[Mono-docs-list] Mono Documentation.

[PJ Cabrera]

Martin Willemoes Hansen said:
>
> A couple of suggestions:
> 1. A chapter on the languages C#, Basic.NET, ie those that are supported
> by mono.
> 2. In the appendices there could be a section on the license.
> 3. A chapter on the .NET class libraries ASP.NET, ADO.NET, Windows Forms
> etc, instead of having a big chapter for them.

I was thinking about this last point after I had started writing my intro
to Windows Forms last night.  After spending an evening rehashing what has
already been said elsewhere, I started thinking "I don't want to document
.NET, I want to document Mono!"  But I bit my tongue and thought it would
be best to finish my first draft and then have it dropped than to act like
a capricious boy that never finishes what he starts because he gets bored.
:)

So now that it seems I am not the only one thinking this way, we really
should devote time to documenting what is new/different about Mono, and
not devote time to write our version of the documentation that is already
available about the MS .NET platform.

MS has already documented this, and there are already a lot of other third
party tutorials on C#, ASP.NET, ADO.NET, etc.  Let them waste time
regurgitating to each other (now there's a wonderful thought to start
lunch with).  The whole reason we are discussing this is because we want
one place for the most relevant Mono documentation.

A chapter or two explaining what the MS .NET technologies are and a set of
links to MSDN should be more than enough to start someone on the topic.

If anybody has any objections to including links to the MSDN site, we
could include links for O'Reilly.  That should be neutral enough for most
people.

> 4. A chapter on addon class libraries, gtk#, qt#, vorbis# etc.
>
> I kind of like to have everything together instead of splitting it up in
> a manual and a tutorial. The TOC looks nice.

The TOC is definitely well organized -- or was, before everybody started
appending to it like mad. :)

My concern is the size of the TOC if it was just one document instead of
two or more.  If I was a Mono newbie, and upon going to the docs I saw 20+
chapters, I would be immediately intimidated.  If I only saw 8 or so
chapters for the manual, and then two links to equally manageable
tutorials and intros, I would not feel so overwhelmed.

Just my two cents.

--
PJ Cabrera
pjcabrera at pobox dot com