version 2.1.11
It appears that at least some of the help files are no longer available at the links embedded in Mailman, like this one: http://www.python.org/doc/current/lib/re-syntax.html
I wonder if someone with the keys to Mailman and/or python.org can fix this.
Michael Welch, volunteer Redwood Alliance PO Box 293 Arcata, CA 95518 707-822-7884 mwelch@redwoodalliance.org www.redwoodalliance.org
Michael Welch wrote:
It appears that at least some of the help files are no longer available at the links embedded in Mailman, like this one: http://www.python.org/doc/current/lib/re-syntax.html
I am aware the the python.org documentation URLs have all changed. Unfortunately, it's not a simple mapping. E.g., the above becomes <http://www.python.org/doc/current/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax> or equivalently <http://docs.python.org/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax>.
I do plan to update all the python.org references before the next release.
I have already updated references to the old FAQ Wizard. If you are aware of any othe broken links, please let me know.
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
on 12/29/08 5:54 PM, Mark Sapiro said:
I am aware the the python.org documentation URLs have all changed. Unfortunately, it's not a simple mapping. E.g., the above becomes <http://www.python.org/doc/current/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax> or equivalently <http://docs.python.org/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax>.
Part of the problem is that the people who maintain the official python.org documentation for this information feel that Mailman should not be referencing their documentation, instead we should have our own internal version of the same information.
So, they don't give a flying flip about what happens to the Mailman community when they change their documentation or their URLs.
Since the release engineer for the next major version of Python is going to be mentored by Barry Warsaw for that role, perhaps we can get some sympathy there and hopefully get a bit more cooperation on things like this.
-- Brad Knowles <brad@shub-internet.org> If you like Jazz/R&B guitar, check out LinkedIn Profile: my friend bigsbytracks on YouTube at <http://tinyurl.com/y8kpxu> http://preview.tinyurl.com/bigsbytracks
On 12/29/2008 07:29 PM, Brad Knowles wrote:
Part of the problem is that the people who maintain the official python.org documentation for this information feel that Mailman should not be referencing their documentation, instead we should have our own internal version of the same information.
Arguably, that is probably the better thing to do. Or at least point to a page that says "Go <here> to find the information that you are wanting..." and have the "<here>" be more easily update able while still providing a static path that will work across multiple Maiman releases.
So, they don't give a flying flip about what happens to the Mailman community when they change their documentation or their URLs.
I'm sure that it's not only Mailman that has been hurt by the changed URLs. Besides, I'd be very tempted to set up 302, or better 301, redirects from the old URLs to the new URLs. That way if /anyone/ does accidentally enter the old URL they are redirected to where they should be. Optionally for pages that merged or split, they could put a disambiguating page (like Wikipedia) allowing people to choose where they want to go.
Grant. . . .
On 12/29/2008 08:29 PM, Taylor, Grant wrote:
I'm sure that it's not only Mailman that has been hurt by the changed URLs. Besides, I'd be very tempted to set up 302, or better 301, redirects from the old URLs to the new URLs. That way if /anyone/ does accidentally enter the old URL they are redirected to where they should be. Optionally for pages that merged or split, they could put a disambiguating page (like Wikipedia) allowing people to choose where they want to go.
Seeing as how both Stephen and Adam have mentioned redirects, I figured I'd add some more information.
If the web server is running Apache and / or PHP, it would be trivial to create a new (sub)directory / structure that behaves much like TinyURL in that it would be something along the lines of redirecting URLs like "<URL>/<(sub)directory>/links/<link_ID>" (using URL re-writing) or "<URL>/<(sub)directory>/links?linkID=<link_ID>" (no URL re-writing) to a final destination.
Using either method (URL rewriting or not) it would be trivial to create a two column database that has the requested URL and the redirect to URL to query and generate a redirection from. (If need be I can put together some example code to do this.)
The only thing that comes to mind that would be a problem is when content either merges or splits across individual files. In this case, you would need some sort of landing page for visitors to decide where they want to go. A sign post for the fork in the road, if you will.
Grant. . . .
Grant Taylor wrote:
Seeing as how both Stephen and Adam have mentioned redirects, I figured I'd add some more information.
<snip>
You're talking to the wrong people. The problem is that the Mailman web interface and other documentation currently contains links to documentation on the python.org web site. These links have been broken by changes at python.org, a site over which we Mailman folks have no control and little influence.
The only way redirects help us is in defending against the *next* change at python.org, we could change our links now to go to a site we do control and redirect from there to python.org. Then next time, we would only have to change the redirects.
