[FM Discuss] When to use FLOSS Manuals and when it's not the best tool / platform? your opinions

[Helen Varley Jamieson]

hi mick, & everyone :)

we are still using UpStage v3 & still using the manual, even though it's
out of date & i simply have no time to update it ... we are now
(slowly!) working on a complete rebuild of the platform, which is going
to result in the need for a completely new manual, but until we are much
further along with that we aren't ready to start the manual. (in case
anyone on this list is interested, see https://upstage.org.nz/ and
https://github.com/upstage-org/limelight)

this chapter is an important one to have in the manual, right up front.
for me i would say that the two most important reasons for using FM have
been around remote collaboration - since our community are all over the
world, it's important to have one central editable repository for the
manual that multiple people can easily access and edit. & the other is
accessibiliity - it's easy to share the link, to download as pdf or
print out for workshop situations, & generally easy for complete newbies
to find the information they need in the manual. in this respect it's
better than wikis, which are not so easy to print out sections from (in
my experience) & can sometimes be off-putting to less geeky people, for
both reading & editing.

other than that, the community around FM is important for me as an
editor; being able to ask questions & get support & importantly to be
involved in the platform itself - owning our tools is important for me,
& as awareness grows around the politics of tech giants i hope this will
be important for more people out there.

h : )


>
> Hi there,
>
> For the FLOSS Manual Manual update, It would be great to get people's
> experiences of when a platform like BookType that FM uses is the best
> option for an individual to use for documentation, and when other tools
> are a better fit.
>
> Times have changed and when Adam Hyde FM started there was really
> nothing out there like it in terms of flexibility and ease of use for
> documentation. Now there are quite a few alternatives.
>
> * https://readthedocs.org/ (in combination with
> https://www.sphinx-doc.org/_
> * git books - and git pages - https://www.gitbook.com/
> * some kind of static site generator using Jamstack / Hugo / Jekyll or
> similar using mark-up source files
> * other solutions
>
> I'd be interested to know if people on this list who used to use FLOSS
> Manuals but now use something else would like to comment on the pros and
> cos. The purpose is to write a chapter that helps people evaluate if FM
> is the right place for them. Some of the factors might be...
>
> * ease of use, pros and cos of using WYSIWYG
> * limits to version control
> * translations
> * issues around communities and particular needs / expectations
>
> One thing, it would be great not to focus on past / current issues of
> using BookType. If you have bug reports or feature requests it would be
> great to put them here instead.
> https://gitlab.com/flossmanuals/fm_booktype
>
> But even if there's an overlap, then please chip in!
>
> nice one!
>
> Mick
>
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-- 

helen varley jamieson

helen at creative-catalyst.com <mailto:helen at creative-catalyst.com>
http://www.creative-catalyst.com
http://www.upstage.org.nz

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