On Thursday, August 7, 2014 9:19:44 PM UTC-4, Robin Powell wrote:
So let me start off by saying that pandoc is certainly not out of
the question and you're welcome to try to do something like that. I
played with it myself for a while.
Would it be possible for me to get a copy of the source material, even just a chapter or two portion, to work with?
The background here is that I want a system that basically any
programmer can work with without significant train-up time, because
no matter what I pick it seems like everybody talks about how they
don't want to work with it. Haskell is unusually popular around
here so it's not completely out of the question, but let's face it,
getting up to speed on a Haskell library isn't exactly trivial most
of the time. To use pandoc I would need to be really compelled by
it, and "has no indexing at all" is not how you compel me in to work
on something like the CLL, which has a *VAST* index.
Ok.
Teaching a system that has no concept of an index whatsoever how to
render one means thoroughly learning a new system that, at the time,
I had no indication that anyone else would be familiar with or be
able to help with. That sounds tedious and upleasent to me, just
because of the time that would be required to learn pandoc.
In addition to my primary goal being accessibility for other coders
and the specific issue of the index, though, it's not just the
index.
http://vrici.lojban.org/~rlpowell/media/public/pandoc_vs_docbook/
Look at the HTML, specifically the "I sell this-thing/these-things
to that-buyer/those-buyers." example. I don't know why the tables
align differently; I'd have to go figure that out. The examples
have no numbers. etc, etc, etc; there's a ton of work there
The HTML shouldn't be too hard to fix, at least mostly. I am more concerned about the PDF output though, that a bit harder to fix.
I have no idea how much work it will take to teach pandoc everything
I need to teach it. I have a pretty good idea how long the Ruby
solution will take, though (I'd say on the order of a hundred
hours).
Ok. Well, maybe that is best choice at this time then. I am a (very good) Ruby programmer so I may be able to help a bit there too.
But I would like to see how far I can get the Pandoc solution to work. Thing is, I have my own book to publish eventually. So I have an ulterior motive of perfecting a publishing platform for myself as well, and I am absolutely adamant about KISS. Using the LLC as base material for working that out should be perfect b/c it contain many of the same kinds of constructs I will need (examples, tables, index, etc).
If I can't get the Pandoc to work, or find something similar, than I may just join your Ruby-platform alliance ;-)