Re: sidebar in docbook

[Karl Berry]

    There is a larger question waiting to be asked, which is how far towards
    docbook are we willing to drag texinfo?

I want to consider each feature on its merits.  Being "like docbook" is
not, in my mind, the right goal.

On the other hand, I can agree that, in principle, the Texinfo ->
Docbook translation should not lose anything.  In practice, neither
Patrice nor I are Docbook experts (to say the least), and we're not
going to just take it up on our own, either.  So you, or someone, is
going to have to push it forward ...

    For example, docbook has explicit markup for prefaces, forewords,
    and dedications.

For example, I am underwhelmed by this.  Texinfo's feature of
@unnumbered seems both simpler and more general.  I see no good reason
to add more commands.  (Aside: @top is logically unnecessary too, was
just added as a kludge for C makeinfo (like so much else), for that
matter, but never mind.)  There are plenty more such prefatory sections
that could be added.  I see no reason to bother.

What I *can* imagine is mapping @node Preface (controlled by a variable,
naturally) to Docbook <preface>, etc.

    Also, I really like the idea of semantic markup

Sorry, but I see nothing to be gained semantically by an explicit
command for forewords.  (Looking forward, I'm no longer convinced that
separate @option, etc., are good ideas either.  But never mind. :)

    DocBook is something of the prevailing standard for
    machine-processable documentation; e.g. the LinuxDoc project

Unconvinced :).  You could say the same for Texinfo.  I don't doubt that
there are many pages of proprietary documentation in Docbook, since
proprietary publishers love verbose, unreadable, unwritable XML, but
useful free documentation?  Not so sure.

Not so impressed with what I've seen of the LinuxDoc project either.
Virtually every document I ever come across is wildly out of date.

karl