How to write documentation for JBDS and JBoss Tools
Here is the list resources related to JBDS/Tools docs:
- SVN - https://svn.jboss.org/repos/jbosstools/trunk
— guides folder contains guides
— jbds-docs folder is the place to generate JBDS release docs -jbosstool-docbook-xslt - xslt styles -jboss-tools-docs folder is the place to generate JBDS release docs -jboss-tools-docs-architype - architype for new guides creation -jbosstool-jdocbook-style -css styles
— qa folder with qa resources (qa owns it)
— whatsnew folder with what's new pages (dev team own it)
2. Doc project page contains links to release docs, nightly docs, movies — http://jboss.org/tools/docs.html
- NEWS - owned by dev team
- reference guides - release guides updated by us
- screen casts - movies we have made
- FAQ - owned by dev team
3. Doc JIRA for both tools and jbds doc projects is on jbds project JIRA — https://jira.jboss.org/jira/browse/JBDS
- open components tab - here is a list of components, doc component are ones with Doc- prefix.
Here is an article on documentation building procedure http://jboss.org/community/wiki/BuildingJBossToolsDocumentaion
Read it and try to build the docs with different profiles from here https://svn.jboss.org/repos/jbosstools/trunk/documentation
Here is JBDS JIRA - https://jira.jboss.org/jira/browse/jbds
On the Open Issues tab you can see the components, the docs ones have Doc- prefix. Usually when a new guide is created I asked Max to add a component for it, as it's very convenient to use guides names as components. New doc JIRA issue usually is created basing on developers' taks, to find the tasks that affects docs use filter with "affects documentation" check-box marked.
Most of the issues that affects docs can be found in JBoss Tools JIRA - https://jira.jboss.org/jira/browse/JBIDE. When a doc task is created basing on a dev task, the tasks are linked to each other with "is related to" link.
- When making a demo, in its setting choose the necessary jboss preloaders and our standard palette and save the movie with this settings, before committing it to svn.
When making a demo, first of all set 0,20 sec. for all frames and then adjust the time you need for some particular frames.
- When it’s necessary to draw user attention to some particular element on a frame, use red ellipse (for small elements – tabs, buttons, etc.) or rectangle (for file lists, windows, etc.)
When a demo is done, watch it yourself and make sure that you have enough time to read text in hints.
- When making a demo, make sure that you chose the appropriate size for hint boxes: not lot’s of empty space should be under the text and the box should look like all other ones, undamaged, ‘cause when you try to minimize it, it could change its form unproportionally, try to avoid such an effect, minimize the box till its form (not size) remains the same.
When making movie, make sure your Wink uses the elements from here, copy it to you wink folders.
https://svn.jboss.org/repos/jbosstools/documentation/trunk/movies/common_resources
- When creating a new movie please use the style features located here - https://svn.jboss.org/repos/jbosstools/documentation/trunk/movies/common_resources
When creating demos make sure that you use correct jboss.org styles, time capture rate is more or equal 4, and the cursor is moving smoothly on the screen
When making a demo, make sure that all application forms, hints, windows are not cut with demo frame.
e.g. the hint is cut
http://community.jboss.org/servlet/JiveServlet/downloadImage/102-14255-3-1596/image002.jpg
While creating a new or updating already existed JBoss Tools/JBDS guide, please keep to the following structure (JBoss Portlet Tools User Guide structure as an example):
1. Introduction
1.1. What is JBoss Portal and Portlet Tools?
1.2. Key Features of JBoss Portlet Tools
1.3. Requirements and Installation
2. JBoss Portlet Tools Tasks
2.1. Creating and Deploying a Java Portlet
2.1.1. Creating a Web Project with JBoss Portlet Capabilities
2.1.2. Adding a Java Portlet to a Web Project
2.1.3. Deploying a Portlet to JBoss Portal
2.2. Creating and Deploying a JSF Portlet
2.2.1. Creating a JSF Project with JSF Portlet Capabilities
2.2.2. Adding a JSF Protlet to the Project and Deploying It to JBoss Portal
2.3. Creating and Deploying a Seam Portlet
2.3.1. Creating a Seam Project with Seam Portlet Capabilities
2.3.2. Adding a Seam Protlet to the Project and Deploying It to JBoss Portal
3. Reference
3.1. JBoss Portlet Descriptors
3.2. Wizards
3.2.1. Java Portlet Wizard
3.2.2. JSF/Seam Portlet Wizard
3.3. JBoss Portlet Preferences
4. Summary
4.1. Other Relevant Resources on the Topic
Comments:
- The "Key Features of [plugin name]" section should contain the table included key features (wizards, editors, tasks, etc.) of the plugin you're describing with short descriptions and references to the appropriate guide section.
- The "Requirements and Installation" section should provide minimal requirements on the environment the plugin needs and installation procedure (or reference to it).
- All procedural operations must be put into the "[plugin name] Tasks" chapter. Each section of the chapter is a tutorial on a particular topic.
- The referential data should be stored in the "Reference" chapter.
