Week 11 - The Sad Sad State of Document Publishing with Computers

Most everybody's User Guide Outlines..


Most everybody's User Guide Outlines..

were ugly as sin.

Most everybody's User Guide Outlines..

were ugly as sin.
BUT ITS NOT YOUR FAULT.

It's his

The idea: WYSIWYG:

What You See Is What You Get

i.e. What you're looking at on the page is what will be printed out...

The idea: WYSIWYG:

What You See Is What You Get

i.e. What you're looking at on the page is what will be printed out...

"..because everyone who isn't a geek like us is a complete idiot"

The problem?

1
2
3
4
...

The problem?

1
2
1
3
4
...

I've ranted about it..

and you've dealt with it.

If you can't "see behind the scenes"
it's AWFUL to work with.

And ironically

Somewhat the opposite of Microsoft EXCEL / Libreoffice CALC

where you can click on the cell and see how you got there.

Okay, so what else you got?


What You See Is What You Mean

i.e.

When composing, you should be able to
see the "source code"*

*this can be metaphorical or literal

The Grandaddy - LaTeX

Fine grained control at the price of MAN THIS IS HARD.

But what else? i.e.

Hey, what about the M in HTML
MARKUP.

Hey, where have i seen that before?

<h1> This is the head line of the thing </h1>
<p> Let's say some things about the things </p>
<ul> 
	<li> Here's a thing </li>
	<li> and another </li>
	<li> and another </li>
</ul>

not bad..

HTML


I mean, you know what this is, right?

Also, a close cousin of XML..
..WHICH IS WHATS GOING ON UNDER THE HOOD OF DOCX et al anyway.

..seriously, try it. Rename a .docx to .zip and have fun..

To get this even better

Understand the theory of "semantic" 

<article> Here is the very smart thing I'm saying </article>
<aside> now send me money </aside>
<address> 2300 Jackson Street..</address>

These are all technically good

But *very* cumbersome, no?
What about something that we all write in,
..with just MINIMAL formatting along the way.

For example


# This can be a headline

/and this can be italics/
*and this could be
*bullet
*points
etc. etc.

MARKDOWN

Excellent idea. Markdown..
.. or something like it.

MARKDOWN

AND, because it's text,

and sort of like a programming language..

WIDELY interchangeable with other formats.

See, e.g. Pandoc

Perhaps the most important part

If you absolutely must deliver a document with formatting;
use PDF if at all possible. This is a good standard.

Specifics: What you may need:

These are in all of these:

Specifics: What you may need:

Outline tools — usually
"Ordered Lists" - usually Numbers and letters
"Unordered Lists" - Bulletpoints








Backlinks: FSU Courses:LIS4022:RawSlides