David Rhodus wrote:
>> patches back into the official document format. But I don't think we
>> can use Wiki as a basis for the documentation... it doesn't have a
>> formal enough infrastructure to serve as a good basis.
>
>
> I've yet to see anything ever done with the fbsd documentation other
> than made into a webpage. Though, I guess with some work a wiki could
> be wrote in php to store the data in SGML format.
I feel that common misunderstanding happens in this argument.
SGML was/is there, in the first place, for having codification of
structure (of information). So are the derivatives (XML etc).
Wiki deals with another problem -- wide community input on dispersed
subjects, with hardly any regard to structure at all.
Do we have dispersed subjects here? Rather no. Do we have a (wide)
community whose desire is exactly writing of documentation? I think no
again.
Obviously, one can contribute to docs even in plain-text.
I think what we really are looking at here is the steep learning curves
of SGML technologies and of the product itself (dfbsd).
Then, there's the absence of *serious* technical writing community (in
open-source community). Nobody wants to (and few can and those who can
seemingly prefer not to) write about things.
I don't really know, perhaps there are complicated procedures of
contributing, too?
FWIW.