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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<html><head><title>The GNOME Handbook of Writing Software Documentation</title><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.40"/></head><body bgcolor="white" text="black" link="#0000FF" vlink="#840084" alink="#0000FF"><div class="article"><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title"><a name="index"/>The GNOME Handbook of Writing Software Documentation</h2></div><div><h3 class="author">David Mason</h3><div class="affiliation"><span class="orgname">Red Hat, Inc.<br/></span><div class="address"><br/>
<tt><<a href="mailto:dcm@redhat.com">dcm@redhat.com</a>></tt><br/>
</div></div><h3 class="author">Daniel Mueth</h3><div class="affiliation"><div class="address"><br/>
<tt><<a href="mailto:d-mueth@uchicago.edu">d-mueth@uchicago.edu</a>></tt><br/>
</div></div><h3 class="author">Alexander Kirillov</h3><div class="affiliation"><div class="address"><br/>
<tt><<a href="mailto:kirillov@math.sunysb.edu">kirillov@math.sunysb.edu</a>></tt><br/>
</div></div></div><div><p class="releaseinfo">
This is a pre-release!
</p></div><div><p class="copyright">Copyright © 2000 Red Hat, Inc., Daniel Mueth, and Alexander Kirillov</p></div><div><div class="legalnotice"><p>
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this
document under the terms of the <i>GNU Free Documentation
License</i>, Version 1.1 or any later version published
by the Free Software Foundation with no Invariant Sections, no
Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. You may obtain a copy
of the <i>GNU Free Documentation License</i> from
the Free Software Foundation by visiting <a href="http://www.fsf.org" target="_top">their Web site</a> or by writing to:
Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330,
Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
</p><p>
Many of the names used by companies to distinguish their products and
services are claimed as trademarks. Where those names appear in any
GNOME documentation, and those trademarks are made aware to the members
of the GNOME Documentation Project, the names have been printed in caps
or initial caps.
</p></div></div><div><div class="revhistory"><table border="1" width="100%" summary="Revision history"><tr><th align="left" valign="top" colspan="2"><b>Revision History</b></th></tr><tr><td align="left">Revision
0.99
</td><td align="left">
04.10.2000
</td></tr></table></div></div><hr/></div><div class="toc"><p><b>Table of Contents</b></p><dl><dt> <a href="#intro">Introduction</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#gdp">The GNOME Documentation Project</a></dt><dt> <a href="#notation">Notation and Conventions</a></dt><dt> <a href="#about">About This Handbook</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#gettingstarted">Getting Started Writing GNOME Documentation</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#selecting">Selecting A Document</a></dt><dt> <a href="#docbook">Installing and Using DocBook</a></dt><dt> <a href="#gdptemplates">GDP Document Templates</a></dt><dt> <a href="#screenshots">Screenshots</a></dt><dt> <a href="#applicationbugs">Application Bugs</a></dt><dt> <a href="#cvs">Using CVS</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#gnomedocsystem">The GNOME Documentation System</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#gnomehelpbrowser">The GNOME Help Browser</a></dt><dt> <a href="#gnomehelpbrowser2">The GNOME Help Browser (GNOME-2.0)</a></dt><dt> <a href="#gnomehelponthefly">Dynamic Document Synthesis(GNOME-2.0)</a></dt><dt> <a href="#gnomehelpcomponents">The GNOME Documentation Components</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#docbookbasics">DocBook Basics </a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#introtodocbook">Introduction to DocBook</a></dt><dt> <a href="#xml">XML and SGML</a></dt><dt> <a href="#structure"> Structure Elements</a></dt><dt> <a href="#inline">Inline Elements</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#conventions">GDP Documentation Conventions </a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#conventionsalldocs">Conventions for All GDP Documentation</a></dt><dt> <a href="#conventionsappdocs">Conventions for Application Documentation</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#writingapplicationmanuals">Writing Application and Applet Manuals</a></dt><dt> <a href="#listingdocsinhelpmenu">Listing Documents in the Help Menu</a></dt><dt> <a href="#applicationhelpbuttons">Application Help Buttons</a></dt><dt> <a href="#packagingappletdocs">Packaging Applet Documentation</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#appletfiles">Applet Documentation Files</a></dt><dt> <a href="#appletmenu">Adding Documentation to an Applet Menu</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#writingcontextsensitivehelp">Writing Context Sensitive Help (coming in GNOME-2.0)</a></dt><dt> <a href="#referring">Referring to Other GNOME Documentation (coming in
GNOME-2.0)</a></dt><dt> <a href="#basics">Basics of Documentation Style</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#styleplanning">Planning</a></dt><dt> <a href="#balance">Achieving a Balanced Style</a></dt><dt> <a href="#stylestructure">Structure</a></dt><dt> <a href="#stylegrammar">Grammar and Spelling</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#teamwork">Teamwork</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#teamworkgdp">Working With The GDP Team</a></dt><dt> <a href="#teamworkdevelopers">Working With Developers</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#finishing">Finishing A Document</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#editting">Editing The Document</a></dt><dt> <a href="#submitting">Submitting The Document</a></dt></dl></dd><dt> <a href="#resources">Resources</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#resourcesweb">Resources On The Web</a></dt><dt> <a href="#resourcesbooks">Books</a></dt><dt> <a href="#mailinglists">Mailing Lists</a></dt><dt> <a href="#irc">IRC</a></dt></dl></dd><dt>A <a href="#templates">Document Templates</a></dt><dd><dl><dt> <a href="#template1">Template 1: Application Manual</a></dt><dt> <a href="#template2-1x">Template 2: Applet Manual For GNOME 1.x</a></dt><dt> <a href="#template2-2x">Template 2: Applet Manual For GNOME 2.x</a></dt></dl></dd></dl></div><div class="sect1"><a name="intro"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="intro"/>Introduction</h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="gdp"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="gdp"/>The GNOME Documentation Project</h3></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="goals"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="goals"/>Goals</h4></div></div><p>
The GNOME Documentation Project (GDP) aims to provide GNOME
and GNOME applications with a complete, intuitive, and clear
documentation system. At the center of the GDP is the
GNOME Help Browser, which
presents a unified interface to GNOME-specific documentation
as well as other Linux documentation such as man pages and
texinfo documents. The GNOME Help System provides a
comprehensive view of documentation on a machine by
dynamically assembling the documentation of GNOME
applications and components which are installed. The GDP is
responsible for writing numerous GNOME-related documents,
both for developers and for users. Developer documentation
includes <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/doc/API/" target="_top">APIs for the GNOME libraries</a>, <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/doc/whitepapers/" target="_top"><i>GNOME White
Papers</i></a>, GNOME developer <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/doc/tutorials/" target="_top">tutorials</a>, the <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/doc/FAQ/" target="_top"><i>GNOME Developer
FAQ</i></a>, the <a href="http://developer.gnome.org" target="_top">GNOME
Developer's Website</a>, and <i>GNOME
Handbook</i>'s, such as the one you are reading.
User documentation include the <a href="http://www.gnome.org/learn/" target="_top"><i>GNOME User's
Guide</i></a>, the <a href="http://www.gnome.org/learn/" target="_top"><i>GNOME FAQ</i></a>, and
GNOME application documentation. Most GNOME applications
have their own manual in addition to context sensitive help.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="joining"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="joining"/>Joining the GDP</h4></div></div><p>
Documenting GNOME and all the numerous GNOME applications is
a very large project. The GDP is always looking for people
to help write, update, and edit documentation. If you are
interested in joining the GDP team, you should join the
<a href="http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-doc-list/" target="_top">
<i>gnome-doc-list mailing list</i> </a>.
Read <a href="#gettingstarted" title="Getting Started Writing GNOME Documentation">the section called “Getting Started Writing GNOME Documentation”</a>, for help selecting a
project to work on. Feel free to introduce yourself on the
gnome-doc-list mailing list and indicate which project you
intend to work on, or else ask for suggestions of important
documents which need work done. You may also want to join the
#docs IRC channel on irc.gnome.org to meet other GDP members
and discuss any questions you may have. For a list of GDP
projects and members, see the
<a href="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp" target="_top">
<i>GDP Website</i></a>.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="collaborating"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="collaborating"/>Collaborating with the GDP</h4></div></div><p>
GNOME developers, packagers, and translators may not be
writing GNOME documentation but will want to understand how
the GNOME documentation system works and will need to
collaborate with GDP members. This document should help to
outline the structure of how the GNOME documentation system
works. Developers who do not write the documentation for
their applications are encouraged to find a GDP member to
write the documentation. This is best done by sending an
email to the <a href="http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-doc-list/" target="_top">
<i>gnome-doc-list mailing list</i> </a>
describing the application, where it can be downloaded from,
and that the developer(s) would like a GDP member to write
documentation for the application. The #docs IRC channel on
irc.gnome.org is another option for contacting GDP members.
</p></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="notation"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="notation"/>Notation and Conventions</h3></div></div><p>
This Handbook uses the following notation:
<div class="informaltable" id="id2416529"><a name="id2416529"/><table border="0"><colgroup><col/><col/></colgroup><tbody><tr><td><tt>/usr/bin</tt></td><td>
Directory
</td></tr><tr><td><tt>foo.sgml</tt></td><td>
Filename
</td></tr><tr><td><b>command</b></td><td>
Command or text that would be typed.
</td></tr><tr><td><b><i><tt>replaceable</tt></i></b></td><td>
"Variable" text that can be replaced.
</td></tr><tr><td><tt>Program or Doc Code</tt></td><td>Program or document code</td></tr></tbody></table></div>
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="about"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="about"/>About This Handbook</h3></div></div><p>
This Handbook is a guide for both writing documentation for
GNOME components and applications and for properly binding and
packaging documentation into GNOME applications.
</p><p>
This Handbook, like all GNOME documentation, was written in
DocBook(SGML) and is available in several formats including
SGML, HTML, PostScript, and PDF. For the latest version, see
<a href="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp/handbook.html" target="_top">
<i>Getting The GNOME Handbook of Writing Software
Documentation</i> </a>. Alternately, one may
download it anonymously from GNOME CVS under <tt>gnome-docu/gdp</tt>.
</p></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="gettingstarted"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="gettingstarted"/>Getting Started Writing GNOME Documentation</h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="selecting"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="selecting"/>Selecting A Document</h3></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="know"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="know"/>Document Something You Know</h4></div></div><p>
The most frequently asked question of new contributors who
join the GDP is "which document should I start
with?". Because most people involved are volunteers, we do
not <i>assign</i> projects and applications to
write documents for. The first step is all yours - you must
decide what about GNOME interests you most and find out if
it has complete documents or not.
</p><p>
It is also important to spend some time with GNOME to make
sure you are familiar enough with it to be
<i>authoritative</i> in your writing. The
best way to do this is to just sit down and play with GNOME
as much as possible before starting to write.
</p><p>
The easiest way to get started is to improve existing
documentation. If you notice some inaccuracies or omissions
in the documentation, or you think that you can explain the
material more clearly, just send your suggestions to the
author of the original documentation or to the GNOME
documentation project at <tt><<a href="mailto:docs@gnome.org">docs@gnome.org</a>></tt>.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="doctable"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="doctable"/>The GNOME Documentation Status Table</h4></div></div><p>
The <i>GDP Documentation Status Table</i>
(<i>DocTable</i>) (<a href="http://www.gnome.org/gdp/doctable/" target="_top">http://www.gnome.org/gdp/doctable/</a>) is a
web page which tracks the status of all the various
documentation components of GNOME. These components include
application documentation, internal GNOME component
documentation, user documentation, and developer
documentation. For each documentation item, it tracks the
current status of the documentation, who is working on the
particular document, where the documentation can be found,
and provides a forum for the discussion of each item.
</p><p>
You should use the <i>DocTable</i> to help
you select a documentation item which needs work done. Once
you have selected an item to work on, please register
yourself as an author so that other authors do not duplicate
your work and may contact you to help or offer suggestions.
Also be sure to keep the status icons up-to-date so that
the GDP team can easily identify which items need additional
help. The <i>DocTable</i> also allows
people to make announcements and suggestions and to discuss
issues in the comments section.
</p><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2412924"/>Note</h3><p>
Note that the information in the
<i>DocTable</i> may not always be up-to-date
or accurate. When you assign yourself to documenting an
application, make sure you find out the latest status of
documentation by contacting the application author.
</p></div></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="docbook"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="docbook"/>Installing and Using DocBook</h3></div></div><p>
All documentation for the GNOME project is written in SGML
using the DocBook DTD. There are many advantages to using
this for documentation, not least of which is the single
source nature of SGML. To contribute to the GDP you should
learn to use DocBook.
</p><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2412986"/>NOTE</h3><p>
To get started writing for the GDP you do not need to rush
out and learn DocBook - if you feel it is too much to handle
for now, you can submit plain ASCII text to the <a href="http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-doc-list/" target="_top">
<i>gnome-doc-list mailing list</i>
</a>and a volunteer will mark it up for you. Seeing your
document marked up will also be a great way for you to start
learning DocBook.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="installingdocbook"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="installingdocbook"/>Installing DocBook</h4></div></div><p>
Download and install the following <a href="ftp://sourceware.cygnus.com:/pub/docbook-tools/" target="_top">DocBook Tools packages</a>: jade, docbook,
jadetex, sgml-common, and stylesheets. (RPM users should note
that jade is platform dependent (eg. i386), while the other packages
are in the <tt>noarch</tt>
directory.) You can find more
information on DocBook Tools <a href=" http://sourceware.cygnus.com/docbook-tools/" target="_top">here</a>.
</p><p>
If you are an Emacs user you may
want to grab the psgml package as well. This is a major mode
for editing sgml files in Emacs.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="gdpstylesheets"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="gdpstylesheets"/>GDP Stylesheets</h4></div></div><p>
The GDP uses its own DocBook stylesheets. To use the GDP
stylesheets, you should download the file
<tt>gdp-both.dsl</tt> from the <tt>gnome-docu/gdp/dsssl</tt> module in
CVS (or from <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp/stylesheets.html" target="_top">
GDP Custom DSSSL Stylesheet</a>)and copy it
over the file
<tt>/usr/lib/sgml/stylesheets/cygnus-both.dsl</tt>.
Alternately, you can download and install the
<a href="http://people.redhat.com/dcm/software.html" target="_top">gnome-doc-tools package</a> which will set
up the stylesheets as well as the DTD discussed below.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="gdpdtd"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="gdpdtd"/>GDP DTD (PNG Image Support)</h4></div></div><p>
Due to some license issues involved with the creation of
gifs, the GNOME Documentation Project has decided to use the
PNG image format for all images in GNOME documentation. You
can read more about the issues involved with gifs at <a href="http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.html" target="_top">http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.html</a>.
</p><p>
The current DocBook DTD(3.1) does not include support for
embedding PNG images in your documents. Since the GDP uses
many screenshots in its documentation, we use our own
variation on the DocBook DTD which has PNG image support.
