Re: Rules on my PalmOS handheld

["boardgamesbook" <dhohls@...>]

--- In piecepack@yahoogroups.com, "Iain Cheyne" <news@c...> wrote:
> --- In piecepack@yahoogroups.com, "boardgamesbook" <dhohls@c...> 
> wrote:
> > --- In piecepack@yahoogroups.com, "Iain Cheyne" <news@c...> wrote:
> PDF is terrible from a usability point of view: 
> www.useit.com/alertbox/20030714.html
> 
> Acrobat reader is free, but it is bloatware. It is a huge download, 
> takes forever to load up and is a nightmware with PDAs. I am not 
> aware of how else you can view PDFs. Certainly Acrobat Reader is
> very unpopular on news:alt.comp.freeware.
> 
> > Overall, I would ask people to consider my proposal for the XML 
> > option; 
> XML is the best option from an idealistic point of view and for 
> viewing, but how do you propose that regular computer users edit
> XML files?

I am not sure the piecepack forum is the place to get into a long 
debate about the pros and cons of PDF.  Suffice to say that many of 
points you raise about PDF apply just as strongly - if not more so - 
to something like Word (and many of its equivalents, be they 
commercial or open source).

The point here is that if we want to create content that can 
genuinely be repurposed for different media, be they 'small screens' 
or high quality print, then storage in an XML format is not 
just "idealistic", it is in fact "ideal".  This is not just a 
personal feeling, but a strongly held view in the broader IT and 
publishing industry.

As for the issue of creating XML; at work I have had to teach non-
technical people with minimal computing skills (and, no, I don't 
include using Word as a "skill") how to create XML for websites... I 
would far rather have had do that than to have shown them HTML, for 
example!  The available tools for creating XML are many and varied - 
right from a simple text editor (notepad, vi, whatever) to full-blown 
commercial packages... and increasing every month - enough to cater 
for almost anyone's taste.  A number of the more substantial 
offerings include direct support for DocBook (which is why I 
suggested it), and this is fast becoming almost the 'de facto' 
standard for document-orientated XML.  

As I said in the previous email, I am happy to offer some time and 
effort to get this process going, as I believe it will "add value" to 
the piecepack system - please excuse the "biz speak"!

Derek