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Date: Wed, 29 Aug 2012 12:34:04 -0700
From: Andrew Rist <andrew.rist@oracle.com>
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To: ooo-dev@incubator.apache.org
Subject: Re: [User Documentation]Are there any plans in place or formal user
 documentation for AOO
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I think the best long term resolution is to have a full set of ALv2 
licensed user documentation.  Unfortunately, the path from here to there 
is rather complex, due to the licensing of the current documentation, 
and the lack of interest in moving that direction by the existing 
documentation community.
This is stated to define the current situation, not touch on motivations 
or loyalties.  The ODFAuthors crew has a long history with OOo and now 
AOO and have no interest in abandoning their current content.  They also 
value their autonomy and are comfortable working as ODFAuthors on 
multiple derivations of the OpenOffice code.
That said, it would be very good for the project to have a full set of 
atomic content (individual topics) under ALv2 that can collected into 
different deliverables (help, user manual, quick start guide, tutorials, 
etc).
Beginning this effort, and looking to integrate content from Symphony, 
would be a big step forward for AOO.
Andrew


On 8/29/2012 11:40 AM, Keith N. McKenna wrote:
> Good Day All;
>
> Today I am going to venture into the breach and bring up a topic that 
> in my experience is most developers favorite profanity: i.e. User 
> Documentation. One of the major reasons I have used and promoted 
> OpenOffice.org is its well written and easily available user 
> documentation. I see a planning wiki for documentation with no 
> activity since 2011.
>
> I also have gone through most of the archived mail to this list I 
> could find on this topic with no apparent consensus on what to do. I 
> have also tried the ODFAuthors website and mailing list. There appear 
> to be some drafts o chapters or a getting started guide but that is 
> about all. The response from the list was basically whatever you folks 
> decide to do with them.
>
> My basic question is re there any plans for user docs or AOO and if so 
> where would the information be found? Although I am not a tech writer 
> and have no real experience in the publishing world, this is a area I 
> believe that I could be o some small help in. I have done document 
> review before on both software documentation and or internal corporate 
> standards documents.
>
> Regards
> Keith
>