We encourage everybody to use this DTD instead of the
default DocBook DTD since your source document header and
your output document appearance subtly vary between the two
DTD's. To install the GDP custom DTD with PNG image support
by hand:
</p><div class="itemizedlist"><ul><li style="list-style-type: opencircle"><p><a name="id2413298"/>
Download <a href="http://www.labs.redhat.com/png/png-support.html" target="_top">the
GDP DocBook DTD for PNG support</a> and install it
where you keep your DTD's. (On Red Hat use <tt>/usr/lib/sgml/</tt>.) Note that
the 3.0 DTD is missing support for the
<tt><legalnotice></tt> tag, so it is
recommended that you use version 3.1
</p></li><li style="list-style-type: disc"><p><a name="id2413345"/>
Add the new DTD to your SGML CATALOG file. The location
of your SGML CATALOG file may vary depending upon your
distribution. (On Red Hat it is usually in
/usr/lib/sgml/CATALOG.) Add the following line to this
file:
<pre class="programlisting">
PUBLIC "-//GNOME//DTD DocBook PNG Variant V1.0//EN" "png-support-3.0.dtd"
</pre>
If you are using the 3.1 DTD, use:
<pre class="programlisting">
PUBLIC "-//GNOME//DTD DocBook PNG Variant V1.1//EN" "png-support-3.1.dtd"
</pre>
</p></li></ul></div><p>
Alternately, you can download and install the
<a href="http://people.redhat.com/dcm/software.html" target="_top">gnome-doc-tools package</a> which will set
up the custom stylesheets and DTD for you.
</p><p>
To include PNG files in your documents, you will need to
indicate that you are using this special DTD. To do
this, use the following headers:
</p><p>
Articles:
<pre class="programlisting">
<!DOCTYPE Article PUBLIC "-//GNOME//DTD DocBook PNG Variant
V1.1//EN"[]>
</pre>
</p><p>
Books:
<pre class="programlisting">
<!DOCTYPE Book PUBLIC "-//GNOME//DTD DocBook PNG Variant
V1.1//EN"[]>
</pre>
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="editors"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="editors"/>Editors</h4></div></div><p>
There are many editors on Linux and UNIX systems available
to you. Which editor you use to work on the sgml documents
is completely up to you, as long as the editor is able to
preserve sgml and produce the source in a format that is
readable by everyone.
</p><p>
Probably the two most popular editors available are
Emacs and
vi. These and other editors are
used regularly by members of the GDP. Emacs has a major
mode, psgml, for editing sgml files which can save you time
and effort in adding and closing tags. You will find the
psgml package in DocBook Tools, which is the standard set of
tools for the GDP. You may find out more about DocBook Tools
in <a href="#installingdocbook" title="Installing DocBook">the section called “Installing DocBook”</a>.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="make-output"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="make-output"/>Creating Something Useful with your Docs</h4></div></div><p>
The tools available in DocBook Tools allow you to convert
your sgml document to many different formats including html
and Postscript. The primary tool used to do the conversion
is an application called Jade. In
most cases you will not have to work directly with
Jade; Instead, you will use the
scripts provided by DocBook Tools.
</p><p>
To preview your DocBook document, it is easiest to convert
it to <tt>html</tt>. If you have installed the
DocBook tools described above, all you have to do is to run
the command <tt>$</tt><b>db2html
mydocument.sgml</b>. If there are no sgml syntax
errors, this will create a directory <tt>mydocument</tt> and place the
resulting html files in it. The title page of the document
will typically be
<tt>mydocument/index.html</tt>. If you have
screenshots in your document, you will have to copy these
files into the <tt>mydocument</tt> directory by
hand. You can use any web browser to view your document.
Note that every time you run <b>db2html</b>, it
creates the <tt>mydocument</tt> directory over, so
you will have to copy the screenshots over each time.
</p><p>
You can also convert your document to PostScript by running
the command <tt>$</tt><b>db2ps
mydocument.sgml</b>, after which you can print out or
view the resulting .ps file.
</p><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2413716"/>NOTE</h3><p>
The html files you get will not look quite the same as the
documentation distributed with GNOME unless you have the
custom stylesheets installed on your machine. DocBook
Tools' default stylesheets will produce a different look
to your docs. You can read more about the GDP stylesheets
in <a href="#gdpstylesheets" title="GDP Stylesheets">the section called “GDP Stylesheets”</a>.
</p></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="jadeimages"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="jadeimages"/>Images in DocBook Tools</h4></div></div><p>
If your document uses images you will need to take note of a
few things that should take place in order for you to make
use of those images in your output.
</p><p>
The DocBook Tools scripts and applications are smart enough
to know that when you are creating html you will be using
PNG files and when you are creating Postscript you will be
using EPS files (you must use EPS with Postscript).
</p><p>
Thus, you should never explicitly
include the extension of the image file, since DocBook
Tools will automatically insert it for you. For example:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
<figure>
<title>My Image</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>Sample GNOME Display</screeninfo>
<graphic format="png" fileref="myfile" srccredit="me">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
</pre><p>
You will notice in this example that the file
<tt>myfile.png</tt> was referred to as simply
<tt>myfile</tt>. Now when you run
<b>db2html</b> to create an html file, it will
automatically look for <tt>myfile.png</tt> in
the directory.
</p><p>
If you want to create PostScript ouput, you will need to create an
EPS version of your image file to be displayed in the
PostScript file. There is a simple script available which
allows you to change a PNG image into an EPS file
easily. You can download this file - img2eps - from <a href="http://people.redhat.com/dcm/sgml.html" target="_top">http://people.redhat.com/dcm/sgml.html</a>
(look for the img2eps section). Note that this script is
included in the gnome-doc-tools package, so if you are using
this package, you should already have
<b>img2eps</b> on you system.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="moredocbookinfo"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="moredocbookinfo"/>Learning DocBook</h4></div></div><p>
There are many resources available to help you learn DocBook.
The following resources on the web are useful for learning
DocBook:
</p><div class="itemizedlist"><ul><li style="list-style-type: disc"><p><a name="id2413930"/>
<a href="http://www.docbook.org" target="_top">http://www.docbook.org</a> - Norman
Walsh's <i>DocBook: The Definitive
Guide</i>. Online O'Reilly book on using
DocBook. Contains an excellent element reference. May be
too formal for a beginner.
</p></li><li style="list-style-type: disc"><p><a name="id2413963"/>
<a href="http://www.oswg.org/oswg-nightly/oswg/en_US.ISO_8859-1/articles/DocBook-Intro/docbook-intro/index.html" target="_top">A Practical Introduction to DocBook</a>
- The Open Source Writers Group's introduction to using
DocBook. This is an excellent HOW-TO type article on
getting started.
</p></li><li style="list-style-type: disc"><p><a name="id2413992"/>
<a href="http://nis-www.lanl.gov/~rosalia/mydocs/docbook-intro/docbook-intro.html" target="_top">Getting Going with DocBook: Notes for
Hackers</a> - Mark Galassi's introduction to DocBook
for hackers. This has to be one of the first
introductions to DocBook ever - still as good as it ever
was.
</p></li><li style="list-style-type: disc"><p><a name="id2527122"/>
<a href="http://www.freebsd.org/tutorials/docproj-primer/" target="_top">
FreeBSD Documentation Project Primer for New
Contributors</a> - FreeBSD documentation project
primer. Chapter 4.2 provides a very good introduction to
writing documentation using DocBook. Note that it also
describes some custom extensions of DocBook;
fortunately, they are clearly marked as such.
</p></li></ul></div><p>
Norman Walsh's book is also available in print.
</p><p>
The following sections of this document are designed to help
documentation authors write correct and consistent DocBook:
</p><div class="itemizedlist"><ul><li style="list-style-type: disc"><p><a name="id2527176"/>
<a href="#docbookbasics" title="DocBook Basics ">the section called “DocBook Basics ”</a> - Descriptions of
commonly used DocBook tags.
</p></li></ul></div><p>
You may also discuss specific DocBook questions with GDP
members on the #docs IRC channel at irc.gnome.org and on the
gnome-doc-list mailing list.
</p></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="gdptemplates"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="gdptemplates"/>GDP Document Templates</h3></div></div><p>
Templates for various types of GNOME documents are found in
<a href="#templates" title="A. Document Templates">Appendix A. Document Templates</a>. They are kept in CVS in
gnome-docu/gdp/templates. The easiest source to get them from
is probably the <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp/templates.html" target="_top">GDP
Document Templates</a> web page, which is typically kept
completely up-to-date with CVS and has a basic description of
each file from CVS.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="screenshots"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="screenshots"/>Screenshots</h3></div></div><p>
Most GNOME documents will have screenshots of the particular
applet, application, GNOME component, or widget being
discussed. As discussed above in <a href="#gdpdtd" title="GDP DTD (PNG Image Support)">the section called “GDP DTD (PNG Image Support)”</a> you
will need to install the special GDP DocBook DTD which
supports PNG images, the format used for all images in GNOME
documentation. For the basic DocBook structure used to insert
images in a document, see <a href="#jadeimages" title="Images in DocBook Tools">the section called “Images in DocBook Tools”</a> above.
</p><div class="sect3"><a name="screenshotappearance"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="screenshotappearance"/>Screenshot Appearance</h4></div></div><p>
For all screenshots of windows that typically have border
decorations (e.g. applications and dialogs, but not applets
in a panel), GDP standards dictate
the appearance of the window. (This is to minimize possible
confusion to the reader, improve the appearance of GNOME
documents, and guarantee the screenshot is readable when
printed.) All screenshots should be taken with the SawFish
(formerly known as Sawmill) window manager using the
MicroGui theme and Helvetica 12pt font. (A different window
manager can be used provided the MicroGui theme is available
for this window manager and the appearance is identical to
that when using the SawFish window manager.) The default
GTK+ theme(gtk) and font (Helvetica 12 pt) should be used
for all screenshots. If you are unable to provide
screenshots in this form, you should create screenshots as
you wish them to appear and send them to the
<a href="http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-doc-list/" target="_top">
<i>gnome-doc-list mailing list</i> </a>
requesting a GDP member reproduce these screenshots in the
correct format and email them to you.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="screenshottools"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="screenshottools"/>Screenshot Tools</h4></div></div><p>
There are many tools for taking screenshots in
GNOME/Linux. Perhaps the most convenient is the
Screen-Shooter Applet. Just click
on the window icon in the applet and then on the window you
would like to take a screenshot of. (Note that
at the time of this writing, PNG images taken by
screenshooter do not appear properly in
Netscape or the
GNOME Help Browser. You
should save your screenshot as a GIF and
then use <b>convert filename.gif
filename.png</b>.) For applets
in a Panel,
xv can be used to crop the
screenshot to only include the relevant portion of the
Panel. Note that
xv and
gimp can both be used for taking
screenshots, cropping screenshots, and converting image
formats.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="screenshotfiles"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="screenshotfiles"/>Screenshot Files</h4></div></div><p>
Screenshots should be kept in the main documentation
directory with your SGML file for applets, or should be
kept in a directory called "figs" for application and other
documentation. After you use <b>db2html</b> to
convert your SGML file to HTML (see <a href="#make-output" title="Creating Something Useful with your Docs">the section called “Creating Something Useful with your Docs”</a>), you will need to copy your
screenshots (either the individual PNG files for applet
documentation, or the whole "figs" directory for other
documentation) into the newly created HTML directory. Note
that every time you use <b>db2html</b> the HTML
directory is erased and rewritten, so do not store your only
copy of the screenshots in that directory. If you wish to
create PostScript or PDF output, you will need to manually
convert the PNG images to EPS as described in <a href="#jadeimages" title="Images in DocBook Tools">the section called “Images in DocBook Tools”</a>, but will not need to copy these
images from their default location, as they are included
directly into the output(PostScript of PDF) file.
</p></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="applicationbugs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="applicationbugs"/>Application Bugs</h3></div></div><p>
Documentation authors tend to investigate and test applets and
applications more thoroughly than most
users. Often documentation authors will discover one or
more bugs in the software. These bugs vary from small ones,
such as mis-spelled words or missing
About dialogs in the menu, to large
ones which cause the applet to crash. As all users, you
should be sure to report these bugs so that application
developers know of them and can fix them. The easiest way to
submit a bug report is by using the Bug
Buddy applet which is part of the gnome-applets
package.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="cvs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="cvs"/>Using CVS</h3></div></div><p>
CVS (Concurrent Versions System) is a tool that allows
multiple developers to concurrently work on a set of
documents, keeping track of the modifications made by each
person. The files are stored on a server and each developer
checks files out, modifies them, and then checks in their
modified version of the files. Many GNOME programs and
documents are stored in CVS. The GNOME CVS server allows
users to anonymously check out CVS files. Most GDP members
will need to use anonymous CVS to download the most up-to-date
version of documentation or programs. Modified documents will
typically be emailed to the the application developer. Core
GDP members may also be granted login CVS privileges so they
may commit modified files directly to CVS.
</p><div class="sect3"><a name="anonymouscvs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="anonymouscvs"/>Anonymous CVS</h4></div></div><p>
To anonymously check out documents from CVS, you must first
log in. From the bash shell, you should set your CVSROOT
shell variable with <b> export
CVSROOT=':pserver:anonymous@anoncvs.gnome.org:/cvs/gnome'</b>
and then login with <b>cvs login</b>(there is no
password, just hit return). As an example, we will use the
"gnome-docu/gdp" module which contains this and several
other documents. To check these documents out for the first
time, type <b>cvs -z3 checkout
gnome-docu/gdp</b>. After you have this document
checked out and you would like to download any updates on
the CVS server, use <b>cvs -z3 update -Pd</b>.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="logincvs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="logincvs"/>Login CVS</h4></div></div><p> If you have been given a
login for the GNOME CVS server, you may commit your file
modifications to CVS. Be sure to read the following section
on CVS etiquette before making any commits to CVS. To log in
to the CVS server as user
<b><i><tt>username</tt></i></b> with a
password, you must first set your CVSROOT shell variable with
<b> export
CVSROOT=':pserver:<i><tt>username</tt></i>@cvs.gnome.org:/cvs/gnome'</b>.
Log in with <b>cvs login</b> and enter your
password. You may check out and update modules as described
above for anonymous CVS access. As a login CVS user, you may
also check modified versions of a file into the CVS server.