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
On Tue, Dec 30, 2008 at 10:01:58AM -0800, Mark Sapiro wrote:
You're talking to the wrong people. The problem is that the Mailman web interface and other documentation currently contains links to documentation on the python.org web site. These links have been broken by changes at python.org, a site over which we Mailman folks have no control and little influence.
The only way redirects help us is in defending against the *next* change at python.org, we could change our links now to go to a site we do control and redirect from there to python.org. Then next time, we would only have to change the redirects.
That's what I was suggesting.
-- ``I speak better English than this villain Bush.'' (Muhammed Saeed al-Sahaf, attrib.)
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On Dec 30, 2008, at 1:01 PM, Mark Sapiro wrote:
You're talking to the wrong people. The problem is that the Mailman
web interface and other documentation currently contains links to documentation on the python.org web site. These links have been broken by changes at python.org, a site over which we Mailman folks have no control and little influence.
Well, sort of <wink>.
I'm sorry, I've been out of town for a while so I've missed the
thread. I gather that links on the Mailman admin u/i have broken with
the new docs.python.org organization. I can ask the pdo admins and
doc folks to set up redirects if possible, and may be able to set
those redirects up myself.
Please submit a bug report on the issue, indicating which links are
broken. It might be best to do this on the Python bug tracker:
bugs.python.org. Feel free to assign the issue to me (user name:
barry). If I can't fix it, I'll try to find someone who can.
- -Barry
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Barry Warsaw wrote:
the new docs.python.org organization. I can ask the pdo admins and doc folks to set up redirects if possible, and may be able to set those redirects up myself.
Please submit a bug report on the issue, indicating which links are broken. It might be best to do this on the Python bug tracker: bugs.python.org. Feel free to assign the issue to me (user name: barry). If I can't fix it, I'll try to find someone who can.
I put it in the tracker as <http://bugs.python.org/issue4789>. It was automagically assigned to georg.brandl, but I put barry on the copy list.
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
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On Dec 30, 2008, at 7:46 PM, Mark Sapiro wrote:
Barry Warsaw wrote:
the new docs.python.org organization. I can ask the pdo admins and doc folks to set up redirects if possible, and may be able to set those redirects up myself.
Please submit a bug report on the issue, indicating which links are broken. It might be best to do this on the Python bug tracker: bugs.python.org. Feel free to assign the issue to me (user name: barry). If I can't fix it, I'll try to find someone who can.
I put it in the tracker as <http://bugs.python.org/issue4789>. It was automagically assigned to georg.brandl, but I put barry on the copy list.
Thanks Mark. I'll ping Georg and see what we can do.
- -Barry
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On 12/30/2008 12:01 PM, Mark Sapiro wrote:
You're talking to the wrong people. The problem is that the Mailman web interface and other documentation currently contains links to documentation on the python.org web site. These links have been broken by changes at python.org, a site over which we Mailman folks have no control and little influence.
I'm really talking to (at) both sets of web developers / maintainers. Such a system should really be in place on both the Mailman /and/ Python.org web sites.
However I do think that the Mailman documentation maintainers should point to web pages that they do have more control over. In my opinion it is bad form to point to something that you do not control and thus can't rely on.
The only way redirects help us is in defending against the *next* change at python.org, we could change our links now to go to a site we do control and redirect from there to python.org. Then next time, we would only have to change the redirects.
*Exactly!*
I think this is what /should/ be done. And what I was (poorly) trying to get at. So, the offer for help with Apache / PHP / DB code is still applicable and still stands. :)
Grant. . . .
on 12/31/08 12:55 AM, Grant Taylor said:
I think this is what /should/ be done. And what I was (poorly) trying to get at. So, the offer for help with Apache / PHP / DB code is still applicable and still stands. :)
One trick here is exactly where we put our documentation on this matter. If we do it within the wiki, then most anyone should be able to update it on demand, although I'm not sure what additional load this might create on the wiki. We might also want to think twice about such a public page being easily editable by anyone that would be used so widely within a program like Mailman.
If we try to do this on the main list.org site itself, I believe that Barry is the only one with the account and permissions to make these kinds of changes, in part because the site is actually owned by someone else (maybe John Viega, one of the original authors of Mailman?).
