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Re: [docbook] Using multiple modules


* Bob Stayton <bobs@sagehill.net> [Feb, 08 2004 02:30]:
> Sorry you didn't get a response.  I took a look at the problem, and
> did not see a way to merge the DTD components without manually
> editing. So I didn't respond, thinking perhaps someone else would.
> And perhaps they will, since not everyone keeps up with the mailing
> list on a daily basis.

I figured this might have been the case, was just hoping someone would
tell me so, so I could keep my solution even though I didn't like it
much.

> Perhaps those files should be called "DTD customizations" instead
> of modules, since you can't just plug them in.  There has been talk
> over the years of making the DocBook DTD truly modular to handle
> needs like yours, but it isn't architected for it now.

Lets hope DocBook 5.0 or some such will work this way.  There's always
the RELAX NG version I suppose, which are a bit more flexible in this
respect (or should be anyway).

> I think you have overstated the problems with DocBook, though.
> "impossible to install"?  Hardly, since lots of people manage to
> do it.  And you can get good PDF output.  I produced my
> book using DocBook XSL to generate the PDF.  FOP isn't
> quite there yet, but the commercial tools are.  I won't say
> DocBook is simple, and there are many situations where it
> isn't appropriate. But it does meet the needs of a lot of people
> who manage to get it to work.

This remark was mostly made after having spent many hours trying to get
various versions of DocBook (SGML and XML) to install and work properly.
Both with the whole catalog business that wasn't really solved in a
standard and clean way until recently it seems and due to bugs in many
of the wrapper utilities.  sgmltools-lite has this one bug that makes
all catalog lookups fail and since it doesn't seem to be under
development anymore it probably won't get fixed (I've fixed it myself
after rediscovering it several times after reinstalls of my system).
Also, a lot of problems with passivetex, xmltex, and xmlto on my current
distribution has really limited my use of DocBook.  Anyway, that has
finally been fixed and now that the FHS has made SGML and XML catalog
and DTD locations standard everything should probably work a lot
smoother.  I hope to be able to use it in the future, whenever I won't
be needing math markup :-)

Anyway, thank you for responding, I won't have to keep myself in
suspense over a solution appearing anymore,
	nikolai

--
::: name: Nikolai Weibull    :: aliases: pcp / lone-star / aka :::
::: born: Chicago, IL USA    :: loc atm: Gothenburg, Sweden    :::
::: page: www.pcppopper.org  :: fun atm: gf,lps,ruby,lisp,war3 :::
main(){printf(&linux["\021%six\012\0"],(linux)["have"]+"fun"-97);}

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