To check
<b><i><tt>filename</tt></i></b> into
the CVS server, type <b>cvs -z3 commit
<i><tt>filename</tt></i></b>. You will be
given a vi editor window to type in a brief log entry,
summarizing your changes. The default editor can be changed
using the <tt>EDITOR</tt> environment variable or
with the <b><tt>-e</tt></b> option. You
may also check in any modifications to files in the working
directory and subdirectories using <b>cvs -z3
commit</b>. To
add a new file to the CVS server, use <b>cvs -z3 add
<i><tt>filename</tt></i></b>, followed by the
commit command.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="cvsetiquette"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="cvsetiquette"/>CVS Etiquette</h4></div></div><p>
Because files in CVS are typically used and modified by
multiple developers and documentation authors, users should
exercise a few simple practices out of courtesy towards the
other CVS users and the project leader. First, you should
not make CVS commits to a package without first discussing
your plans with the project leader. This way, the project
leader knows who is modifying the files and generally, what
sort of changes/development is being done. Also, whenever a
CVS user commits a file to CVS, they should make an entry in
the CVS log and in the <tt>ChangeLog</tt> so
that other users know who is making modifications and what
is being modified. When modifying files created by others,
you should follow the indentation scheme used by the initial
author.
</p></div></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="gnomedocsystem"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="gnomedocsystem"/>The GNOME Documentation System</h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="gnomehelpbrowser"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="gnomehelpbrowser"/>The GNOME Help Browser</h3></div></div><p>
At the core of the GNOME help system is the GNOME
Help Browser. The Help
Browser provides a unified interface to several
distinct documentation systems on Linux/Unix systems: man
pages, texinfo pages, Linux Documentation Project(LDP)
documents, GNOME application documentation, and other GNOME
documents.
</p><p>
The GNOME Help Browser works by
searching standard directories for documents which are to be
presented. Thus, the documentation that appears in the GHB is
specific to each computer and will typically only represent
software that is installed on the computer.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="gnomehelpbrowser2"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="gnomehelpbrowser2"/>The GNOME Help Browser (GNOME-2.0)</h3></div></div><p> In
GNOME 2.0, the GNOME Help Browser
will be replaced by Nautilus.
Nautilus will be the file manager/graphical shell for GNOME 2.0
and will also implement a more sophisticated help system than
that used by the GNOME Help Browser
used in GNOME 1.0. It will read and display DocBook files
directly, avoiding the need for duplicating documents in both
DocBook and HTML formats. Its display engine for DocBook will
be much faster than running jade to
convert to HTML for rendering. Because it uses the original
DocBook source for documentation, it will be possible to do more
sophisticated searching using the meta information included in
the documents. And since Nautilus is a virtual file system
layer which is Internet-capable, it will be able to find and
display documents which are on the web as well as those on the
local file system. For more information on
Nautilus, visit the #nautilus IRC
channel on irc.gnome.org. </p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="gnomehelponthefly"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="gnomehelponthefly"/>Dynamic Document Synthesis(GNOME-2.0)</h3></div></div><p>
GNOME uses the documentation presented by all the various
GNOME components and applications installed on the system to
present a complete and customized documentation environment
describing only components which are currently installed on a
users system. Some of this documentation, such as the manuals
for applets, will be combined in such a way that it appears to
be a single document.
</p><p>
By using such a system, you can be sure that any GNOME app you
install that has documentation will show up in the index,
table of contents, any search you do in the help browser.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="gnomehelpcomponents"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="gnomehelpcomponents"/>The GNOME Documentation Components</h3></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="applicationmanualsintro"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="applicationmanualsintro"/>Application Manuals</h4></div></div><p>
Every GNOME application should have an application manual.
An application manual is a document specific to the
particular application which explains the various windows
and features of the application. Application Manuals
typically use screenshots (PNG format) for clarity. Writing
application manuals is discussed in more detail in <a href="#writingapplicationmanuals" title="Writing Application and Applet Manuals">the section called “Writing Application and Applet Manuals”</a> below.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="applicationhelpintro"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="applicationhelpintro"/>Application Help</h4></div></div><p>
Applications should have a Help
button on screens on which users may need help. These
Help buttons should pull up the
default help browser, determined by the
<tt>ghelp</tt> URL Handler (configured using the
Control Center), typically the
GNOME Help Browser. The help
browser should show either the first page of the application
manual, or else the relevant page thereof. Application help
is described in more detail in <a href="#applicationhelpbuttons" title="Application Help Buttons">the section called “Application Help Buttons”</a> below.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="contextsensitivehelpintro"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="contextsensitivehelpintro"/>Application Context Sensitive Help (coming in
GNOME-2.0)</h4></div></div><p>
Context sensitive help is a system which will allow the user
to query any part (button, widget, etc.) of an application
window. This is done by either entering a CS Help mode by
clicking on an icon or by right clicking on the application
part and selecting "What's This" or whatever is decided on
at the time. Context sensitive help is described in more
detail in <a href="#writingcontextsensitivehelp" title="Writing Context Sensitive Help (coming in GNOME-2.0)">the section called “Writing Context Sensitive Help (coming in GNOME-2.0)”</a>
below.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="userguide"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="userguide"/>The GNOME User Guide</h4></div></div><p>
The <i>GNOME User Guide</i> describes the
GNOME desktop environment and core components of GNOME such
as the panel and
control center. In GNOME 1.x this
was the main and only source of documentation. In GNOME 2.0
this will become a document for the web and for printing
that is derived from various parts chosen in the system that
are necessary for the new user to understand.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="userdocs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="userdocs"/>User Documents</h4></div></div><p>
Aside from the <i>GNOME User Guide</i>,
there are several other documents to help GNOME users learn
GNOME, including the <i>GNOME FAQ</i>,
<i>GNOME Installation and Configuration
Guide</i>, and the <i>GNOME Administrators
Guide</i>.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="developerdocs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="developerdocs"/>Developer Documents</h4></div></div><p>
There are many White Papers, Tutorials, HOWTO's and FAQ's to
make programming GNOME and GNOME applications as easy as
possible.
</p><p>
API documentation is also available for the GNOME libraries. This is
detailed documentation of the code that is used to build GNOME
apps. You can keep up with the GNOME API docs on the <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/doc/API/" target="_top">GNOME API
Reference</a> page.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="projectdocs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="projectdocs"/>Project Documents</h4></div></div><p>
Some GNOME projects have documentation to maintain
consistency in their product and to help new contributors
get up to speed quickly. Among these are the GDP documents,
such as the one you are reading now.
</p></div></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="docbookbasics"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="docbookbasics"/>DocBook Basics </h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="introtodocbook"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="introtodocbook"/>Introduction to DocBook</h3></div></div><p>
To understand DocBook, a basic understanding of SGML is
helpful. SGML stands for Standard General Markup Language and
is one of the first markup languages every created. HTML is
actually derived from SGML and XML is a subset of SGML. SGML
uses what is called a Document Type Definition to specify
<i>elements</i> which are contained between
brackets, < and >. Text is marked by both beginning and
ending elements, for example in the DocBook DTD, one denotes a
title with <tt><title></tt>The
Title<tt></title></tt>.
</p><p>
The DTD (in the case of the GDP, DocBook) defines rules for how the
elements can be used. For example, if one element can only be used when
embedded within another, this is defined in the DTD.
</p><p>
An SGML file is just a plain ASCII file containing the text
with the markup specified above. To convert it to some easily
readable format, you need special tools. The GDP uses <i>DocBook
Tools</i>, a free package of utilities for working with DocBook
which includes <i>Jade</i>, which does the SGML/DSSL
parsing. You can read more about DocBook Tools in <a href="#installingdocbook" title="Installing DocBook">the section called “Installing DocBook”</a>.
</p><p>
The final appearance of the output (e.g. PostScript or HTML)
is determined by a
<i>stylesheet</i>. Stylesheets are files,
written in a special language (DSSSL -- Document Style
Semantics and Specification Language), which specify the
appearance of various DocBook elements, for example,
what fonts to use for titles and various inline elements, page
numbering style, and much more. DocBook tools come with a
collection of stylesheets (Norman Walsh's modular
stylesheets); GNOME Document Project uses some customized
version of this stylesheets -- see <a href="#gdpstylesheets" title="GDP Stylesheets">the section called “GDP Stylesheets”</a>.
</p><p>
The advantage of specifying the <i>structure</i>
of a document with SGML instead of specifying the
<i>appearance</i> of the document with a typical
word processor, or with html, is that the resulting document
can be processed in a variety of ways using the structural
information. Whereas formatting a document for appearance
assumes a medium (typically written text on a standard-sized
piece of paper), SGML can be processed to produce output for a
large variety of media such as text, postscript, HTML,
Braille, audio, and potentially many other formats.
</p><p>
Using 'content' as the elements to define the text of a document also
allows for search engines to make use of the actual elements to make a
"smarter search". For example, if you are searching for all documents
written by the author "Susie" your search engine could be made smart
enough to only search <author> elements, making for a faster and more
accurate search.
</p><p>
Since the overall appearance of the output is determined not by the DTD
or the SGML document, but rather by a stylesheet, the appearance of a
document can be easily changed just by changing the stylesheet. This
allows everyone in the project to create documents that all look the
same.
</p><p>
As stated before, the GDP uses the DocBook DTD. For a list of
introductory and reference resources on DocBook, see <a href="#resources" title="Resources">the section called “Resources”</a>. The following sections also provide
convenient instructions on which markup tags to use in various
circumstances. Be sure to read <a href="#conventions" title="GDP Documentation Conventions ">the section called “GDP Documentation Conventions ”</a>
for GDP documentation-specific guidelines.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="xml"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="xml"/>XML and SGML</h3></div></div><p> In not so distant future (probably before GNOME 2.0),
DocBook itself and GNOME Documentation project will migrate from
SGML to XML. This transition should be relatively painless:
(almost) all DocBook tags will remain the same. However, XML has
stricter syntax rules than SGML; thus, some constructions which
are valid in SGML will not be valid in XML. Therefore, to be
ready for this transistion, it is <i>strongly
advised</i> that the documentation writers conform to XML
syntax rules. Here are most important differences:
</p><div class="variablelist"><dl><dt><a name="id2529076"/><span class="term"> <i>Minimization</i></span></dt><dd><p><a name="id2529088"/>
It is possible with some implementations of SGML to use
minimizations to close elements in a document by using
</>, for example:
<tt><tt><title></tt>The
Title<tt></></tt></tt>. This is not
allowed in XML. You can use <b>sgmlnorm</b> command,
included in DocBook Tools package, to expand minimized tags;
if you are using Emacs with psgml
mode, you can also use menu command
Modify->Normalize.
</p></dd><dt><a name="id2529176"/><span class="term"> <i>Self-closing tags</i></span></dt><dd><p><a name="id2529188"/>
Also, in SGML some tags are allowed not to have closing
tags. For example, it is legal for
<tt><xref></tt> not to have a closing tag:
<tt><tt><xref
linkend="someid"></tt></tt>. In
XML, it is illegal; instead, you should use
<tt><tt><xref
linkend="someid"/></tt></tt> (note the
slash!).
</p></dd><dt><a name="id2529236"/><span class="term"> <i>Case sensitive tags</i></span></dt><dd><p><a name="id2529248"/>
In XML, unlike SGML, tags are case-senstive
<tt><title></tt> and
<tt><TITLE></tt> are different tags!
Therefore, please always use lowercase tags (except for
things like <tt>DOCTYPE, CDATA</tt> and
<tt>ENTITY</tt>, which are not DocBook tags).
</p></dd></dl></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="structure"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="structure"/> Structure Elements</h3></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="section"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="section"/>Sections and paragraphs</h4></div></div><p>
Top-level element of a book body must be
<tt><chapter></tt>; it may contain one or more
<tt><sect1></tt>, each of them may contain
<tt><sect2></tt> and so on up to
<tt><sect5></tt>. The top-level element of an
article body is always
<tt><sect1></tt>. Regardless of which elements
you use, give each structural element a unique id, so that
you can link to it. For usage example, see the template.
</p><p> Please try to avoid using deeply nested sections; for
most situations, <tt><sect1></tt> and
<tt><sect2></tt> should be sufficient. If not,
you probably should split your <tt><sect1></tt>
into several smaller ones.
</p><p> Use the tag <tt><para></tt> for
paragraphs, even if there is only one paragraph in a
section--see template for examples.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="notes"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="notes"/>Notes, Warnings, And Tips</h4></div></div><p>
For notes, tips, warnings, and important information, which
should be set apart from the main text (usually as a
paragraph with some warning sign on the margin), use tags
<tt><note></tt>, <tt><tip></tt>,
<tt><warning></tt>,
<tt><important></tt> respectively. For example:
<pre class="programlisting">
<tip>
<title>TIP</title>
<para>
To speed up program compilation, use <application>gcc</application>
compiler with Pentium optimization.
</para>
</tip> </pre> produces
</p><div class="tip" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="extip"/>TIP</h3><p>
To speed up program compilation, use
gcc compiler with Pentium
optimization. </p></div><p>
Note that this should not be inside a
<tt><para></tt> but between paragraphs.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="figures"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="figures"/> Screenshots and other figures</h4></div></div><p>
To include screenshots and other figures, use the following
tags:
<pre class="programlisting">
<figure id="shot1">
<title>Screenshot</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>Screenshot of a program</screeninfo>
<graphic format="PNG" fileref="figures/example_screenshot" srccredit="ME">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
</pre>
replacing <tt>example_screenshot</tt> with the
actual file name (without extension). The result will look like this:
<div class="figure"><p><a name="shot1"/><b>Figure 1. Screenshot</b></p><div class="screenshot"><p><img src="figures/example_screenshot"/></p></div></div>
</p><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2529626"/>NOTE</h3><p>
Notice in this example that the screenshot file name does
not include the file type extension -- to find out
why, please read <a href="#jadeimages" title="Images in DocBook Tools">the section called “Images in DocBook Tools”</a>.
</p></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="listing"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="listing"/>Program listings and terminal session</h4></div></div><p>
To show a file fragment--for example, program
listing--use <tt><programlisting></tt> tag:
<pre class="programlisting">
<programlisting>
[Desktop Entry]
Name=Gnumeric spreadsheet
Exec=gnumeric
Icon=gnome-gnumeric.png
Terminal=0
Type=Application
</programlisting>
</pre>
which produces
<pre class="programlisting">
[Desktop Entry]
Name=Gnumeric spreadsheet
Exec=gnumeric
Icon=gnome-gnumeric.png
Terminal=0
Type=Application
</pre>
As a matter of fact, all examples in this document were
produced using <tt><programlisting></tt>.
</p><p>
To show a record of terminal session--i.e., sequence of
commands entered at the command line--use
<tt><screen></tt> tag:
<pre class="programlisting">
<screen>
<prompt>bash$</prompt><userinput>make love</userinput>
make: *** No rule to make target `love'. Stop.
</screen>
</pre>
which produces
<pre class="screen">
<tt>bash$</tt><b><tt>make love</tt></b>
make: *** No rule to make target `love'. Stop.
</pre>
Note the use of tags <tt><prompt></tt> and
<tt><userinput></tt> for marking system prompt
and commands entered by user.
<div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2529790"/>NOTE</h3><p>
Note that both <tt><programlisting></tt>
and <tt><screen></tt> preserve linebreaks,
but interpret SGML tags (unlike LaTeX
verbatim environment). Take a look at
the source of this document to see how you can have SGML
tags literally shown but not interpreted,
</p></div>
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="lists"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="lists"/> Lists</h4></div></div><p>
The most common list types in DocBook are
<tt><itemizedlist></tt>,
<tt><orderedlist></tt>, and
<tt><variablelist></tt>.
