RE: Introduction / MSDN-js

I can help with the script if it's XSLT or Python or Perl, or if
Alexander is doing it I could be a tester.  Using XSLT you could turn
it directly into MediaWiki markup.  However, I foresee lots of
problems with links and references, so even if you start with XSLT
there will likely end up being a need for script code like Python to
to hard things like cross reference the whole bundle, finding dups,
errors, missing links, rewriting footnotes and anchors and whatnot.

Instead of a one-by-one conversion, an exactly opposite idea is an
all-at-once conversion, a processing pipeline, where you benefit from
one or more intermediate formats, that always takes the pristine
original and always creates a completed finished product to be
reviewed.  When any error at all is found, open an issue, and the
script or scripts are tweaked, we redo the whole thing, and continue
iteratively until it's all perfectly converted.

As to the three points made at
http://blog.webplatform.org/2013/04/new-msdn-js-docs/#more-335 :

1.  URL structure - nice to have contributed content stay together as
a cohesive unit in the wiki and not try to merge it into something
else for now.  You're not doing a rewrite and mass edits just yet.
Keep it together at first.  Maybe contributed content can be subpages,
such as mjs/page1 and mjs/page2, etc.

2.  MediaWiki templates - anything the XSLT or Python? script produces
is easily template aware, i.e., it can create content that is
template-syntax-correct.  Not focusing on this just yet.

3.  Methodology to convert the HTML content into the wiki - that's
what I'm addressing mainly, a potentially multi-step conversion.

Received on Sunday, 28 April 2013 22:51:19 UTC