Re: FAQs: What to do?

On Wed, 31 Mar 1999 01:32:32 +0200, Veronica Karlsson (aci...@earthling.net) wrote:
: The HTML of the main body of content, yes. But if I find something like:
: <a name="figlet"></a>
: <h3>What is Figlet?</h3>
: I WILL change that to:
: <h3><a name="figlet">What is Figlet?</a></h3>
: (or if I find a <font> tag in there that too will get snipped out...)

Yes, I'd prefer to do so too, but I'd probably mail the author of the
document and ask for a fix/compromise to be made. If they refused, then
I'd have to think about whether I want to have that document on my site.

: What I think the FAQ people should do is provide the middle part, the
: content, and let each person put whatever top and end part on as they
: like.
: Here's an example of what I mean:
: http://www.ludd.luth.se/~vk/pics/temp/example.html

Ok, I can completely agree with that. As long as the top and bottom parts
don't make the middle part harder to view, I have nothing against that. Of
course, the less the better. (Explicit reminder: my opinions don't count,
except as advice, as long as I'm not the author.)

: If the author insists on any specific colours, etc, I will not be part
: of this "mirroring" business.

That is up to you. The way I see it, the author can refuse to have their
work changed, and the site owner can refuse to host the document. Of
course I hope that no such disagreements appear, but if they do then it's
a take-it-or-leave-it situation.

I do hope that the FAQ authors will not insist on colored text, but if
they actually have some valid reason for that, I'd probably accept it on
my site. OTOH, I see _no_ valid reason for mirror providers to ever insist
on a specific text color.


I suppose what we're both advocating here is moderation and compromise.
It is obvious that the FAQs should be targeted to the widest possible
range of readers. This might mean making different versions, but IMHO it
should be accomplished by making the documents generic enough that no such
variations are needed.

The base FAQs should be written (as much as possible) so, that every
potential mirror provider can accept them on their site. I believe that
this is identical with the previous goal. In turn the modifications to the
mirrors should be small enough that all the mirrors can be considered
identical by the reader.

We can have several identical copies, and several slightly modified ones,
but if we ever do have a green-flyspeck-on-a-starfield version, it should
at the very least be clearly marked as such.


This thread needs ObAscii.. I apparently have yet to reach the top of
Illiad's fan mail queue, but I doubt he'll mind me plugging User Friendly
(http://www.userfriendly.org/) by posting this ascii of the Dust Puppy:

           .`:;ij;f,;,
        .`;sk568G6itz,-",
      .\a\x6P^98^"^986r/,-'
    -._sV89"   "    `88k,-_"
   `.-\Q8f           188/,-',
   .-_J88|    o o    |88KJ-_.
   ,-;388l           j888[=-
   _".>88Y6._ ,J.__.4988E:._"
   .;=J98|  T"^T^"T  |88K;-._
    _"Z38|._|_ | _|_.|88R=;.
     .'/2l. | """ | ,j8S^._"
     '"j^7Z6bouuuod3R^L`-.
       ,'./jQV9TYVR\[\`".
          '|'|! |'|`. "
          ./ l  | \
        .'_ _.\ j, `._,.
       (_)_)._) (_.__,._)

-- 
<-- Ilmari Karonen --><-- http://www.sci.fi/~iltzu/ --><-- ilt...@sci.fi -->
"I am a student at UC Berkeley, and I am taking this class where we have to
go to a news group and ask an "intelligent question"."  -- a luser in a.a-a

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