</p><div class="variablelist"><dl><dt><a name="id2529876"/><span class="term"> <tt><itemizedlist></tt></span></dt><dd><p><a name="id2529888"/>
This is the simplest unnumbered list, parallel to
<tt><ul></tt> in HTML. Here is an example:
<pre class="programlisting">
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<guilabel>Show backup files</guilabel> &mdash; This will
show any backup file that might be on your system.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guilabel>Show hidden files</guilabel> &mdash; This will
show all "dot files" or files that begin with a dot. This
files typically include configuration files and directories.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guilabel>Mix files and directories</guilabel> &mdash; This
option will display files and directories in the order you
sort them instead of
always having directories shown above files.
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</pre>
and output:
</p><div class="itemizedlist"><ul><li><p><a name="id2529912"/>
Show backup files --
This will show any backup file that might be on
your system.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2529958"/>
Show hidden files --
This will show all "dot files" or files that
begin with a dot. This files typically include
configuration files and directories.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2529981"/>
Mix files and directories
-- This option will display files and
directories in the order you sort them instead
of always having directories shown above files.
</p></li></ul></div><p> Note the use of <tt>&mdash;</tt>
for long dash (see <a href="#specsymb" title=" Special symbols ">the section called “ Special symbols ”</a>). Also,
please note that the result looks much nicer because the
terms being explained (Show backup
files, etc.) are set in a different font. In
this case, it was achieved by using <a href="#gui" title="GUI elements"><tt><guilabel></tt></a>
tag. In other cases, use appropriate tags such as
<a href="#gui" title="GUI elements"><tt><guimenuitem></tt></a>,
<a href="#filenames" title="Filenames, commands, and other computer-related things"><tt><command></tt></a>,
or -- if none of
this applies -- use
<a href="#gui" title="GUI elements"><tt><emphasis></tt></a>.
</p></dd><dt><a name="id2530107"/><span class="term"> <tt><orderedlist></tt></span></dt><dd><p><a name="id2530119"/>
This list is completely analogous to
<tt><itemizedlist></tt> and has the same
syntax, but it produces numbered list. By default,
this list uses Arabic numerals for numbering entries;
you can override this using <tt>numeration</tt>,
for example <tt><orderedlist
numeration="lowerroman"></tt>. Possible values of
these attribute are <tt>arabic</tt>,
<tt>upperalpha</tt>,
<tt>loweralpha</tt>,
<tt>upperroman</tt>,
<tt>lowerroman</tt>.
</p></dd><dt><a name="id2530183"/><span class="term"> <tt><variablelist></tt></span></dt><dd><p><a name="id2530195"/> This list is used when each entry is
rather long, so it should be formatted as a block of text
with some subtitle, like a small subsection. The
<tt><variablelist></tt> is more complicated
than itemizedlists, but for larger blocks of text, or when
you're explaining or defining something, it's best to use
them. Their greatest advantage is that it's easier for a
computer to search. The lines you are reading now were
produced by <tt><variablelist></tt>. The
source looked liked this:
<pre class="programlisting">
<variablelist>
<varlistentry>
<term> <sgmltag>&lt;itemizedlist></sgmltag></term>
<listitem><para>
This is the simplest unnumbered list, parallel to
<sgmltag>&lt;ul></sgmltag> in HTML. Here is an example:...
</para></listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term> <sgmltag>&lt;orderedlist></sgmltag></term>
<listitem><para>
This list is completely analogous to
<sgmltag>&lt;itemizedlist></sgmltag>
</para></listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term> <sgmltag>&lt;variablelist></sgmltag></term>
<listitem><para>
This list is used when each entry is rather long,...
</para></listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>
</pre>
</p></dd></dl></div><p>
Lists can be nested; in this case, the stylesheets
are smart enough to change the numeration (for
<tt><orderedlist></tt>) or marks of each entry
(in <tt><itemizedlist></tt>) for sub-lists
</p></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="inline"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="inline"/>Inline Elements</h3></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="gui"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="gui"/>GUI elements</h4></div></div><div class="itemizedlist"><ul><li><p><a name="id2530324"/>
<tt><guibutton></tt> -- used for
buttons, including checkbuttons and radio buttons
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530343"/>
<tt><guimenu></tt>,
<tt><guisubmenu></tt> --used for
top-level menus and submenus
respectively, for example <tt>
<guisubmenu>Utilities</guisubmenu> submenu of the
<guimenu>Main Menu</guimenu></tt>
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530378"/>
<tt><guimenuitem></tt>--an entry in a
menu
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530395"/>
<tt><guiicon></tt>--an icon
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530412"/>
<tt><guilabel></tt>--for items which have
labels, like tabs, or bounding boxes.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530429"/>
<tt><interface></tt>-- for most everything
else... a window, a dialog box, the Panel, etc.
</p></li></ul></div><p>
If you need to refer to a sequence of menu choices, such as
Main Menu->Utilities->GNOME
terminal
there is a special construction for this, too:
<pre class="programlisting">
<menuchoice>
<guimenu>Main Menu</guimenu> <guisubmenu>Utilities</guisubmenu>
<guimenuitem>GNOME terminal</guimenuitem> </menuchoice>
</pre>
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="links"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="links"/>Links and references</h4></div></div><p>
To refer to another place in the same document, you can use
tags <tt><xref></tt> and
<tt><link></tt>. The first of them
automatically inserts the full name of the element you refer
to (section, figure, etc.), while the second just creates a
link (in HTML output). Here is an example:
<pre class="programlisting">
An example of a <link linkend="extip">tip</link> was given in
<xref linkend="notes" />.
</pre>
which produces: An example of a <a href="#extip">tip</a> was given in <a href="#notes" title="Notes, Warnings, And Tips">the section called “Notes, Warnings, And Tips”</a>.
</p><p>
Here <tt>notes</tt> and <tt>extip</tt>
are the id attributes of <a href="#notes" title="Notes, Warnings, And Tips">the section called “Notes, Warnings, And Tips”</a> and of the
example of a tip in it.
</p><p> To produce a link to an external source, such as a
Web page or a local file, use <tt><ulink></tt>
tag, for example:
<pre class="programlisting">
To find more about GNOME, please visit <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.gnome.org">GNOME Web page</ulink>
</pre>
which produces: To find more about GNOME, please visit
<a href="http://www.gnome.org" target="_top">The GNOME Web
Site</a> You can use any of the standard URL types, such
as <tt>http, ftp, file, telnet, mailto</tt> (in
most cases, however, use of <tt>mailto</tt> is
unnecessary--see discussion of
<tt><email></tt> tag).
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="filenames"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="filenames"/>Filenames, commands, and other
computer-related things</h4></div></div><p>
Here are some tags used to describe operating system-related
things:
</p><div class="itemizedlist"><ul><li><p><a name="id2530717"/> <tt><filename></tt> -- used
for filenames,
e.g.<tt><filename></tt>
foo.sgml
<tt></filename></tt>
produces: <tt>foo.sgml</tt>.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530757"/> <tt><filename
class="directory"></tt> -- used for
directories, e.g.<tt><filename
class="directory"></tt>/usr/bin
<tt></filename></tt>
produces: <tt>/usr/bin</tt>.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530804"/>
<tt><application></tt> -- used for
application names,
e.g. <tt><application></tt>Gnumeric
<tt></application></tt> produces:
Gnumeric.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530845"/>
<tt><envar></tt> -- used for
environment variables, e.g.
<tt><envar></tt>PATH<tt></envar></tt>.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530876"/>
<tt><command></tt> -- used for
commands entered on command line, e.g.
<tt><command></tt>make install
<tt></command></tt> produces:
<b>make install</b>.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2530916"/>
<tt><replaceable></tt> -- used for
replaceable text, e.g.
<tt><command></tt>db2html<tt><replaceable></tt>
foo.sgml
<tt></replaceable></tt><tt></command></tt>
produces: <b>db2html
<i><tt>foo.sgml</tt></i></b>.
</p></li></ul></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="keys"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="keys"/>Keyboard input</h4></div></div><p> To mark up text input by the user, use
<tt><userinput></tt>.
</p><p> To mark keystrokes such as shortcuts and other
commands, use <tt><keycap></tt>.
This is used for marking up what is printed on the top
of the physical key on the keyboard. There are a couple of
other tags for keys, too: <tt><keysym></tt>
and <tt><keycode></tt>. However you are
unlikely to need these for most documentation. For reference,
<tt><keysym></tt> is for the “symbolic
name” of a key. <tt><keycode></tt> is
for the “scan code” of a key. These are not
terms commonly required in GNOME documentation,
although <tt><keysym></tt> is useful for marking
up control codes.
</p><p>
To mark up a combination of keystrokes, use the
<tt><keycombo></tt> wrapper:
<pre class="programlisting">
<keycombo>
<keycap>Ctrl</keycap>
<keycap>Alt</keycap>
<keycap>F1</keycap>
</keycombo>
</pre>
</p><p>
Finally, if you want to show a shortcut for some menu
command, here are the appropriate tags (rather long):
<pre class="programlisting">
<menuchoice>
<shortcut>
<keycombo><keycap>Ctrl</keycap><keycap>q</keycap></keycombo>
</shortcut>
<guimenuitem> Quit</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
</pre>
which produces simply
Quit (<b>Ctrl-q</b>)
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="email"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="email"/>E-mail addresses</h4></div></div><p> To mark up e-mail
address, use <tt><email></tt>:
<pre class="programlisting">
The easiest way to get in touch with me is by e-mail
(<email>me@mydomain.com</email>)
</pre>
which produces: The easiest way to get in touch with me is
by e-mail (<tt><<a href="mailto:me@mydomain.com">me@mydomain.com</a>></tt>) Note that
<tt><email></tt> automatically produces a link
in html version.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="specsymb"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="specsymb"/> Special symbols </h4></div></div><p>
DocBook also provides special means for entering
typographic symbols which can not be entered directly
form the keyboard (such as copyright sign). This is done using
<i>entities</i>, which is SGML analogue of
macros, or commands, of LaTeX. They generally have the form
<tt>&entityname;</tt>. Note that the semicolon
is required.
</p><p>
here is partial list of most commonly used enitites:
</p><div class="itemizedlist"><ul><li><p><a name="id2531260"/>
<tt>&amp;</tt> -- ampersend (&)
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2531274"/>
<tt>&lt;</tt> -- left angle bracket (<)
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2531287"/>
<tt>&copy;</tt> -- copyright sign (©)
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2531348"/>
<tt>&mdash;</tt> -- long dash (--)
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2531314"/>
<tt>&hellip;</tt> -- ellipsis (...)
</p></li></ul></div><p>
Note that the actual look of the resulting symbols depends
on the fonts used by your browser; for example, it might
happen that long dash (<tt>&mdash;</tt>) looks
exactly like the usual dash (-). However, in the PostScript
(and thus, in print) the output will look markedly better if
you use appropriate tags.
</p></div></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="conventions"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="conventions"/>GDP Documentation Conventions </h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="conventionsalldocs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="conventionsalldocs"/>Conventions for All GDP Documentation</h3></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="xmlcomp"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="xmlcomp"/> XML compatibility </h4></div></div><p>
All GNOME documentation should conform to XML syntax
requirements, which are stricter than SGML ones -- see
<a href="#xml" title="XML and SGML">the section called “XML and SGML”</a> for more informaion.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="authorsnames"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="authorsnames"/> Authors' names</h4></div></div><p>
All GNOME documentation should contain the names of both the
application authors and documentation authors, as well as a
link to the application web page (if it exists) and
information for bug submission -- see templates for an
example.
</p></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="conventionsappdocs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="conventionsappdocs"/>Conventions for Application Documentation</h3></div></div><div class="sect3"><a name="applicationversionid"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="applicationversionid"/>Application Version Identification</h4></div></div><p>
Application documentation should identify the version of the
application for which the documentation is written:
<pre class="programlisting">
<sect1 id="intro">
<title>Introduction</title>
<para>
blah-blah-blah This document describes version 1.0.53 of gfoo.
</para>
</sect1>
</pre>
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="license"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="license"/> Copyright information </h4></div></div><p> Application
documentation should contain a copyright notice, stating the
licensing terms. It is suggested that you use the GNU Free
Documentation License. You could also use some other license
allowing free redistribution, such as GPL or Open Content
license. If documentation uses some trademarks (such as UNIX,
Linux, Windows, etc.), proper legal junk should also be
included (see templates).
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="license2"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="license2"/>Software license</h4></div></div><p>
All GNOME applications must contain information about the
license (for software, not for documentation), either in the
"About" box or in the manual.
</p></div><div class="sect3"><a name="bugtraq"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h4 class="title"><a name="bugtraq"/> Bug reporting</h4></div></div><p>
Application documentation should give an address for
reporting bugs and for submitting comments about the
documentaion (see templates for an example).
</p></div></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="writingapplicationmanuals"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="writingapplicationmanuals"/>Writing Application and Applet Manuals</h2></div></div><p>
Every GNOME application or applet should have a manual specific
to that particular application. This manual should be a complete
and authoritative guide. The manual should describe what the
program does and how to use it. Manuals will typically describe
each window or panel presented to the user using screenshots (in
PNG format only) when appropriate. They should also describe
each feature and preference option available.
</p><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2531646"/>Documentation Availability</h3><p>
Applications and applets should not rely on documentation
which is only available on the internet. All manuals and
other documentation should be packaged with the application or
applet and be made available to the user through the standard
GNOME help system methods described below.
</p></div><p> Application manuals should be based on the template in
<a href="#template1" title="Template 1: Application Manual">the section called “Template 1: Application Manual”</a>. Applet manuals should be based on
the templates in <a href="#template2-1x" title="Template 2: Applet Manual For GNOME 1.x">the section called “Template 2: Applet Manual For GNOME 1.x”</a> for GNOME
versions 1.x and the templates in <a href="#template2-2x" title="Template 2: Applet Manual For GNOME 2.x">the section called “Template 2: Applet Manual For GNOME 2.x”</a>
for GNOME versions 2.x.
</p><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2531713"/>Manuals For Large Applications</h3><p>
Manuals for very large applications, such as GNOME Workshop
components should be a <tt><book></tt> (and thus
use <tt><chapter></tt> for each primary section)
, instead of <tt><article></tt> which most
applications use(with each primary section being a
<tt><sect1></tt>).
</p></div><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2531756"/>Applet Manuals in GNOME 2.0</h3><p>
Note that applet manuals in GNOME 2.0 are treated in a special
way. The manuals for all applets are merged into a single
virtual document by Nautilus. For this reason, the header
information for applet manuals is omitted and the first
section of each applet is
<tt><sect1></tt>. Applet manuals will typically
have several sections, each of which is
<tt><sect2></tt>.
