[Doc-SIG] Producing output

[Tony J Ibbs (Tibs)]

David Goodger wrote (partly in response to me):
> Of course, such a translator [1]_ would need style sheets in order
> to understand the DPS XML output. (Forgive me if this is obvious; I
> think it isn't obvious to many people). XML is not a single data
> structure, it is a syntax for describing data structures. XML is
> like the Latin alphabet; necessary to understand written English,
> French, Spanish, Python, etc., but not sufficient.

.. [1] [La]TeX, PDF, etc.

or, in my field, the UK national geographic transfer format - people
often ask if we can read/write "NTF" when they *actually* are asking a
much too broad question - they need to specify a format that *uses* NTF.

> > At the rate he's going, I don't know how much longer that will take
> > him.
>
> Is that an expression of confidence or of despair? ;->

Oh, amazement and confidence, don't worry!

> Seriously, though, the parser code is almost finished (95%).

That's what I suspected (well, not the exact percentage value!).

> parser/DPS interface is also almost finished, at least until there's
> another parser besides reStructuredText (at which time its needs
> will be accommodated).

Although I'm not sure how much demand there would be for such a thing...

> Tibs is working on Python docstring mode
> code, from docstring extraction to final output, but I haven't
> examined it properly yet. It should prove a good source of code and
> inspiration.

That was my feeling - it's a prototype, from which the final will come
(possibly from more refactoring).

> > or how he sees different formatters integrating into DPS in
> > detail (I suspect he hasn't *got* detailed ideas yet).
>
> Your suspicions are once again well founded. We'll take what you've
> written, and I'll work on another output format myself, and we'll
> determine the API through what works in practice.

ooh - which one? reST itself, maybe?

Tibs

--
Tony J Ibbs (Tibs)      http://www.tibsnjoan.co.uk/
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