discuss: modularization - was: xml/xsl/dtd-howto
Subject:
Re: modularization - was: xml/xsl/dtd-howto
From:
David Lawyer ####@####.####
Date:
5 Dec 2001 06:04:14 -0000
Message-Id: <20011204211819.E424@lafn.org>
On Tue, Dec 04, 2001 at 03:37:39PM +0100, Nicolas Chauvat wrote:
> > > I think it a possible solution, to have this chapters at hand as
> > > modules. I can imagine this modules as self standing mini-howtos.
> >
> > An interesting idea. I wonder how maintainable it will be,
> > though. Just a thought.
>
> Indeed, this sounds like a very nice idea. We use it here at work for our
> professional training material : every course is the aggregate of smaller
> modules that one can mix-n-match in order to adapt to the audience or to
> specific cases. Our catalog offers the courses with their "standard" or
> "most-often-asked-for" modules, but we quite often change these.
But sometimes reading earlier chapters first is a prerequisite to
understanding later chapters. So this decreases the utility of modules
since they are not then "stand-alone". If we had category coordinators
they could then organize the module system for each top-level category
(such as networks). But, alas, we are not this well organized. So I
would like to keep the module idea in mind for the future, but not do it
now.
> An obvious advantage is that if you have a set of modules that describes
> in several days object oriented programming and another set that tells you
> everything about the python language in a week, you don't have much to do
> when you need to setup a course that introduces to OOP with python in
> three days.
>
> Of course, SGML/XML is your friend here.
>
> It works well for us, do any of you think it could be a nice thing for the
> LDP ? Instead of big howtos that are harder to write and update and may
> easily overlap, could we think of a way to get people to maintain sets of
> modules that we would tie together to offer HOWTOs that cover larger
> subjects ? Or would you think the current granularity of the collection of
> HOWTOs is the right one and that HOWTOs are already to be considered as
> modules of the larger LDP library ?
There is a modularity of sorts in the mini-howtos. For example,
I maintain a Modem-HOWTO about modems in general, while some others
maintain mini-howtos on specific models of modems. It spreads the work
around this way. Also, I wouldn't want to go out and buy various brands
of modems to test that I have no use for, nor to spend a lot of time
testing and configuring them.
It's been proposed to eliminate the mini-howtos, but one use for them is
as subordinate howtos such as the modem example above.
David Lawyer