</p></div><p>
Application manuals should be made available by having a
"Manual" entry in the Help pull-down menu
at the top of the
application, as described in <a href="#listingdocsinhelpmenu" title="Listing Documents in the Help Menu">the section called “Listing Documents in the Help Menu”</a>.
Applets should make their manuals available by
right-clicking on the applet.
</p></div><div class="sect1"><a name="listingdocsinhelpmenu"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="listingdocsinhelpmenu"/>Listing Documents in the Help Menu</h2></div></div><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2531851"/>Developer Information</h3><p>
This section is for developers. Documentation authors
generally do not need to know this material.
</p></div><p>
Typically the application manual and possibly additional help
documents will be made available to the user under the
Help menu at the top right of the
application. To do this, you must first write a
<tt>topic.dat</tt> file. The format for this file is:
<pre class="programlisting">
One line for each 'topic'.
Two columns, as defined by perl -e 'split(/\s+/,$aline,2)'
First column is the HTML file (and optional section) for the topic,
relative to the app's help file dir.
Second column is the user-visible topic name.
</pre>
For example, Gnumeric's
<tt>topic.dat</tt> file is:
<pre class="programlisting">
gnumeric.html Gnumeric manual
function-reference.html Gnumeric function reference
</pre>
When the application is installed, the
<tt>topic.dat</tt> file should be placed in the
<tt>$prefix/share/gnome/help/<i><tt>appname</tt></i>/C/</tt> directory
where <i><tt>appname</tt></i> is replaced by the
application's name. The application documentation (converted
from SGML into HTML with <b>db2html</b>) should be
placed in this directory too.
</p><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2531991"/>Note</h3><p>
If the help files are not present in the correct directory, the
menu items will NOT appear when the program is run.
</p></div><p>
The <tt>topic.dat</tt> file is used by the GNOME
menu building code to generate the Help
menu. When you define your menu:
<pre class="programlisting">
GnomeUIInfo helpmenu[] = {
{GNOME_APP_UI_ITEM,
N_("About"), N_("Info about this program"),
about_cb, NULL, NULL,
GNOME_APP_PIXMAP_STOCK, GNOME_STOCK_MENU_ABOUT,
0, 0, NULL},
GNOMEUIINFO_SEPARATOR,
GNOMEUIINFO_HELP("<i>appname</i>"),
GNOMEUIINFO_END
};
</pre>
the line specifying <tt>GNOMEUIINFO_HELP</tt> causes
GNOME to create a menu entry which is tied to the documentation
in the directory mentioned above. Also, all the topics in the
<tt>topic.dat</tt> file will get menu entries in the
Help menu. When the user selects any of these
topics from the Help menu, a help browser
will be started with the associated HTML documentation.
</p></div><div class="sect1"><a name="applicationhelpbuttons"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="applicationhelpbuttons"/>Application Help Buttons</h2></div></div><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2532116"/>Developer Information</h3><p>
This section is for developers. Documentation authors
generally do not need to know this material.
</p></div><p>
Most GNOME applications will have Help
buttons. These are most often seen in Preference windows. (All
Preference windows should have Help
buttons.) Most Help buttons will connect
to the application manual, although some may connect to special
documents. Because the Help buttons do
not generally have their own special documentation, the
documentation author(s) do not need to do very much. However,
the application author must be careful to guarantee that the
application correctly opens the help documentation when the
Help buttons are pressed.
</p><p>
To make the Help buttons call the correct document in the GNOME Help
Browser the developer should add code based on the following example:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
gchar *tmp;
tmp = gnome_help_file_find_file ("module", "page.html");
if (tmp) {
gnome_help_goto(0, tmp);
g_free(tmp);
}
</pre><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2532218"/>NOTE</h3><p>
The example above is in the C language, please refer to other
documentation or forums for other GNOME language bindings.
</p></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="packagingappletdocs"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="packagingappletdocs"/>Packaging Applet Documentation</h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="appletfiles"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="appletfiles"/>Applet Documentation Files</h3></div></div><p>
In GNOME 2.0 each applet will have its own documentation
installed separately, and the GNOME 2.0 help
browser (Nautilus) will dynamically
merge the applet documents into a single virtual book
called <i>GNOME Applets</i>. During the
transitionary stage between GNOME 1.0 and GNOME 2.0, each
applet in the gnome-applets package has its own manual(stored
with the applet in CVS), but they are merged together manually
to create the <i>GNOME Applets</i> book before
distribution. Telsa
<tt><<a href="mailto:hobbit@aloss.ukuu.org.uk">hobbit@aloss.ukuu.org.uk</a>></tt> is the maintainer of
this document. Applet documentation should be sent to Telsa
(or placed in CVS) who will make sure they are correctly
packaged with the applets. The applet author should be
contacted to modify the menu items and help buttons to bind to
the applet documentation if necessary.
</p><p>
Images which are part of the applet documentation should be in
PNG format and should reside in the same directory as the SGML
document file in CVS(gnome-applets/APPLETNAME/help/C).
</p><p>
Applets which are not part of the gnome-applets package must
package their documentation with the particular applet
package. They should use the same applet template as other
applets. However, the <tt><xref></tt> links to
the introductory chapter of the <i>GNOME
Applets</i> book must be removed (as the 1.x
GNOME Help Browser does not allow
you to create links between separate documents) and replaced
with suitable text. Note that since this document is not part
of the <i>GNOME Applets</i> book, you must
remember to add <tt><legalnotice></tt> and
<tt><copyright></tt> sections.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="appletmenu"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="appletmenu"/>Adding Documentation to an Applet Menu</h3></div></div><div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title"><a name="id2532404"/>Developer Information</h3><p>
This section is for developers. Documentation authors
generally do not need to know this material.
</p></div><p>
Applets should have About and
Manual menu items, typically as the first
and second top-most items in the menu respectively. This
section describes how the developer creates these menu items
and links them to the documentation.
</p><p>
To add an applet's manual to its applet menu, use:
<pre class="programlisting">
/* add an item to the applet menu */
applet_widget_register_callback(APPLET_WIDGET(applet), "manual",
_("Manual"), &open_manual, NULL);
</pre>
Here the second argument is an arbitrary name for the
callback, the third argument is the label which will appear
when the user right clicks on the applet, and the fourth
argument is the callback function.
</p><p>
You will need to write a simple callback function to open the
help browser to the appropriate document. This is done using
the <tt>gnome_help_file_find_file</tt> function,
as described in <a href="#applicationhelpbuttons" title="Application Help Buttons">the section called “Application Help Buttons”</a>.
</p><p>
You will also want to add an About menu
item to the applet's menu. This is a
stock menu item and is done:
<pre class="programlisting">
applet_widget_register_stock_callback (APPLET_WIDGET(applet), "about",
GNOME_STOCK_MENU_ABOUT, _("About"), &my_applet_cb_about,
NULL);
</pre>
</p><p>
More information can be found at <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/doc/tutorials/applet/index.html" target="_top">Writing
GNOME panel applets using the GTK+/GTK-- widget set</a>.
</p></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="writingcontextsensitivehelp"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="writingcontextsensitivehelp"/>Writing Context Sensitive Help (coming in GNOME-2.0)</h2></div></div><p>
Context sensitive help, also known as "pop-up" help, will allow
a user to obtain help information about specific buttons or
parts of an application.
</p><p>
Context sensitive help is still under development and not all
the details are available at this time. However, the basics can
be shown here so that you can understand how the system will
work.
</p><p>
The Context Sensitive Help system is designed to allow the
developer to give an id to a particular portion of the User
Interface, for example, a button. Once the interface is complete
a Perl script can then be run against the interface code to
create a "map" file. This map file allows the developer or
writer to associate particular paragraph sections from an XML
document to the interface items.
</p><p>
The XML used for the document is a small XML DTD that is being
developed to use the same tags (albeit, much fewer) as DocBook
so that writers do not have to re-learn a new DTD.
</p><p>
Once the document is written and map file is complete, when the
user launches context sensitive help on the interface (either by
pressing a button and then clicking on the interface item they
want information on, or by right mouse clicking on the interface
item and selecting a pop-up menu item like "What's This") a
small transient window will appear with brief but detailed
information on the interface item.
</p></div><div class="sect1"><a name="referring"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="referring"/>Referring to Other GNOME Documentation (coming in
GNOME-2.0)</h2></div></div><p>
In the GNOME 2.0 Help System, you will be able to create links
from one document to another. The exact mechanism for doing
this is in development.
</p></div><div class="sect1"><a name="basics"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="basics"/>Basics of Documentation Style</h2></div></div><p>
Most people have never enjoyed reading a software manual, and
they probably never will. Many times, they'll read the
documentation only when they run into problems, and they'll be
frustrated and upset before they even read a word. On the
other hand, some readers will read the manual all the way
through, or at least look at the introduction before they
start. Your document might serve as a reference for an expert
or a guide to a beginner, and it must have enough depth to
satisfy the first without overwhelming the second. Ideally, it
will serve beginners as they <i>become</i>
experts. Remember, your goal is to produce <i>complete,
intuitive and clear</i> documentation.
</p><p>
In order to write useful documentation, you'll have to know who
your audience is likely to be. Then, you can look for the
problems they're likely to run into, and solve them. It will
also help if you focus on the tasks users will perform, and
group features accordingly, rather than simply describing
features at random.
</p><div class="sect2"><a name="styleplanning"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="styleplanning"/>Planning</h3></div></div><p>
Begin documenting by learning how to use the application and
reading over any existing documentation. Pay attention to
places where your document will differ from the template. It
may help to develop a document skeleton: a valid XML or SGML
document that has little or no content. For very large
applications, you will need to make significant departures
from the templates, since you'll be using the
<tt><book></tt> tag instead of
<tt><chapter></tt> or
<tt><article></tt>.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="balance"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="balance"/>Achieving a Balanced Style</h3></div></div><p>
Just as you need to juggle expert and novice readers,
you'll have to juggle a number of other extremes as you write:
<div class="itemizedlist"><ul><li><p><a name="id2532825"/>
Documents should be complete, yet concise. You should
describe every feature, but you'll have decide how much
detail is really necessary. It's not, for example,
necessary to describe every button and form field in a
dialog box, but you should make sure that your readers
know how to bring up the dialog and what it does. If
you spend fewer words on the obvious, you can spend more
time clarifying the ambiguous labels and explaining
items that are more complex.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2532845"/>
Be engaging and friendly, yet professional. Games
documents may be less formal than productivity
application documents (people don't
<i>use</i> games, they
<i>play</i> them), but all of them should
maintain a standard of style which holds the reader's
interest without resorting to jokes and untranslatable
allusions or puns.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2532874"/>
Examples, tips, notes, and screenshots are useful to
break up long stretches of text, but too many can get in
the way, and make your documents too choppy to read.
It's good to provide a screenshot of any dialog windows
a user might run into, but if a dialog box has several
tabs, it's not usually necessary to have one for each.
</p></li><li><p><a name="id2532892"/>
The GDP strives to have all of its documentation conform
to certain standards of style and content, but every
document (and every writer) is different. You will need
to use your judgement, and write documents to fit with
the rest of the project, without compromising the
individual needs of your subject, or your own
individuality as a writer.
</p></li></ul></div>
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="stylestructure"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="stylestructure"/>Structure</h3></div></div><p>
In general, you won't have to worry too much about structure,
because the templates provide you with an excellent example.
As a general rule, try to follow that structural example.
That means using links, hierarchical nesting, and, if
necessary, a glossary or index. You probably won't need to
use every available structural tag, but take advantage of
what DocBook provides you.
</p><p>
As to linking, there's some disagreement about whether to use
<tt><xref></tt> <tt><link></tt>
when you make links within your documents. You'll have to
decide, based on the different ways that they are presented
in output, which is more appropriate given the context.
Regardless of which you use, you should not forget to use
them. Help your readers find information that relevant to
the issue at hand.
</p><p>
The table of contents will be generated automatically, but
you will probably have to develop your own index if you wish
to have one. The Nautilus Help Browser will have new, and
currently unknown, indexing capabilities, so index style and
structure are still under discussion. The GNOME User's Guide
will contain a glossary in its next versions; unless you're
writing a<tt><book></tt>, it will probably be best to
contribute to that rather than developing your own.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="stylegrammar"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="stylegrammar"/>Grammar and Spelling</h3></div></div><p>
Nobody expects you to be perfect; they just expect the
documentation for their software to be error-free. That means
that, in the same way that developers look for bugs and accept
bug reports, writers must check for errors in their documents.
Poor grammar, bad spelling, and gross technical errors in
draft documents are fine. However, if those problems show up
in a "real" release, they can count against the credibility of
GNOME and Linux. They'll also make you look bad.
</p><p>
There is no substitute for a human proofreader; use a
spell-check program, then read it over yourself, and then find
someone else to help you. Other GDP members are, of course,
willing and able to help you, but non-writers are often at
least as helpful.
</p><p>
Proofreading documents is both a also a good way to
familiarize yourself with documentation, and it certainly
makes you valuable to the GDP. Help other writers proof their
documents, and they will help you with yours.
</p></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="teamwork"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="teamwork"/>Teamwork</h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="teamworkgdp"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="teamworkgdp"/>Working With The GDP Team</h3></div></div><p>
The GDP team is a valuable resource for any documentation
author. GDP members can answer most questions documentation
authors have during the course of their work. It is also
important to make sure you are not duplicating work of other
GDP members by visiting the <i>GDP Documentation
Status Table</i> (<a href="http://www.gnome.org/gdp/doctable/" target="_top">http://www.gnome.org/gdp/doctable/</a>) and
assigning a documentation item to yourself. This table also
provides a forum for making suggestions and announcements for
each documentation item. The best way to get in touch with
GDP members is on the #docs IRC channel at irc.gnome.org or
else by emailing the <a href="http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-doc-list/" target="_top">
<i>gnome-doc-list mailing list</i></a>.
</p><p>
After an author has finished a document (or even a draft
version of the document), it is a good idea to ask a member of
the GDP team to read the document, checking it for grammar,
proper DocBook markup, and clarity. One may typically find
another author to do this by either asking on the #docs IRC
channel at irc.gnome.org or by emailing the <a href="http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-doc-list/" target="_top">
<i>gnome-doc-list mailing list</i></a>.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="teamworkdevelopers"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="teamworkdevelopers"/>Working With Developers</h3></div></div><p>
Writing documentation typically involves a certain amount of
interaction with the developers of GNOME or the application
which is being documented. Often a document author will need
to ask the developer technical questions during the course of
writing a document. After the document is finished, it is good
idea to ask the developer to read the document to make sure it
is technically correct. The documentation author should also
make sure that the application author correctly binds and
packages the documentation with the application.
