use of alerts on the help wiki

[Andrew Sayers]

Hi list,

As Matthew said, our only disagreement is about which types of alert to
include.  Although I think it's valuable to discuss a default set of
alerts, I increasingly think we don't have enough information to make a
really good decision.  As such, I agree that starting with a small set
of alerts is best, but I think we should give authors an extension
mechanism, so they can vote with their feet.

It should be possible to give people either or both of:

<<Alert("message", "title", "icon", "background colour", ...)>>

or:

<<Alert("message", "class")>>

An example of the latter solution would be:

<<Alert("Ubuntu is an African word that means 'humanity to others'",
	"information")>>

The former many-argument macro would let users choose any icon from the
icons page, while the latter two-argument macro would only let them
choose from a predefined list of alert types.

The many-argument macro would give expert authors enough scope to
implement any alert they like, but should also scare people away unless
they really can't use one of the pre-defined alert types.  On the other
hand, two-argument macro would keep more control in the hands of
administrators, which would probably lead to more good alerts, but fewer
brilliant or terrible ones.

	- Andrew Sayers