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Re: A documetation suggestion (was Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem)
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Re: A documetation suggestion (was Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem)


  • Subject: Re: A documetation suggestion (was Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem)
  • From: "Gerriet M. Denkmann" <email@hidden>
  • Date: Fri, 23 May 2008 10:09:29 +0200


On 23 May 2008, at 08:54, Scott Anguish wrote:

On May 23, 2008, at 2:23 AM, Gerriet M. Denkmann wrote:

1. For me the documentation would be very hard to use without the excellent AppKiDo.


2. It really should be Apple's job to provide something like AppKiDo.

There is new browsing facilities in Xcode 3.0. Research Assistant, and the class browser.. I believe those are intended to provide something in that direction...
I do not have Leopard (because this excellent cat deems my hardware to have not enough Megapixels or Megabits or whatever).
Xcode Version 2.4 has Help -> Documentation, which I do not like very much, but which I have to use for things not in AppKiDo (like Carbon calls).



3. What I really want:
	NextStep's Digital Librarian

May I ask at this point why?

Yes. I even can give you a concrete example:
I do seem to remember that there was something to write files and folders to a CDs using an Objective-C interface.
- entered "disk" into AppKido - nothing except NSURLCache.
- entered "disk recording" into Xcode -> Help -> Documentation - nothing at all
- entered "disk recording" into Spotlight - got 360 things, about 250 are .html with names like "index-topic0.html" or similar.


Now I start reminiscing about the good old times with Digital Librarian:
- I would enable the Conceptual Guides or the Reference (or both) enter my string and am quite confident to get some references (if NeXTStep 3.3 only would have had disk recording).


- Ok so I open /Developer/ADC Reference Library/index.html and look at the choices (Note: there is no search offered). "Cocoa" (because I am looking for an Objective-C interface) or "Storage" look promising.
"Carbon" is absolutely wrong, because everybody knows that Carbon contains only C-APIs.


Well, the answer is of course: look under "Carbon" then "Audio" (I want to backup the data of my hard disk - I am not interested in burning audio CDs at all) - then you will see the "Disc Recording Framework Reference" which "Describes the Objective-C and C API for burning audio and data CDs and DVDs."

Yes: "Carbon", because there also is a C-API; "Audio" because it also can burn audio CDs.

This took me just now quite some time (almost half an hour?) to find (even though I have looked for it several times before).


Given the current integration of search and viewing in various apps I'm not sure how DL would really fit with the modern system.
I tried Marshmellow Librarian and MT LIbrarian, but both I stopped using a long time ago.


There are various third party apps that allow you to collect and index PDFs as well.. that would give you DL functionality almost completely.

I will tell you how I did use the NextStep Digital Librarian (and maybe you can suggest tools which can do the same on Mac OS X):
1. enable the Apple Documentation, enter "disk recording" , get the relevant document (Conceptual + Reference) and read them.
2. enable "/Develper/Examples" in Digital Librarian to see some examples, where this framework is being used (examples always help to understand new concepts).
3. enable "~/Source" to see in which projects I have already used this framework
4. enable "~/Remarks" to see in whether I have written down some remarks about this


That is: full text search, restricted to one or a few folders.

Kind regards,

Gerriet.

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  • Follow-Ups:
    • Re: A documetation suggestion (was Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem)
      • From: Steve Weller <email@hidden>
    • Re: A documetation suggestion (was Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem)
      • From: Ken Thomases <email@hidden>
References: 
 >Re: A documetation suggestion (was Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem) (From: "Gerriet M. Denkmann" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: A documetation suggestion (was Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem) (From: Scott Anguish <email@hidden>)

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