</p></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="finishing"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="finishing"/>Finishing A Document</h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="editting"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="editting"/>Editing The Document</h3></div></div><p>
When the document is finished, the document should be edited
by another member of the GDP for spelling, clarity, and
DocBook markup. It should also be read by an application
author to make sure the document is technically accurate.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="submitting"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="submitting"/>Submitting The Document</h3></div></div><p>
After the document has been edited and checked for technical
accuracy, it is ready to be combined with the application or
documentation package. This is typically done by passing the
document to the application or package developer. In some
cases, the documents can be committed directly into CVS,
however this should only be done after obtaining permission to
make CVS commits from the developer. Note that in many cases,
the application may need to be modified to correctly link to
the documentation. The packaging system (tarballs and binary
packages) may also need to be modified to include the
documentation in the package. Generally, this should be done
by the developers.
</p><p>
The final step is to email the GNOME Translation Team at
<tt><<a href="mailto:gnome-i18n@nuclecu.unam.mx">gnome-i18n@nuclecu.unam.mx</a>></tt> to notify them that
there is a new document for them to translate.
</p></div></div><div class="sect1"><a name="resources"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="resources"/>Resources</h2></div></div><div class="sect2"><a name="resourcesweb"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="resourcesweb"/>Resources On The Web</h3></div></div><p> The <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp/" target="_top">GNOME
Documentation Project Web page</a> lists current GDP
projects and members.
</p><p>
The <a href="http://www.gnome.org/gdp/doctable/" target="_top">GDP Documentation Status Table</a> tracks the
status of all the various documentation components of GNOME.
</p><p>
Norman Walsh's <a href="http://www.docbook.org" target="_top"> <i>DocBook: The Definitive
Guide</i></a> in an excellent book on DocBook,
available both online and in print.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="resourcesbooks"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="resourcesbooks"/>Books</h3></div></div><p>
Docbook: The Definitive Guide is available in both printed
form and on the web at:
<a href="http://www.docbook.org/tdg/index.html" target="_top">
<i>Docbook: The Definitive Guide</i>
</a>
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="mailinglists"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="mailinglists"/>Mailing Lists</h3></div></div><p>
The <i>gnome-docs-list</i> mailing list is the
main discussion area for all contributors to the GNOME
Documentation Project. You can find out how to subscribe to
this list on <a href="http://www.gnome.org/resources/mailing-lists.html" target="_top">GNOME Mailing Lists</a>. This is a rather
low-volume list, so you will not be flooded with messages.
</p></div><div class="sect2"><a name="irc"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h3 class="title"><a name="irc"/>IRC</h3></div></div><p>
Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is a fast and easy way to get in
touch with other GDP members. There are generally at least a
few members here who can answer questions or discuss
documentation issues. The IRC channel is #docs at
irc.gnome.org.
</p></div></div><div class="appendix"><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="templates"/>A. Document Templates</h2><div class="sect1"><a name="template1"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="template1"/>Template 1: Application Manual</h2></div></div><p>
The following template should be used for all application
manuals. You can always get the latest copy of this
template from <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp/templates.html" target="_top">GDP
Documentation Templates</a>.
<pre class="programlisting">
<!DOCTYPE Article PUBLIC "-//GNOME//DTD DocBook PNG Variant V1.1//EN"[
<!-- if not using PNG graphic, replace reference above with
.....PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook V3.1//EN"[
-->
<!ENTITY version "1.0.53">
<!-- replace version above with actual application version number-->
<!-- Template Version: 1.0.1 (do not remove this line) -->
]>
<!-- This is a GNOME documentation template, designed by the GNOME
Documentation Project Team. Please use it for writing GNOME
documentation, making obvious changes. In particular, all the words
written in UPPERCASE (with the exception of GNOME) should be
replaced. As for "legalnotice", please leave the reference
unchanged.
Remember that this is a guide, rather than a perfect model to follow
slavishly. Make your manual logical and readable. And don't forget
to remove these comments in your final documentation! ;-)
-->
<!-- =============Document Header ============================= -->
<article id="index"> <!-- please do not change the id -->
<artheader>
<title>MY-GNOME-APP</title>
<copyright>
<year>2000</year>
<holder>ME-THE-AUTHOR</holder>
</copyright>
<!-- translators: uncomment this:
<copyright>
<year>2000</year>
<holder>ME-THE-TRANSLATOR (Latin translation)</holder>
</copyright>
-->
<!-- do not put authorname in the header except in copyright - use
section "authors" below -->
<legalnotice>
<para>
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this
document under the terms of the <citetitle>GNU Free
Documentation License</citetitle>, Version 1.1 or any later
version published by the Free Software Foundation with no
Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover
Texts. You may obtain a copy of the <citetitle>GNU Free
Documentation License</citetitle> from the Free Software
Foundation by visiting <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.fsf.org">their Web site</ulink> or by writing
to: Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite
330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
</para>
<para>
Many of the names used by companies to distinguish their
products and services are claimed as trademarks. Where those
names appear in any GNOME documentation, and those trademarks
are made aware to the members of the GNOME Documentation
Project, the names have been printed in caps or initial caps.
</para>
</legalnotice>
<!-- this is the version of manual, not application -->
<releaseinfo>
This is version 1.0 of MY-GNOME-APP manual.
</releaseinfo>
</artheader>
<!-- ============= Document Body ============================= -->
<!-- ============= Introduction ============================== -->
<sect1 id="intro">
<title>Introduction</title>
<para>
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> is an application which
proves mathematical theorems. It has all the basic features
expected from a mathematical theorem prover, as well as a number
of advanced ones, such as proof by confusion. In fact, many of
the proofs produced by <application>MY-GNOME-APP</application>
are so complex that they are capable of proving almost anything
with a virtually null likelihood of being disproven. It also has
the very popular predecessor of proof by confusion, proof by
dialog, first implemented by Plato.
</para>
<para>
It also allows you to save and print theorem proofs and to add
comments to the proofs it produces.
</para>
<para>
To run <application>MY-GNOME-APP</application>, select
<menuchoice>
<guisubmenu>SUBMENU</guisubmenu>
<guimenuitem>MY-GNOME-APP</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
from the <guimenu>Main Menu</guimenu>, or type
<command>MYGNOMEAPP</command> on the command line.
</para>
<para>
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> is included in the
<filename>GNOME-PACKAGE</filename> package, which is part of the
GNOME desktop environment. This document describes version
&version; of <application>MY-GNOME-APP</application>.
</para>
</sect1>
<!-- ================ Usage ================================ -->
<!-- This section should describe basic usage of the application. -->
<sect1 id="usage">
<title>Using MY-GNOME-APP</title>
<para>
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> can be used to produce a
perfect proof of <emphasis>any</emphasis> mathematical theorem
(provided, of course, that this theorem is correct), thus
providing for new users an easy-to-use graphical interface to
modern mathematics. This section describes basic usage of
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application>.
</para>
<!-- ========= Basic Usage =========================== -->
<sect2 id="mainwin">
<title>Basic usage</title>
<para>
Starting <application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> opens the
<interface>Main window</interface>, shown in <xref
linkend="mainwindow-fig">. The window is at first empty.
<!-- ==== Figure ==== -->
<figure id="mainwindow-fig">
<title>MY-GNOME-APP Main Window</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>MY-GNOME-APP Main Window</screeninfo>
<graphic fileref="SCREENSHOT" format="png" srccredit="ME">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
<!-- ==== End of Figure ==== -->
</para>
<!-- For this app, one could put "proving" or "edit" (probably even
both of them) as sect2's seperate from the main window
section. Since they were both so closely involved with the main
window, I decided to have them as sect3's isntead. Judgement
call. -->
<sect3 id="proving">
<title>Proving a Theorem</title>
<para>
To get a proof of a theorem, select
<menuchoice>
<guisubmenu>File</guisubmenu>
<guimenuitem>New</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>,
which will
bring up the <interface>New Proof</interface> dialog box.
Enter the statement of the theorem in the
<guilabel>Theorem statement</guilabel> field, select your
desired proof type from the drop-down menu, and and press
<guibutton>Prove!</guibutton>.
</para>
<para>
If <application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> cannot prove the
theorem by the method you have chosen, or if you have not
selected a proof type at all,
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> will attempt to
choose the one that it thinks is most conclusive. In order,
it will attempt to prove the theorem with the following techniques:
<variablelist>
<varlistentry>
<term>Deduction</term>
<listitem>
<para>
This is a proof method that is generally accepted
for full credit by Logic professors.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>Induction</term>
<listitem>
<para>
This logical style will also earn you full credit on
your homework.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>Dialog</term>
<listitem>
<para>
This logical method is best for Philosophy classes,
and will probably only merit partial credit on Logic
or Mathematics homework.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>Confusion</term>
<listitem>
<para>
Suitable only for political debates, battles of wits
against the unarmed, and Philosophy classes focusing
on the works of Kant. Use with caution.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>
</para>
<!-- You might want to include a note, warning, or tip, e.g. -->
<warning>
<title>Proving Incorrect Theorms</title>
<para>
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> cannot prove
incorrect theorems. If the theorem you have entered is not
demonstrably true, you will get a message to that effect
in the main window. To disprove a theorem, ask
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> to prove its
logical inverse.
</para>
</warning>
</sect3>
<sect3 id="editing">
<title>Editing Proofs</title>
<para>
Once you have proven the theorem, it will be displayed in
the <interface>main window</interface>. There, you can read
it over, choose text styles for different portions of it,
and make comments on it. This section will guide you through
that process.
</para>
<para>
To alter text styles, first select the statement you wish to
change by clicking on it once. You can select several
statements by Then, choose the style you want to apply from
the <guisubmenu>Style</guisubmenu> submenu of the
<guimenu>Edit</guimenu> menu.
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> will convert the
text to that style.
</para>
<para>
You can also enter comments on a statement by selecting that
statement, and then beginning to type. Comments will appear
after the statement you have selected.
</para>
<note>
<title>Altering The Proofs Themselves</title>
<para>
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> does not allow you
to alter a proof it has produced itself. You can, save
your proof as a plain text file (using the
<guimenuitem>Save as...</guimenuitem> menu), and alter it
that way. Be aware, however, that
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> uses its own file
format for saved proofs, and cannot re-open a file unless
it is in the .mga format.
</para>
</note>
</sect3>
<!-- If there are other functions performed from the main window,
they belong here. -->
</sect2>
<!-- =========================================================
Additional Sect2's should describe additional windows, such as
larger dialog boxes, or functionality that differs significantly
from the most immediate functions of the application. Make the
structure logical.
============================================================= -->
<sect2 id="toolbar">
<title>Toolbar</title>
<para>
The toolbar (shown in <xref linkend="figure-usage-toolbar">)
provides access to several commonly used routines.
<figure id="figure-usage-toolbar">
<title>MY-GNOME-APP Toolbar</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>MY-GNOME-APP Toolbar</screeninfo>
<graphic fileref="usage-toolbar.png" format="png"></graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
<variablelist>
<varlistentry>
<term>New</term>
<listitem>
<para>
Brings up the <interface>New Theorem</interface>
dialog.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>Open</term>
<listitem>
<para>
Open an exisiting theorem you want to prove, or a
completed proof you wish to print or format.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>Save</term>
<listitem>
<para>
Save the current theorem permanently in a
file.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>
</para>
</sect2>
<!-- ========= Menus =========================== -->
<sect2 id="menubar">
<!-- Describing the menubar ensures comprehensive feature
coverage. Nest itemizedlists inside variablelists so that each
menu is easily located by indexing software. Proper indentation
makes it easier! -->
<title>Menus</title>
<para>
The menu bar, located at the top of the <interface>Main
Window</interface>, contains the following menus:
</para>
<variablelist>
<varlistentry>
<term><guimenu>File</guimenu></term>
<listitem>
<para>
This menu contains:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<menuchoice>
<shortcut>
<keycap>F3</keycap>
</shortcut>
<guimenuitem>Open</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
&mdash; This opens a file which is saved on your computer.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<menuchoice>
<shortcut>
<keycombo><keycap>Ctrl</keycap><keycap>S</keycap></keycombo>
</shortcut>
<guimenuitem>Save</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
&mdash; This saves your file.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<menuchoice>
<shortcut>
<keycombo><keycap>Ctrl</keycap><keycap>W</keycap></keycombo>
</shortcut>
<guimenuitem>Close</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
&mdash; This closes your file.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<menuchoice>
<shortcut>
<keycombo><keycap>Ctrl</keycap><keycap>Q</keycap></keycombo>
</shortcut>
<guimenuitem>Exit</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
&mdash; This quits the application.
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term><guimenu>Edit</guimenu></term>
<listitem>
<para>
This menu contains:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<menuchoice>
<shortcut>
<keycombo><keycap>Ctrl</keycap><keycap>X</keycap></keycombo>
</shortcut>
<guimenuitem>Cut</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
&mdash; This removes any text or data which is selected and
places it in the buffer.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<menuchoice>
<shortcut>
<keycombo><keycap>Ctrl</keycap><keycap>C</keycap></keycombo>
</shortcut>
<guimenuitem>Copy</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
&mdash; This copies any text or data which is selected into
the buffer.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<menuchoice>
<shortcut>
<keycombo><keycap>Ctrl</keycap><keycap>V</keycap></keycombo>
</shortcut>
<guimenuitem>Paste</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>
&mdash; This pastes any text or data which is copied into
the buffer.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>COMMAND1&hellip;</guimenuitem>
&mdash; This opens the <interface>COMMAND1</interface>
dialog, which is used to ....
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>COMMAND2</guimenuitem>
&mdash; This ....
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term><guimenu>Settings</guimenu></term>
<listitem>
<para>
This menu contains:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>Preferences&hellip;</guimenuitem>
&mdash; This opens the <link
linkend="prefs"><interface>Preferences
Dialog</interface></link>, which allows you to configure
many settings.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>COMMAND3</guimenuitem> &mdash;
This command does something.
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term><guimenu>Help</guimenu></term>
<listitem>
<para>
This menu contains:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>Manual</guimenuitem> &mdash; This
opens the <application>GNOME Help
Browser</application> and displays this manual.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>About</guimenuitem> &mdash; This
opens the <interface>About</interface> dialog
which shows basic information about
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application>, such as
the author's name, the application version number,
and the URL for the application's Web page if one
exists.
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>
</sect2>
</sect1>
<!-- ============= Customization ============================= -->
<sect1 id="prefs">
<title>Customization</title>
<para>
To change the application settings, select
<menuchoice>
<guimenu>Settings</guimenu>
<guimenuitem>Preferences...</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>. This opens the
<interface>Preferences</interface> dialog, shown in <xref
linkend="preferences-fig">.
