mailing-list for TeXmacs Users

[Massimiliano Gubinelli <address@hidden>]

Giovanni,

 I think we need some experimentation to understand which setup fits well with TeXmacs. 

Some time ago Darcy also setup a blog here:

https://texmacs.github.io/blog/

which however has somewhat more complex internal structure which uses the software Hugo, and as far as I understand, convert the TeXmacs documents first into Markdown to be used by Hugo to build the static site. 

In my opinion it would be better to avoid using external programs. TeXmacs can do everything we need and without conversion to Markdown which looses information in the process. Of course the final goal is to have informations published, so I do not care too much on the how. I'm open to discuss.

Best

Max

On 8. Nov 2020, at 16:26, Giovanni Piredda <address@hidden> wrote:

Hi Massimiliano,

this is very nice.

I think in the next few days I will try and post a small article. Maybe my first contribution will be a guide on how to make a contribution (unless someone else writes it before me ;-) ), since I think that it is important to make contributions easy :-)

By the way perhaps it is the case to integrate this repository with the TeXmacs developer wiki (https://github.com/texmacs/texmacs/wiki). Maybe by migrating the articles? But here maybe Darcy can say something.

I will also write a few more lines of response here on the mailing list to both you and Joris, as I would like to get my point ("TeXmacs will benefit from making it easy for people to contribute") across.

Giovanni

On 08.11.20 16:07, Massimiliano Gubinelli wrote:

Dear Giovanni, dear all,
 I've hacked up a beginning of a Blog/Wiki for TexMacs along the lines below (statically generated site/git managed/github hosted).

You find the repository here:

https://github.com/texmacs/notes <https://github.com/texmacs/notes>

and the static web site served here:

https://texmacs.github.io/notes/ <https://texmacs.github.io/notes/>

The TeXmacs sources for the site are in the src/ directory in the repository. The website can be generated (via "Tools->Web->Create/Update web site") within TeXmacs. Once the repository is pushed on github it becomes visible. Please feel free to improve/add content/make pull requests.

We can experiment to see how it goes and if it works for us. In my opinion is a relatively simple solution which has the advantage that one can clone and browse from within TeXmacs.

Best
Max

On 8. Nov 2020, at 09:55, Massimiliano Gubinelli <address@hidden <mailto:address@hidden>> wrote:

Dear Giovanni,

I'm not expert in this matter, but I would tend to suggest that we use git-oriented approach, i.e. we collect/build the wiki/blog/manual as a git repository and maybe publish it via services like github.

In my mind this has some advantage for us: we are not bound to some CMS, and we can manage the material the way we want, e.g. by writing the posts in TeXmacs,  exporting them as html and committing to the repository.

I think people which want to contribute can just provide PR.

This will allow us to work within TeXmacs. Also the material can be made accessible as tm files which can then be viewed directly in TeXmacs and not in the browser, improving the rendering and (hopefully) the experience.

With time one can imagine to code some macro to automatically edit and request pulls within TeXmacs, bypassing completely the browser. :)

Best,
Max

On 4. Nov 2020, at 18:21, Giovanni Piredda <address@hidden <mailto:address@hidden>> wrote:

Dear all,

I think a wiki for TeXmacs, written in good part by users, could be helpful.

There used to be one - still linked from http://www.texmacs.org/tmweb/help/informal.en.html <http://www.texmacs.org/tmweb/help/informal.en.html> and saved on the "Internet Archive" (http://web.archive.org/web/20051107175054/alqua.com/tmresources/FrontPage <http://web.archive.org/web/20051107175054/alqua.com/tmresources/FrontPage>); at the moment there is a wiki on GitHub, at https://github.com/texmacs/texmacs/wiki <https://github.com/texmacs/texmacs/wiki>. I did not understand how to edit the GitHub wiki (as suggested here: http://forum.texmacs.cn/t/a-wiki-for-texmacs/71/2 <http://forum.texmacs.cn/t/a-wiki-for-texmacs/71/2>) but it might be through pull requests.

A user-maintained TeXmacs wiki could be helpful for TeXmacs and therefore for all people that use it. Wiki topics relatively easy to write up are syntheses of good mailing-list answers - I am available to write some of them and this could become a FAQ.

Another good use of the wiki would be in my opinion a collection of links to plugins written by people not on the development team. I got the idea from the DokuWiki website, here: https://www.dokuwiki.org/plugins <https://www.dokuwiki.org/plugins> and especially here: https://www.dokuwiki.org/devel:plugins#publishing_a_plugin_on_dokuwikiorg <https://www.dokuwiki.org/devel:plugins#publishing_a_plugin_on_dokuwikiorg>; the software itself would be in other repositories, the wiki would contain links, descriptions and instructions. This would on one hand set the necessary distance between the software written by the development team and the user contributions (clear separation) and on the other hand would both show prospective users what is available and hopefully encourage current and prospective users to contribute more. Since uploads would not be permitted, this is probably quite safe and takes less work (maybe just very little) to manage.

For the wiki itself, if the GitHub one is the one that the developers would like to have, I would suggest to

- write up instructions on how to contribute

- put a link to it from the texmacs.org <http://texmacs.org> website

Another possibility is DokuWiki. On https://www.dokuwiki.org/faq:license#dokuwiki_software <https://www.dokuwiki.org/faq:license#dokuwiki_software> it says that it is released under the GPL so it is appropriate for a wiki on a free software project. I use it privately and it has been easy and quick to set up for my private use, maybe it will be easy to set it up for public use too (I do not know). Again IMO, it should be linked to from the texmacs.org <http://texmacs.org> website (it could be even part of texmacs.org <http://texmacs.org>, but maybe the designs do not fit together well).

A debate on the wiki topic would be nice :-)

Giovanni