> 
> An added side benefit is that potential long term contributers will
> get exposed to docbook early on as they may soon tire of adding
> comments, and just dive into the docbook source just one click away.
> They may find that it's easy to work on docbook without knowing all of
> docbook.
> 
> Another benefit is that contributors won't have to bother themselves
> with svn and whatnot. They simply work on the wiki page's docbook
> source, and the rest is taken care of in the background. With this
> method, writers write, and developers develop. Writers won't have to
> learn developer's tools such as svn.
> 
> What do you think? Am I missing something obvious? It sounds so simple.
> 
> Cheers,
> Jeff
> 
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> 

To me, that is a good temporary solution, but it really doesn't
harness the power of the wiki, in that anybody can edit from anywhere.
It also means a lot of duplication of effort, as the comments are made
into docbook.

Corey