</para>
<figure id="preferences-fig">
<title>Preferences Dialog</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>Preferences Dialog</screeninfo>
<graphic fileref="SCREENSHOT" format="png"
srccredit="ME">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
<para>
The properties in the <guilabel>PREFSTABNAME</guilabel> tab are:
<!--many people use itemizedlists in cases like this. Variablelists
are more appropriate -->
<variablelist>
<varlistentry>
<term> <guilabel>Default Text Style</guilabel></term>
<listitem>
<para>
Select the default text style for statements in your
proof. You can still change the style for individual
proofs or sections of a proof at a later date.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>(Configuration Item Label)</term>
<listitem>
<para>
(Description of Configuration)
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>(Configuration Item Label)</term>
<listitem>
<para>
(Description of Configuration)
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>
</para>
<para>
The properties in the <guilabel>SECONDTABNAME</guilabel> tab are:
<variablelist>
<varlistentry>
<term>(Configuration Item Label)</term>
<listitem>
<para>
(Description of Configuration)
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>(Configuration Item Label)</term>
<listitem>
<para>
(Description of Configuration)
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>
</para>
<para>
After you have made all the changes you want, click on
<guibutton>OK</guibutton> to apply the changes and close the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog. To cancel the changes
and return to previous values, click the
<guibutton>Close</guibutton> button.
</para>
</sect1>
<!-- ============= Various Sections ============================= -->
<!-- Here you should add, if necessary, several more sect1's,
describing other windows (besides the main one), file formats,
preferences dialogs, etc. as appropriate. Try not to make any of
these sections too long. -->
<!-- ============= Bugs ================================== -->
<!-- This section should describe known bugs and limitations of
the program if there are any - please be frank and list all
problems you know of. -->
<sect1 id="bugs">
<title>Known Bugs and Limitations</title>
<para>
This application has no known bugs.
</para>
</sect1>
<!-- ============= Authors ================================ -->
<sect1 id="authors">
<title>Authors</title>
<para>
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application> was written by GNOME-HACKER
(<email>hacker@gnome.org</email>). To find more information about
<application>MY-GNOME-APP</application>, please visit the <ulink
url="http://www.my-gnome-app.org" type="http">MY-GNOME-APP Web
page</ulink>. Please send all comments, suggestions, and bug
reports to the <ulink url="http://bugs.gnome.org" type="http">GNOME
bug tracking database</ulink>. (Instructions for submitting bug
reports can be found <ulink
url="http://bugs.gnome.org/Reporting.html" type="http">
on-line</ulink>.) You can also use <application>Bug Report
Tool</application> (<command>bug-buddy</command>), available in the
<guisubmenu>Utilities</guisubmenu> submenu of <guimenu>Main
Menu</guimenu>, for submitting bug reports.
</para>
<para>
This manual was written by ME
(<email>MYNAME@MYADDRESS</email>). Please send all comments and
suggestions regarding this manual to the <ulink type="http"
url="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp">GNOME Documentation
Project</ulink> by sending an email to
<email>docs@gnome.org</email>. You can also add your comments online
by using the <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.gnome.org/gdp/doctable/">GNOME Documentation Status
Table</ulink>.
</para>
<!-- For translations: uncomment this:
<para>
Latin translation was done by ME
(<email>MYNAME@MYADDRESS</email>). Please send all comments and
suggestions regarding this translation to SOMEWHERE.
</para>
-->
</sect1>
<!-- ============= Application License ============================= -->
<sect1 id="license">
<title>License</title>
<para>
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
modify it under the terms of the <citetitle>GNU General Public
License</citetitle> as published by the Free Software Foundation;
either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later
version.
</para>
<para>
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
<citetitle>GNU General Public License</citetitle> for more details.
</para>
<para>
A copy of the <citetitle>GNU General Public License</citetitle> is
included as an appendix to the <citetitle>GNOME Users
Guide</citetitle>. You may also obtain a copy of the
<citetitle>GNU General Public License</citetitle> from the Free
Software Foundation by visiting <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.fsf.org">their Web site</ulink> or by writing to
<address>
Free Software Foundation, Inc.
<street>59 Temple Place</street> - Suite 330
<city>Boston</city>, <state>MA</state> <postcode>02111-1307</postcode>
<country>USA</country>
</address>
</para>
</sect1>
</article>
</pre>
</p></div><div class="sect1"><a name="template2-1x"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="template2-1x"/>Template 2: Applet Manual For GNOME 1.x</h2></div></div><p>
The following templates should be used for all applet
manuals in GNOME 1.x releases. You can always get the latest
copy of these templates from <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp/templates.html" target="_top">GDP
Documentation Templates</a>. Note that the template
consists of two files; the first file calls the second as an
entity. You should name the first file
<tt><i><tt>appletname</tt></i>-applet.sgml</tt>
and the second file should be named
<tt><i><tt>appletname</tt></i>.sgml</tt>,
where
<tt><i><tt>appletname</tt></i></tt> is
the name of the applet.
<pre class="programlisting">
<!DOCTYPE Article PUBLIC "-//GNOME//DTD DocBook PNG Variant V1.1//EN"[
<!entity APPLETNAME.sgml SYSTEM "applet_template_1.sgml">
<!-- Template Version: 1.0.1 (do not remove this line) -->
]>
<!-- This is a GNOME documentation template, designed by the GNOME
Documentation Project Team. Please use it for writing GNOME
documentation, making obvious changes. In particular, all the words
written in UPPERCASE (with the exception of GNOME) should be
replaced. As for "legalnotice", please leave the reference
unchanged,make sure to add/remove trademarks to the list as
appropriate for your document.
Please don't forget to remove these comments in your final documentation,
thanks ;-).
-->
<article id="index"> <!-- please do not change the id -->
<!-- ============= Document Header ============================= -->
<artheader>
<title>APPLETNAME Applet</title>
<copyright>
<year>2000</year>
<holder>YOURFULLNAME</holder>
</copyright>
<!-- translators: uncomment this:
<copyright>
<year>2000</year>
<holder>ME-THE-TRANSLATOR (Latin translation)</holder>
</copyright>
-->
<!-- do not put authorname in the header except in copyright - use
section "authors" below -->
<legalnotice>
<para>
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this
document under the terms of the <citetitle>GNU Free Documentation
License</citetitle>, Version 1.1 or any later version published
by the Free Software Foundation with no Invariant Sections, no
Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. You may obtain a copy
of the <citetitle>GNU Free Documentation License</citetitle> from
the Free Software Foundation by visiting <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.fsf.org">their Web site</ulink> or by writing to:
Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330,
Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
</para>
<para>
Many of the names used by companies to distinguish their products and
services are claimed as trademarks. Where those names appear in any
GNOME documentation, and those trademarks are made aware to the members
of the GNOME Documentation Project, the names have been printed in caps
or initial caps.
</para>
</legalnotice>
<releaseinfo>
This is version XXX of the APPLETNAME applet manual.
</releaseinfo>
</artheader>
<!-- ============= Document Body ============================= -->
&APPLETNAME.sgml;
</article>
</pre>
<pre class="programlisting">
<!-- Template Version: 1.0.1 (do not remove this line) -->
<sect1 id="APPLET">
<title>APPLET Applet</title>
<para>
<application>APPLET</application> applet, shown in <xref
linkend="APPLETapplet-fig">, allows you to &hellip;. To add this
applet to a <interface>Panel</interface>,
right-click on the <interface>Panel</interface> and choose
<menuchoice>
<guimenu>Panel</guimenu>
<guisubmenu>Add to panel</guisubmenu>
<guisubmenu>Applet</guisubmenu>
<guisubmenu>SECTION</guisubmenu>
<guimenuitem>APPLET</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>.
</para>
<figure id="APPLETapplet-fig">
<title>APPLET Applet</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>APPLET Applet</screeninfo>
<graphic format="png" fileref="APPLET_applet"
srccredit="YOURNAME">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
<!-- ============= Usage ================================ -->
<sect2 id="APPLET-usage">
<title>Usage</title>
<para>
(Place a short description of how to use the applet here.)
</para>
<para>
Right-clicking on the applet brings up a menu containing the
following items:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>Properties&hellip;</guimenuitem> &mdash;
opens the <link linkend="APPLET-prefs">
<guilabel>Properties</guilabel></link> dialog.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>Help</guimenuitem> &mdash;
displays this document.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>About&hellip;</guimenuitem> &mdash;
shows basic information about <application>APPLET
Applet</application>, including the applet's version and the
author's name.
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
</sect2>
<!-- ============= Customization ============================= -->
<sect2 id="APPLET-prefs">
<title>Customization</title>
<para>
You can customize <application>APPLET</application>
applet by right-clicking on it and choosing
<guimenuitem>Properties&hellip;</guimenuitem>. This will open the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog(shown in <xref
linkend="APPLET-settings-fig">), which allows you to
change various settings.
</para>
<figure id="APPLET-settings-fig">
<title>Properties dialog</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>Properties dialog</screeninfo>
<graphic format="png" fileref="APPLET_settings"
srccredit="YOURNAME">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
<para>
The properties are:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
(Configuration Item Label) &mdash; If this button is
checked&hellip;(description)
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
(Configuration Item Label) &mdash; Selecting this
button&hellip;(description)
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
(Configuration Item Label) &mdash; Enter the name of
&hellip;(description)
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
<para>
After you have made all the changes you want, click on
<guibutton>OK</guibutton> to apply the changes and close the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog. To cancel the changes
and return to previous values, click the
<guibutton>Close</guibutton> button.
</para>
</sect2>
<!-- ============= Bugs ================================== -->
<!-- This section should describe known bugs and limitations of
the program if there are any - please be frank and list all
problems you know of -->
<sect2 id="bugs">
<title>Known Bugs and Limitations</title>
<para>
This applet has no known bugs.
</para>
</sect2>
<!-- ============= Authors ================================ -->
<sect2 id="authors">
<title>Authors</title>
<para>
<application>APPLET</application> was written by GNOME-HACKER
(<email>hacker@gnome.org</email>). Please send all comments,
suggestions, and bug
reports to the <ulink url="http://bugs.gnome.org" type="http">GNOME
bug tracking database</ulink>. (Instructions for submitting bug
reports can be found <ulink
url="http://bugs.gnome.org/Reporting.html" type="http">
on-line</ulink>. You can also use <application>Bug Report
Tool</application> (<command>bug-buddy</command>), available in the
<guisubmenu>Utilities</guisubmenu> submenu of <guimenu>Main
Menu</guimenu>, for submitting bug reports.
</para>
<para>
This manual was written by ME
(<email>MYNAME@MYADDRESS</email>). Please send all comments and
suggestions regarding this manual to the <ulink type="http"
url="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp">GNOME Documentation
Project</ulink> by sending an email to
<email>docs@gnome.org</email>. You can also submit comments online
by using the <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.gnome.org/gdp/doctable/">GNOME Documentation
Status Table</ulink>.
</para>
<!-- For translations: uncomment this:
<para>
Latin translation was done by ME
(<email>MYNAME@MYADDRESS</email>). Please send all comments and
suggestions regarding this translation to SOMEWHERE.
</para>
-->
</sect2>
<!-- ============= Application License ============================= -->
<sect2 id="license">
<title>License</title>
<para>
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
modify it under the terms of the <citetitle>GNU General Public
License</citetitle> as published by the Free Software Foundation;
either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later
version.
</para>
<para>
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
<citetitle>GNU General Public License</citetitle> for more details.
</para>
<para>
A copy of the <citetitle>GNU General Public License</citetitle> is
included as an appendix to the <citetitle>GNOME Users
Guide</citetitle>. You may also obtain a copy of the
<citetitle>GNU General Public License</citetitle> from the Free
Software Foundation by visiting <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.fsf.org">their Web site</ulink> or by writing to
<address>
Free Software Foundation, Inc.
<street>59 Temple Place</street> - Suite 330
<city>Boston</city>, <state>MA</state> <postcode>02111-1307</postcode>
<country>USA</country>
</address>
</para>
</sect2>
</sect1>
</pre>
</p></div><div class="sect1"><a name="template2-2x"/><div class="titlepage"><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="template2-2x"/>Template 2: Applet Manual For GNOME 2.x</h2></div></div><p>
The following templates should be used for all applet
manuals in GNOME 2.x releases. You can always get the latest
copy of these templates from <a href="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp/templates.html" target="_top">GDP
Documentation Templates</a>.
</p><p>
Note that this template consists of two files. The first file
is an introductory chapter. You should not modify this
chapter. The second file is the actual applet document, which
you should modify to describe the applet you are documenting.
You can name the first file whatever you like, such as
<tt>gnome-applets.sgml</tt>. Name the second file
according to the applet's name:
<tt><i><tt>appletname</tt></i>-applet.sgml</tt>.
Make sure you update the entity
at the top of the shell document to reflect the new name of
the applet document.
</p><p>
<pre class="programlisting">
<!DOCTYPE book PUBLIC "-//GNOME//DTD DocBook PNG Variant V1.1//EN"[
<!ENTITY TEMPLATE-APPLET SYSTEM "gnome-applet-template.sgml.part">
]>
<book id="gnome-applets">
<bookinfo>
<title>GNOME Applets</title>
<authorgroup>
<author><firstname>Telsa</firstname><surname>Gwynne</surname></author>
<author><firstname>John</firstname><surname>Fleck</surname></author>
<author><firstname>David</firstname><surname>Mason</surname>
<affiliation><orgname>Red Hat, Inc.</orgname></affiliation>
</author>
<author><firstname>Dan</firstname><surname>Mueth</surname></author>
<author><firstname>Alexander</firstname><surname>Kirillov</surname></author>
</authorgroup>
<edition>GNOME Applets version 0.1 for GNOME 1.1.5</edition>
<pubdate>2000</pubdate>
<copyright>
<year>2000</year>
<holder>Telsa Gwynne, John Fleck, Red Hat Inc., Dan Mueth, and
Alexander Kirillov</holder>
</copyright>
<legalnotice>
<para>
Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this
manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are
preserved on all copies.
</para>
<para>
Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of
this manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that
the entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a
permission notice identical to this one.
</para>
<para>
Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this
manual into another language, under the above conditions for modified
versions, except that this permission notice may be stated in a
translation approved by the Free Software Foundation.
</para>
<para>
Many of the names used by companies to distinguish their products and
services are claimed as trademarks. Where those names appear in any
GNOME documentation, and those trademarks are made aware to the members
of the GNOME Documentation Project, the names have been printed in caps
or initial caps.
</para>
</legalnotice>
</bookinfo>
<!-- #### Introduction ###### -->
<chapter id="applets-intro">
<title>Introduction</title>
<!-- #### Intro | What Are Applets? ###### -->
<sect1 id="applets-what-are">
<title>What Are Applets?</title>
<para>
Applets are one of the most popular and useful objects you can add
to your <interface>Panel</interface> to customize your desktop.
An applet is a small application which runs inside a small area of
your <interface>Panel</interface>. Applets have been written for
a wide range of purposes. Some are very powerful interactive
tools, such as the <application>Tasklist</application> Applet
which allows you to easily
control all of your main applications. Others are simple system
monitors, displaying information such as the amount of power left
in the battery on your laptop (see <application>Battery Charge
Monitor</application>) or weather
information(see <application>GNOME Weather</application>). Some
are simply for amusement(see <application>Fish</application>).
