> > As I understand Jack's suggestion, the idea would be to split the > > material into > > > > 1) The stuff that's currently in gretl_commands.xml, which is used > > to generate the plain text help files and the command reference > > chapter of the existing manual. This is basically one section per > > gretl command. This would stay in XML. > > > > 2) All the rest of the current manual, plus some new things that are > > in the pipeline. This would go into TeX. > > > > Given 1) in XML, one could easily produce a chm version of that > > subset of the material. Msybe this should be used in place of plain > > text on Windows? > > I'd like to expand a little on "what happens after the great doc split" > with an example. Suppose somenone feels like writing some comments on > logit/probit/tobit models, which have been in gretl for a long time now > but have very scant documentation. Something in the style of Chapter 12 or > the upcoming discussion on maximum likelihood estimation. > > I could do this, but I'm sure many list members could provide excellent > material. Of course, this would have to be written in LaTeX. To integrate > nicely with the rest of the documentation, though, we need to make > available all the tools that make this easy. I imagine that this > somenone could download the LaTeX sources to the manual (ideally not via > CVS, which may be intimidating for some), as a zip or tar.gz file, add > to its contents and send it back to an "editor" who may approve or reject > the changes.
I like the idea, and I agree completely with Jack's thoughts. > > Of course we would have to provide some "instructions to authors", which > explain which macros are defined in the preamble, some style norms and so > on. > > Advantages I see: > > 1) This way, adding to the gretl manual becomes not very different from > submitting a piece to a journal, which is a tried and tested procedure. > Only, marginal changes (even one-liners) would be perfectly acceptable > too. > > 2) The pool of contributors will probably grow. As I said in an earlier > message, there's many people around who won't or can't contribute code, > but can contribute documentation (hint to Ignacio: how about a nice ARIMA > tutorial? :-)). !! Well, I may try it, but give me some time ... -- Ignacio Díaz-Emparanza Dpto. de Economía Aplicada III (Econometría y Estadística) UPV-EHU http://www.bl.ehu.es/~etpdihei/
