[Zope] Structured text is inconvenient esp. w BackTalk

[Asad Quraishi]

Thanks Chris,

The reason I am trying to use OO vs. something like emacs is that as we 
propose the use of Zope/Plone to our clients we want to offer them a 
solution which they will understand in the context of a world of word 
processors.  It is difficult for someone to convert their word 
processor-based training manuals, for example, into a BackTalk book 
based on how structured text works.  I don't mind emacs but clients 
won't feel quite as comfortable.

Any thoughts on this?

Chris McDonough wrote:

>Structured text has some well-known idiosyncrasies.  One of these is
>that a body paragraph is defined as a block of lines followed by a
>carriage return where each line is indented to the same number of
>characters.  Another is that a "heading" is defined as a single line of
>text followed by a carriage return and a further-indented block of
>text.  Your examples show that you've created something that you think
>is a body paragraph, although structured text rules consider it a
>heading because it has no line breaks.  Structured text has these
>idiosyncrasies because one of its tenets is that its source should be as
>"human-readable" as its rendering.
>
>For an example of "correct" structured text formatting, see
>http://www.zope.org/Documentation/Books/ZopeBook/2_6Edition/ScriptingZope.stx/document_src (and its rendering at http://www.zope.org/Documentation/Books/ZopeBook/2_6Edition/ScriptingZope.stx).
>
>You're not doing anything wrong, really, but BackTalk does make the
>assumption that you are willing to author your content in structured
>text (this is mentioned prominently in the docs).  If you step outside
>the bounds of structured text, your formatting will suffer, as you've
>found out.  I'd suggest using an indent-aware text editor instead of
>OpenOffice.  I use emacs in "indented-text-mode" via External Editor. 
>BackTalk can also create PDFs, so if you're comfortable with editing
>like this, you can deliver PDFs to your customer instead of .doc files. 
>On the other hand, if structured text is hamstringing you, you might
>want to consider using something other than BackTalk, because it's
>nontrivial to teach it to use an input format different than structured
>text.
>
>On Wed, 2003-02-26 at 10:49, Asad Quraishi wrote:
>  
>
>>Here's the application:
>>
>>We have Zope and Plone installed and working for some months.  We also 
>>installed BackTalk and CMFBackTalk in order to publish docs with inline 
>>comments in Plone.  Works but there must be a better way.  Let me explain:
>>
>>We create our documents in OpenOffice (OO) and then cut and paste them 
>>into stx docs.  This works fine.  However to use stx you have to indent 
>>each heading/content level.  I can do this in a paragraph indent 
>>scenario like this with a BackTalk comment example:
>>--------
>>This is a Heading
>>
>>    This paragraph has the first line indented but all of the other 
>>lines will wrap
>>over to start flush with the margine.  This is how it should work so 
>>that I can
>>cut my content after commenting and paste in back in my OO doc.  It also
>>turns 'This is a Heading' into a heading.  I can continue with first 
>>line indents in
>>order to generate different heading levels.<p>
>>
>>  % this is a comment
>>--------
>>
>>When I do this, first of all I don't get a comment icon unless I break 
>>the rules (i.e. no inline html) and enter a <p> at the end of the 
>>paragraph where I want it.  However this creates another problem.  Once 
>>the comment is entered, since it is indented it makes the paragraph 
>>above it a heading.  It also removes the comment icon once a comment is 
>>entered.
>>
>>However if I do this:
>>------------
>>This is a Heading
>>
>>     The paragraph following is created by indenting the entire 
>>paragraph / and
>>     having to enter CR's at the end of each line.  Boy this makes it a 
>>pain to
>>     enter the text into word processor afterwards.
>>
>>        % the comment is indented again but doesn't turn the above paragraph
>>        into a heading
>>-----------
>>
>>This works.  The paragraph above the comment doesn't become a heading 
>>and the comment icon remains meaning I can enter as many comments for 
>>one paragraph as I like.  This really sucks when I want to paste it back 
>>into OO.
>>
>>What am I doing wrong?  Is our process wrong?  i.e. "create doc in OO -> 
>>copy to stx -> comment with BackTalk --> copy back to OO for formatting 
>>and delivery to client as .doc"
>>
>>Thanks.
>>
>>- Asad
>>
>>
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>
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