[Sugar-devel] Help 17 and Help Doers Kit

[Walter Bender]

On Mon, Nov 4, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Iain Brown Douglas
<iain at browndouglas.plus.com> wrote:
> Help 17 is at a point close to release, but in some essential ways, is, as
> yet, unfinished.
>
> It is largely updated in content, but there is still some very important
> changes that have not been crossed off the list on this
> page:http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Help_Activity_refresh/0.98
>
> Help 17 is already a nearly complete set of Sugar 1.00 documentation.
>
> I came to the project very recently, Gonzalo Odiard has spent more time
> supporting me to learn the process, than I have so far contributed.
>
> This will be an inadequate description, which is why I write. Gonzalo
> has modified the source of Activity Help, so that the version of Help in
> the link below includes a self-installing, fully user editable form of
> Help. Please test if you can. I tested it in sugar-build and SoaS. It works nicely.
>
> *To Get this Activity*
> ----------------------
>
> Right now if you do:
>
> git clone gitorious at git.sugarlabs.org:help/mainline.git
>
> you will get the help activity _with_ the sources included.
>
> You can install it in your development environment doing:
>
> cd mainline
>
> ./setup.py dev
>
> If you have the Activity Help already installed, uninstall it first.
>
> Now you can modify any .rst file in /mainline/source directory or the
> images in the /mainline/images directory,
>
> and to create the html files, you only need do:
>
>
> make html
>
> * In Sugar
> You don’t need to restart the activity to see the changes, can do click
> with the secondary button, and select reload.
>
>
> * In any other Linux environment
> The output of make html is in /mainline/html, and is opened by opening
> index.html in a browser, it is easy to see the changes as you work.
>
>
> * Features
> Help already allows internationalisation of the content.
>
> *Next steps*
> ------------
>
> I think this is a really good way of producing documentation in the field.
>
> But it has taken me three weeks to get to the point where I can contribute!
> On my hard drive, I have a variant of the above, that I would like to
> sell to you as "Help Doers Kit".
>
> *Help Doers Kit*
> ----------------
>
> I replaced the "regular" index, with one containing "Help Doers Kit",
> which is about 4 pages I have written, containing:
>
> all I know about How To write and contribute to Activity Help
> an improving version of the content of this e-mail
> a sandbox.
> I have already used it to start to create some New-to-Sugar, pages which
> I hope to submit in due course.
>
> The Help Doers Kit allows someone with no coding experience,
>         * to practice on the software,
>         * to start to write documentation from scratch,
>         * to write self-help pages, which remain in the users copy of Help,
>         * to edit existing Help pages, and have them patched into the next Help Activity,
>         * to develop the Help Doers Kit itself,
>         * to have a common low-tech platform for collaboration,
>         * to develop the Help Activity's look, feel, and features,
>         * to, potentially, write attractive documentation available to
>         distribute as .html web pages, or How_to_change_the_world.xo
>
>
> Would there be any market for Help Doers Kit, and what should I do next?

How about advertising with a link from the Sugar Labs wiki home page?

-walter
>
> Iain Brown Douglas
> aka inkyfingers
>
>
>
>
>
>
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-- 
Walter Bender
Sugar Labs
http://www.sugarlabs.org