</para>
<para>
Applets are similar to swallowed applications in that both of them
reside within the <interface>Panel</interface>. However,
swallowed applications are generally applications which were
not designed to run within the <interface>Panel</interface>.
Typically one will swallow an application which already exists in
the main <interface>desktop</interface> area, putting it into your
<interface>Panel</interface>. The application will continue to
run in the <interface>Panel</interface> until you end the
application or unswallow it, placing it back onto the main part of
your desktop when you need to.
</para>
<para>
<figure id="example-applets-fig">
<title>Example Applets</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>Example Applets</screeninfo>
<graphic fileref="example_applets" format="png"
srccredit="muet">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
Several example applets are shown in <xref
linkend="example-applets-fig">. From left to right, they are: (1)
<application>Mixer Applet</application>, which allows you to turn
on/off sound and control its volume by clicking on the applet. (2)
<application>Sound Monitor</application> Applet, which displays
the current volume of sound being played and allows you to control
various sound features. (3) <application>GTCD</application>
Applet, a CD player which has all its controls
available in the applet and displays the track and time. (4)
<application>Drive Mount</application> Applet, used to mount and
unmount drives with a single click of the mouse. (5)
<application>Desk Guide</application> which allows you to view
and control multiple virtual screens. (6)
<application>Tasklist</application> Applet which allows you to
control your various windows and applications.
</para>
<para>
There are many other applets to choose from. The rest of this
chapter will explain the basic information to get you started
adding, moving, and removing applets from your
<interface>Panels</interface> and using them. The following
chapters go through each of the standard GNOME applets describing
them in detail. There are also additional applets which can be
downloaded off the Web. See <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.gnome.org/applist/list-martin.phtml">The GNOME
Software Map</ulink> for lists of additional GNOME applications
and applets.
</para>
<para>
As you read through the the rest of this chapter, you should try
adding and removing applets from your <interface>Panel</interface> and
experiment with them freely.
</para>
</sect1>
<!-- #### Intro | Adding, Moving, and Removing Applets ###### -->
<sect1 id="applet-add-move-replace">
<title>Adding, Moving, and Removing Applets</title>
<sect2 id="adding-applets">
<title>Adding Applets to a Panel</title>
<para>
To add an applet to a <interface>Panel</interface>, right-click
on the <interface>Panel</interface> and select
<menuchoice><guimenu>Panel</guimenu><guisubmenu>Add to panel</guisubmenu>
<guisubmenu>Applet</guisubmenu></menuchoice>. This will show you
the menu of all the applets on your system, divided into
categories. Choosing any applet from this menu will add it to the
<interface>Panel</interface>.
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="moving-applets">
<title>Moving Applets In or Between Panels</title>
<para>
It is easy to move applets in a <interface>Panel</interface> or
between two <interface>Panels</interface>. If you have a
three-button mouse, just move the mouse over the applet, depress
the middle mouse button and drag the applet to its new location,
releasing the middle mouse button when you are finished. Note
that you can drag applets within a <interface>Panel</interface>
or between two <interface>Panels</interface> this way. If you
don't have a three-button mouse, just
right-click on the applet and choose
<guimenuitem>Move</guimenuitem>. The cursor will turn into a
cross and the applet will move with your mouse until you press
any mouse button to indicate you are finished moving it.
If, in the course of this movement, it hits
other objects, the behavior depends on the global preferences
you have set for your <interface>Panels</interface> in the
<application>GNOME Control Center</application>: the applet you are
moving can switch places with other objects, "push" all objects
it meets, or "jump" over all other objects without disturbing
them. You can also override the default behavior by holding
<keycap>Shift</keycap> button (for "push" mode),
<keycap>Ctrl</keycap> (for "switched" mode), or
<keycap>Alt</keycap> (for "free" mode, i.e. jumping other other
objects without disturbing them) button while dragging.
</para>
<para>
To change the global Panel preferences, right-click on any applet
or <interface>Panel</interface> and select
<menuchoice>
<guimenu>Panel</guimenu>
<guimenuitem>Global Preferences...</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>.
The <guilabel>Default movement mode</guilabel> is set under the
<guilabel>Applets</guilabel> tab.
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="removing-applets">
<title>Removing Applets from a Panel</title>
<para>
To remove an applet from a <interface>Panel</interface>,
right-click on the applet and select <guimenuitem>Remove from
panel...</guimenuitem>.
</para>
</sect2>
</sect1>
<!-- #### Intro | The Right-Click Pop-Up Menu ###### -->
<sect1 id="right-click-pop-up-menu">
<title>The Right-Click Pop-Up Menu</title>
<para>
Clicking the right mouse button on any applet brings up
a <guimenu>pop-up menu</guimenu>. This
menu always has certain standard menu items in it and
often has additional items which vary depending on the particular
applet.
</para>
<sect2 id="standard-right-click-items">
<title>Standard Pop-Up Items</title>
<para>
All applets should have the following items in their right-click
<guimenu>pop-up menu</guimenu>:
<variablelist>
<varlistentry>
<term>Remove from panel</term>
<listitem>
<para>
The <guimenuitem>Remove from panel</guimenuitem> menu item
removes the applet from the <interface>Panel</interface>.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>Move</term>
<listitem>
<para>
After selecting <guimenuitem>Move</guimenuitem>, your mouse
pointer will change appearance (typically to a cross with
arrows in each direction). As you move your mouse, the applet
will move with it. When you have finished moving the applet,
click any mouse button and the applet will anchor in its
current position. Note that applets can be moved between two
<interface>Panels</interface> this way.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>Panel</term>
<listitem>
<para>
The <guisubmenu>Panel</guisubmenu> submenu contains various
items and submenus for adding and removing
<interface>Panels</interface> and applets and for changing
the configuration.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>About</term>
<listitem>
<para>
The <guimenuitem>About...</guimenuitem> menu item brings up a
dialogue box containing various information about the applet,
typically including the applet's name, version, author,
copyright, license and desciption.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
<term>Help</term>
<listitem>
<para>
The <guimenuitem>Help</guimenuitem> menu item brings up the help
manual for the applet.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="applet-properties-dialog">
<title>The Applet Properties Dialog</title>
<para>
Many applets have customizable properties. These applets will
have a <guimenuitem>Properties...</guimenuitem> menu item in their
right-click <guimenu>pop-up menu</guimenu> which brings up the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog where you can alter the
appearance or behaviour of the applet.
<figure id="example-props-dialog-fig">
<title>An Example Applet Properties Dialog</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>An Example Applets Properties Dialog</screeninfo>
<graphic fileref="applet_props_dialog" format="png"
srccredit="muet">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
All <interface>Properties</interface> dialogs have the following
buttons at the bottom of the dialog:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<guibutton>OK</guibutton> &mdash;
Pressing <guibutton>OK</guibutton> will activate any changes
in the properties you have made and close the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guibutton>Apply</guibutton> &mdash;
Pressing <guibutton>Apply</guibutton> at any time will
make your changes active without closing the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog. This is helpful if
you would like to test the effects of the changes you have
made but may want to continue changing the properties.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guibutton>Close</guibutton> &mdash;
Pressing <guibutton>Close</guibutton> will close the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog. Only changes in the
configuration which were previously applied with the
<guibutton>Apply</guibutton> button will persist. Other
changes will not be made active.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guibutton>Help</guibutton> &mdash;
Pressing <guibutton>Help</guibutton> brings up the manual for
the application, opening it to the page describing the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog.
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="common-right-click-items">
<title>Other Common Pop-Up Items</title>
<para>
Many applets also have one or more of the following items in their
right-click pop-up menu:
<variablelist>
<varlistentry>
<term>Run...</term>
<listitem>
<para>
The <guimenuitem>Run...</guimenuitem> menu item generally
invokes a program which is related to the applet in some way
but which runs in its own window rather than in the
panel. For example:
</para>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
The <application>CPU Load</application> applet, which monitors
what programs are running, has a <guimenuitem>Run
gtop...</guimenuitem> menu item. Selecting this menu item
starts <application>GTop</application>, which allows you to
view and control programs which are running.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
The <application>CD Player</application> applet has a
<guimenuitem>Run gtcd...</guimenuitem> menu item which
starts the GNOME <application>CD Player</application> when
selected, which has more capabilities than the applet.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>
</para>
</sect2>
</sect1>
<sect1 id="feedback">
<title>Feedback</title>
<sect2 id="reporting-bugs">
<title>Reporting Applet Bugs</title>
<para>
GNOME users are encouraged to report bugs to <ulink type="http"
url="http://bugs.gnome.org">The GNOME Bug Tracking
System</ulink>. The easiest way to submit bugs is to use the
<application>Bug Report Tool</application> program by selecting
<menuchoice>
<guimenu>Main Menu</guimenu> <guisubmenu>Utilities</guisubmenu>
<guimenuitem>Bug Report Tool</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice>.
Be sure to be complete in describing what you did to cause the
bug to surface and, if possible, describe how the developer can
reproduce the the scenario.
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="documentation-feedback">
<title>Providing Feedback</title>
<para>
GNOME users are welcome to provide suggestions for how
applications and documentation can be improved. Suggestions for
application changes should be submitted using the
<application>Bug Report Tool</application> discussed above.
Suggestions for documentation changes can be emailed directly to
the documentation author (whose email should be included in the
"Authors" section of the document) or by sending an email to
<email>docs@gnome.org</email>.
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="joining-gnome">
<title>Joining GNOME</title>
<para>
GNOME is a community project, created by hundreds of programmers,
documentation writers, icon design artists, web masters, and
other people, most of whom work on a volunteer basis. New GNOME
contributors are always welcome. To join the GNOME team, visit
these web sites: developers &mdash; <ulink type="http"
url="http://developer.gnome.org">The GNOME Development
Site</ulink>, documentation writers &mdash; <ulink type="http"
url="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gdp">The GNOME Documentation
Project</ulink>, icon design artists &mdash; <ulink type="http"
url="http://gnome-icons.sourceforge.net/">Gnome Icon Web</ulink>,
general &mdash; <ulink type="http"
url="http://developer.gnome.org/helping/">Helping GNOME</ulink>,
or just join the gnome-list email list (see <ulink type="http"
url="http://www.gnome.org/resources/mailing-lists.html">GNOME Mailing
Lists</ulink>) to discuss what you are interested in doing.
</para>
</sect2>
</sect1>
</chapter>
<!-- ############### Template Applets ##################### -->
<chapter id="template-applets">
<title>Template Applets</title>
&TEMPLATE-APPLET
</chapter>
</book>
</pre>
<pre class="programlisting">
<!-- Please replace everywhere below GNOMEAPPLET with the name of -->
<!-- your applet. Most importantly, all id attributes should start -->
<!-- with the name of your applet - this is necessary to avoid name -->
<!-- conflict among different applets -->
<!-- Please replace YOUR-NAME with your name and YOUR-EMAIL with your email-->
<!-- Please replace HACKER-NAME with the applet author's name and -->
<!-- HACKER-EMAIL with the applet author's email -->
<!-- You should name your file: GNOMEAPPLET-applet.sgml -->
<!-- Screenshots should be in PNG format and placed in the -->
<!-- same directory as GNOMEAPPLET-applet.sgml -->
<!-- Applet docs will be merged into <chapter>'s inside a -->
<!-- <book>. Thus, the indentation below (2 spaces before the <sect1>) is -->
<!-- correct.-->
<!-- Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of -->
<!-- this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission -->
<!-- notice are preserved on all copies. -->
<!-- -->
<!-- Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of -->
<!-- this manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided -->
<!-- that the entire resulting derived work is distributed under the -->
<!-- terms of a permission notice identical to this one. -->
<!-- -->
<!-- Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this -->
<!-- manual into another language, under the above conditions for -->
<!-- modified versions, except that this permission notice may be -->
<!-- stated in a translation approved by the Foundation. -->
<!-- ############### GNOMEAPPLET ############### -->
<sect1 id="GNOMEAPPLET">
<title>GNOMEAPPLET Applet</title>
<para>
<application>GNOMEAPPLET</application> applet, shown in <xref
linkend="GNOMEAPPLET-fig">, does this and that. To learn how to
add this applet to a <interface>Panel</interface>, see <xref
linkend="adding-applets">.
</para>
<figure id="GNOMEAPPLET-fig">
<title>GNOMEAPPLET</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>GNOMEAPPLET</screeninfo>
<graphic format="png" fileref="GNOMEAPPLET-fig" srccredit="ME">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
<sect2 id="GNOMEAPPLET-usage">
<title>Usage</title>
<para>
This applet does nothing. To use it, just
left-click on it and it will instantly do nothing.
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="GNOMEAPPLET-right-click">
<title>Right-Click Pop-Up Menu Items</title>
<para>
In addition to the standard menu items (see <xref
linkend="standard-right-click-items">), the right-click pop-up menu has
the following items:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>Properties...</guimenuitem> &mdash; This menu
item opens the <interface>Properties</interface> dialog (see
<xref linkend="GNOMEAPPLET-properties">) which allows you to
customize the appearance and behavior of this applet.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<guimenuitem>Run Hello World...</guimenuitem> &mdash; This
menu item starts the program <application>Hello
World</application>, used to say "hello" to the world.
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="GNOMEAPPLET-properties">
<title>Properties</title>
<para>
You can configure <application>GNOMEAPPLET</application> applet by
right-clicking on the applet and choosing the
<guimenuitem>Properties...</guimenuitem> menu item. This will open the
<interface>Properties</interface> dialog, shown in <xref
linkend="GNOMEAPPLET-properties-fig">.
</para>
<figure id="GNOMEAPPLET-properties-fig">
<title>Properties Dialog</title>
<screenshot>
<screeninfo>Properties Dialog</screeninfo>
<graphic format="png" fileref="GNOMEAPPLET-properties" srccredit="ME">
</graphic>
</screenshot>
</figure>
<para>
To change the color of the applet, click on the
<guibutton>color</guibutton> button. To change other properties,
click on other buttons.
</para>
<para>
For more information on the <interface>Properties</interface>
dialog, including descriptions of the <guibutton>OK</guibutton>,
<guibutton>Apply</guibutton>, <guibutton>Cancel</guibutton>, and
<guibutton>Help</guibutton> buttons, see <xref
linkend="applet-properties-dialog">.
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="GNOMEAPPLET-bugs">
<title> Known Bugs and Limitations</title>
<para>
There are no known bugs in the
<application>GNOMEAPPLET</application> applet.
</para>
</sect2>
<sect2 id="GNOMEAPPLET-authors">
<title>Authors</title>
<para>
This applet was writen by HACKER-NAME
<email>HACKER-EMAIL</email>. The documentation for this applet
which you are reading now was written by
YOUR-NAME <email>YOUR-EMAIL</email>. For information on submitting
bug reports and suggestions for improvements, see <xref
linkend="feedback">.
</para>
</sect2>
</sect1>
</pre>
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