- Remember to summarize the results and provide the links to other relevent resources in the "Summary" chapter.
In case you need to show some project structure in the documentation you should use the "tree" utility that builds in terminal the project structure that you can copy/paste to your docs. Quite likely that the "tree" utility is not installed on your local machine, the sudo apt-get install tree command will install this utility. You need to create the project structure schema in Linux since the tree command in Windows draws a tree that is not as nice as the one in Linux, besides Linux is our primary OS. However if you still need to draw a tree in Windows please use the tree /a /f command. This is what the project structure should be like.
|-- pom.xml
`-- src
|-- main
| |-- java
| | `-- org
| | `-- docs
| | `-- richfaces
| | `-- Bean.java
| |-- resources
| `-- webapp
| |-- WEB-INF
| | |-- faces-config.xml
| | `-- web.xml
| |-- index.jsp
| `-- pages
| |-- index.jsp
| `-- index.xhtml
`-- test
`-- java
`-- org
`-- docs
`-- richfaces
`-- BeanTest.java
When inserting an inline graphics element please leave it unscaled. If you scale a tiny inline element, the image will be broken and hardly readable.
Command line option for only creating part of the outputs to speed up roundtrip.
See the issue for details https://jira.jboss.org/jira/browse/MPJDOCBOOK-7
When writing some article or component description or complicated section/chapter and need some review of it, let me know plz, and I’ll try to find a reviewer for your task.
E.g. letter “p” inside two opening tags (<section>p <title>… ) makes the document invalid and failes the build on this place. Do not forget to validate xmls each time you make changes.
When updating the guides according to some dev issue, remember about our movies collection, it also should be updated.
Documenting UI, from time to time you talk about icons, mouse arrows that change depending on the user behavior etc. In these cases you can insert an image of the element into the documentation right into the text. DocBook allows you to embed inline graphics using:
<inlinemediaobject>
<imageobject>
<imagedata fileref="images/image1.png"/>
</imageobject>
</inlinemediaobject>
https://svn.jboss.org/repos/jbosstools/trunk/documentation/jboss-tools-docs/pom.xml
When you’re resolving a task, make sure that the person who will be closing the task, has enough time for its verification.
E.g. if you resolve the task in a release day it means that QA or a person who needs to verify the task, has no time for it, and also you won’t have time to fix the task if it’s reopened.
JIRA issues format.
All your tasks in JIRA should have versions and components defined.
JIRA issues resolution.
When closing an issue, plz write some resolution as the last comment about what exactly was done.
"Fix version" of a jira issue.
When closing or resolving a jira issue, make sure “fix version” is the correct one, it must correspond to the next release version, which could be found on project jira page on Version tab.
Don’t insert programlisting into para tags, it causes damaged code on a page.
When print-screening an image, please make sure that canvas size (uninformative white space around) of it is not to large, if yes, trim it.
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In order to compare previous documentation with the current one and add update/added marker to TOC, we use DiffMk version 3.0.a1. tool.
We added two script files in the bin folder of the DiffMk distribution:
The first is responsible for comparing 2 files and producing a third file with *diff* markers. The second one we use to indicate the files to compare and the output files, the format is the following: ./run.sh [the path to the file] [the path to the file modified] [the path to the output file]
To identify the changes between two different revisions of the same guide, use the following line: ./run.sh /path/to/the/old/revision/guide/master.xml /path/to/the/current/revision/guide/master.xml /path/to/the/produced/by/diffmk/master_output.xml
Next, run the run_mkdiff.sh
Actually, the DiffMk is not an ideal tool for comparing. It has a lot of lacks. Here are some of such lacks we run into:
- It removes the HTML entities when outputs the file, for instance & in the links;
- Sometimes it mixes the structure of the document, for instance, put the <chapter> into the <chapter>;
- Sometimes it deletes the tags such as <imageobject>.
Thus, in order the docs with diff markers could be built, the next step is validating and checking the master_output.xml files carefully.
To build the guide with updated/new markers on the TOC, chapters and sections and have the changes highlighted, use the 'diffmk' profile, i.e. the mvn clean install -P diffmk maven command.
To build the release version of the guide (for JBDS release) with updated/new markers on the TOC, use the 'releaseJBDS' profile, i.e. the mvn clean install -P releaseJBDS maven command.
Nightly docs online:
http://download.jboss.org/jbosstools/nightly-docs/
Here is svn for it:
https://svn.jboss.org/repos/jbosstools/trunk/documentation/jboss-tools-docs
Here is Hudson for it:
http://hudson.qa.jboss.com/hudson/job/jbosstools-docs-nightly/ (to build nightly docs VPN access and admin pass are required)
When a new guide is created it should be added to nightly docs build
https://svn.jboss.org/repos/jbosstools/trunk/documentation/jboss-tools-docs/pom.xml
See that the guide is added and email Denis Golovin asking to add a new guide to the server settings for nightly docs.
Build the guides with mvn clean install from https://svn.jboss.org/repos/jbosstools/trunk/documentation/jboss-tools-docs