-- Brad Knowles <brad@shub-internet.org> If you like Jazz/R&B guitar, check out LinkedIn Profile: my friend bigsbytracks on YouTube at <http://tinyurl.com/y8kpxu> http://preview.tinyurl.com/bigsbytracks
On 12/31/08 10:12, Brad Knowles wrote:
One trick here is exactly where we put our documentation on this matter. If we do it within the wiki, then most anyone should be able to update it on demand, although I'm not sure what additional load this might create on the wiki. We might also want to think twice about such a public page being easily editable by anyone that would be used so widely within a program like Mailman.
I'm betting that the wiki can't do a 302 redirect, which would be proper. I'm sure that something could be done to do an HTML "refresh" or a JavaScript "document.location", but neither of those are as nice as an HTTP 302 redirect. The 302 redirect operates at a much lower layer and is much easier on systems because clients don't have to process the downloaded page. It uses less bandwidth too.
If we try to do this on the main list.org site itself, I believe that Barry is the only one with the account and permissions to make these kinds of changes, in part because the site is actually owned by someone else (maybe John Viega, one of the original authors of Mailman?).
*nod*
I got to thinking. I chose Apache / PHP because that's what I know best. But there is no reason (that I know of) that would prevent the same thing from being written in Python, or any other dynamic language for that matter.
Grant. . . .
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On Dec 31, 2008, at 11:12 AM, Brad Knowles wrote:
on 12/31/08 12:55 AM, Grant Taylor said:
I think this is what /should/ be done. And what I was (poorly)
trying to get at. So, the offer for help with Apache / PHP / DB
code is still applicable and still stands. :)One trick here is exactly where we put our documentation on this
matter. If we do it within the wiki, then most anyone should be
able to update it on demand, although I'm not sure what additional
load this might create on the wiki. We might also want to think
twice about such a public page being easily editable by anyone that
would be used so widely within a program like Mailman.
Load on the wiki is probably not too big of a deal; it's supposedly on
a fairly beefy virtual host connected to a big pipe. The security
issue is worth considering though.
If we try to do this on the main list.org site itself, I believe
that Barry is the only one with the account and permissions to make
these kinds of changes, in part because the site is actually owned
by someone else (maybe John Viega, one of the original authors of
Mailman?).
Several people can actually edit the pages (and of course, I'd be
happy to add permissions for you too Brad!), but it's true that I'm
the only one that can push out new pages. It's easy for me to do
though, so a quick ping in email or irc would do the trick.
- -Barry
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On 12/31/08 14:25, Barry Warsaw wrote:
Load on the wiki is probably not too big of a deal; it's supposedly on a fairly beefy virtual host connected to a big pipe. The security issue is worth considering though.
Can the wiki actually do the redirect(s) with out relying on an HTML refresh to a new location? Or better asked, will the wiki (as a system) allow you to return a HTTP Location header or will you be constrained with in the structure of the wiki?
Grant. . . .
Brad Knowles writes:
So, they don't give a flying flip about what happens to the Mailman community when they change their documentation or their URLs.
Whatever happened to the principle that URLs shouldn't just disappear?
How about TOOWTDI? And the closely related DRY (don't repeat yourself)? Doc people should be especially sensitive to these issues. :-(
But I suppose it's too much to hope that they'll be persuaded. Would it be a good idea to make such references indirect? E.g., have a list.org URL that does a redirect to the Python URL?
On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 07:29:59PM -0600, Brad Knowles wrote:
on 12/29/08 5:54 PM, Mark Sapiro said:
I am aware the the python.org documentation URLs have all changed. Unfortunately, it's not a simple mapping. E.g., the above becomes <http://www.python.org/doc/current/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax> or equivalently <http://docs.python.org/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax>.
Part of the problem is that the people who maintain the official python.org documentation for this information feel that Mailman should not be referencing their documentation, instead we should have our own internal version of the same information.
I'd say "why reinvent the wheel"...
So, they don't give a flying flip about what happens to the Mailman community when they change their documentation or their URLs.
Although 10years old, I still think http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/URI is a well-put document.
Since the release engineer for the next major version of Python is going to be mentored by Barry Warsaw for that role, perhaps we can get some sympathy there and hopefully get a bit more cooperation on things like this.
Make sense to me.
If not/it doesn't happen, perhaps a workaround could be to reference python.org docs via a list.org/pythonref/foo Redirect or similar? -- bit more maint, but could be scripted.
-- A bureaucrat's idea of cleaning up his files is to make a copy of everything before he destroys it
participants (8)
-
Adam McGreggor -
Barry Warsaw -
Barry Warsaw -
Brad Knowles -
Grant Taylor -
Mark Sapiro -
Michael Welch -
Stephen J. Turnbull