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Subject:Re: Rant: Giving up on XML From:jlshaeffer -at- aol -dot- com To:techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com Date:Wed, 14 Mar 2007 11:16:42 -0400
1. Early evangelists for XML touted it as the universal solvent for single sourcing. Once we got our material into XML, we would have the power to output any parts we wanted into any output format we wanted. They skipped all the messy part about writing our own programs or researching esoteric tool chains to get what we wanted.
2. Yes, people constantly ask how they can print out Web pages in formats similar to Word, with proper page layout, page breaks, etc. I know, having been on the receiving end of some of those questions. (Also, Microsoft has invested in improving printing capabilities in their browser.) As another example, we frequently see questions on this list about how to use Adobe PDF files as source files for other formats (not using the Adobe tool as designed).
So it goes,
Jim Shaeffer
-----Original Message-----
From: eric -dot- dunn -at- ca -dot- transport -dot- bombardier -dot- com
To: edgar -dot- b -dot- dsouza -at- gmail -dot- com; techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Sent: Wed, 14 Mar 2007 9:44 AM
Subject: RE: Rant: Giving up on XML
"Edgar D' Souza" <edgar -dot- b -dot- dsouza -at- gmail -dot- com> wrote:
>Like: I can do callouts/drawing shapes and
>annotations atop my screenshots in both Word and Frame; can I do
>something similar in DocBook?
And the original poster was looking how to define page size.
The lack of comprehension of the basic reality that neither XML or Docbook
are tools is astounding.
Docbook and DITA are only definitions of how to markup text. Another "XML
document" might be built using any DTD. What is supported and how it is
supported depends on the tools used and the tool chain. Both Docbook and
DITA can be produced using FrameMaker, or another tool or tool chain.
Do we ask if HTML supports annotations or can output similar to Word or
Frame? How do you get HTML to print on a specific page size? Of course
not. You ask how IE, Firefox, plugins, HTML editors, content management
systems, and the like import, export, render, and manage HTML files,
codes, and scripts. It is the same for XML.
To make any headway in learning XML and XML technologies you have to have
to understand these most basic of principles first.
Eric L. Dunn
Senior Technical Writer
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