Message-Id: <199601290741.JAA32109@xiron.pc.helsinki.fi>
Date:         Mon, 29 Jan 1996 02:40:53 -0500
Reply-To: Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>
Sender: Lojban list <LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET>
From: Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>
Subject:      Re: publication
To: Veijo Vilva <veion@XIRON.PC.HELSINKI.FI>
Content-Length: 3932
Lines: 75

If you want to review the refgrammar, you should RUN, not walk to the ftp
site and download the files that are in /pub/lojban/draft/refgrammar

Those are the current versions - not fancy formatted, but in near final
draft form. Every once in a while Cowan puts up new drafts but they are not
 changing all that much these days - most work is going into writing the few
unwritten sections, and standardizing a couple of forms throughout the set
of papers.

The version of the papers on the WWW site is from last JUly and is not all
that obsolete if you insist on HTML format.  You can access the ftp site
from the WWW site to get the latest versions if you prefer not to use ftp
protocols.

>3. There are TeX interpreters for all platforms. Some of these are freeware
>or shareware. Mathematica by Wolfram Research (expensive, but good) can
>read most TeX things. Not sure TeX is the best on-line distribution format.
>(Good format to send to the publisher, though)


There may be TeX processors on all platforms, but it is NOT a well-known
document format in the non-Unix world.  Most of the other Lojban work
has been done in Microsoft Word format, and more recently Word for Windows
(which is the current format for the phonology section of the refgrammar,
though there is a plaintext version as well)

>4. For a dictionary, thesaurus or grammer, an online HTML or Java document
>would have some advantages over a paper document, (capability of
>hyperlinks, fast look up, bookmarking, relational data-base reordering)


I am sdure that someone will do this with the refgrammar within a short time
of publication.  I was merely saying that this may not be the format at the
time of publication.

>Paper is nice though. Its physical, and is more consistent with my previous
>suggestion of versioning. Its fairly easy to change an electronic document
>without users really noticing right away.


We maintain configuartion controls on all of the stuff we do.  Your versioning
presumed some kind of single version for the whole language, which I think is
a pipedream - we will probably never have any two documents that are PERFECTLY
in sync as to currency.

Cowan uses a separate version number for each paper (i.e. chapter) of the
refgrammar, and keeps all old versions.  Thus even comments received on
last July's HTML version of the papers is useful provided that you include
the version number (or in this one case, specift that it is the WWW HTML version
since Cowan presumably can back determine the version number from that fact).

Similarly, the gismu and cmavo lists each have a revision date showing when
they were last officially changed.  The master lists on my machine are only
slightly different than the versions on the ftp site, or I would have put them
up more often.  I make minor wording changes when I work on the dictionary.

>5. After refgrammer & dictionary are done, it would be nice to have a
>phrasebook. This could be put on the FAQ section of the www page. This
>would be a good way to show netsurfers how the language works.

There have been efforts to put together a phrasebook, and we had an effort
at one point to ermulate a Berlitz style phrasebook in particular.  The
problem is that people aren't really going to visit Lojbanistan, and thus
making up phrases pertaianing to "Can you direct me to the Lojbanistan
Passport Authority?" or "Where is the train station?" or
"I have lost my airline tickets." are no more useful than your
eely hovercraft.  Thus our abortive phrasebook had accumulations of words
and phrases from such things as our attempt to conduct a sewing class for
people who don't know what end of a needle to thread in Lojban, and another
attempt to conduct a Dungeon's and Dragons adventure game session in Lojban.
These at least theoretically are of practical value.  I don't think I have
ever uploaded them, although the lujvo therein will be found in Nick's
lujvo list.

lojbab