ietf
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: XML2RFC must die, was: Re: Two different threads - IETF Document Format

2009-07-05 13:05:15
Iljitsch van Beijnum <iljitsch at muada dot com> wrote:

My apologies for the subject line. I'm very disappointed that the silent majority of draft authors isn't speaking up. I can't imagine that the vast majority of draft authors has absolutely no problems with XML2RFC. So I'm assuming they've been ignoring the thread, hopefully the new subject line will get some of them to chime in. If that doesn't happen I'll shut up and try to figure out why I have so much trouble with something that nobody else finds difficult.

I'm a programmer, so none of this probably matters, but I didn't have any more trouble learning to use xml2rfc than I normally have with other programs that are fairly powerful but poorly documented. Reading XML is its own skill and not always easy, by any means, but that is true for any other text markup language. Deciphering the error messages isn't easy either, but not *extremely* hard.

I did try to install xml2rfc locally on my system and failed miserably, partly because of all the additional junk I would have had to install, but the online version always works like a champ for me.

The point about capitalizing Dutch names wrong is an important localization issue, since people's names are important, but treating it as a fatal flaw in the premise of "encode meaning, not presentation" seems to weaken the overall argument. It's a bug.

What we need is the ability to write drafts with a standard issue word processor. I'm sure that sentence conjured up nightmares of Word documents with insane formatting being mailed around clueless beaurocracies, but that's not what I mean. Word processors use styles to tag headings, text, quotes, lists and so on: the exact same stuff that you can do in XML but rather than having to think about it (especially closing all tags correctly) it happens easily, automatically and without getting in the way. (I can even change the style for an entire paragraph with a single menu selection or function key without having to find the beginnings and ends of that paragraph.)

I fear this will run into the ground instantly, if the anti-Microsoft faction insists on a single "standard issue" word processor that is unfamiliar to most users. The same problems with learning to use a new tool will apply.

It sounds like what people really want is a more comprehensive system that would allow I-D authors to use xml2rfc, roff, Word, LaTeX, or basically any tool they like, not a great policy reversal that replaces one mandatory tool with another. Given the level of effort involved and user expectations, especially concerning support for the latest updates to the IP boilerplate, this would be beyond the scope of volunteer developers; it would require professional developers with a professional development budget.

--
Doug Ewell  *  Thornton, Colorado, USA  *  RFC 4645  *  UTN #14
http://www.ewellic.org
http://www1.ietf.org/html.charters/ltru-charter.html
http://www.alvestrand.no/mailman/listinfo/ietf-languages  ˆ

_______________________________________________
Ietf mailing list
Ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>