Okay, my responsibilities at school have recently eased up a bit, and I might have some actual free time over the coming months. So I'd like to volunteer my services to write some needed documentation, tutorials, FAQs, etc. I am "fluent" in C and C++ and am not bad at Perl. I have been told I'm good at explaining things. I am anal-retentive about grammar, syntax, and spelling. I proofread compulsively. On the other hand, I didn't pay enough attention in linear algebra, so I don't remember how to multiply two non-square matrices, much less what a(n) MDCT is. So API references are probably out. Also I have no experience with formats other than plain text and HTML, which means man pages, info pages, DocBook or what-have-you would be prohibitively difficult. End-user documentation may be the place for me. For an example of my "work", see [ http://grahammitchell.net/files/copyrand.txt ], which is the documentation for a utility I wrote for my own use nearly four years ago and subsequently released. Most of the other programs listed at [ http://grahammitchell.net/code.html ] also have documentation included in the zipfile/tarball, if someone wants to read other examples. I am the sort of person who will say "No" at first rather than accept an assignment and not finish it. Which is to say, if I refuse an opportunity, it's probably because I know I would have done a crappy job or not had enough free time to do it anyway. I am also the sort of person who's perfectly happy writing a long FAQ and then letting someone else hack it up, so that the final product might be quite different from my suggestions. In fact, since my free time varies greatly with the time of year, I can't promise to *maintain* any of the documentation I do write. With all that out of the way, suggestions in this forum are welcome (if that's acceptable), or by personal email. If I get several things on my plate, I'll announce that I'm "booked" as well. -- Graham Mitchell - computer science teacher, Leander High School Man: What man? Praline: The man from the cat detector van. Man: Loony detector van you mean. Praline: It's people like you what cause unrest. --- >8 ---- List archives: http://www.xiph.org/archives/ Ogg project homepage: http://www.xiph.org/ogg/ To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to 'vorbis-dev-request@xiph.org' containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body. No subject is needed. Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.
> On the other hand, I didn't pay enough attention in linear algebra, so I > don't remember how to multiply two non-square matrices, much less what a(n) > MDCT is. So API references are probably out.If you can read C and are a good editer, I would say the API documentation for Ogg (what I've read) really seriously needs help. It's bad enough that the source is easier to read. I don't even think gritty understanding would be required - most of the stuff is glaring erros that could be fixed by a brute force search (things like incorrect function prototypes and variabe descriptions, not errors in reporting about algorithms). Ross Vandegrift ross@willow.seitz.com --- >8 ---- List archives: http://www.xiph.org/archives/ Ogg project homepage: http://www.xiph.org/ogg/ To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to 'vorbis-dev-request@xiph.org' containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body. No subject is needed. Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.
On Sat, 2 Feb 2002, Graham Mitchell wrote:> have some actual free time over the coming months. So I'd like to volunteer > my services to write some needed documentation, tutorials, FAQs, etc.<p>You are awesome. <p>> On the other hand, I didn't pay enough attention in linear algebra, so I> don't remember how to multiply two non-square matrices, much less what a(n) > MDCT is. So API references are probably out. Also I have no experience with > formats other than plain text and HTML, which means man pages, info pages, > DocBook or what-have-you would be prohibitively difficult.<p>Rather than make you waste your time learning a new markup, you could probably write stuff using simple, traditional HTML markup and convince someone else on the list ( I volunteer Jack! :) ) convert it to the format we need. <p>> End-user documentation may be the place for me. For an example of my "work",> see [ http://grahammitchell.net/files/copyrand.txt ], which is the > documentation for a utility I wrote for my own use nearly four years ago and > subsequently released.<p>Here are my suggestions (in order of decending importance): * Update and expand the FAQ on Vorbis.com: That FAQ is quite stale and could use some updating. If you decide to do this, post a request on vorbis@xiph.org for FAQ's (and perhaps answers). You can compile the results, clean them up a bit, and send it to Jack. * An introduction to compressed audio with Vorbis: Hanging around #vorbis, I can tell you that a lot of people show up with misconceptions about compressed (especially lossy) audio. An introduction to the area which uses Vorbis as the specific example would be a nice thing. Most people learned about lossy audio from MP3 and some have assigned attributes of MP3 to Vorbis incorrectly. Such a document would also have some tutorial aspects as well. If this interests you, I (and many others on the list) could suggest some topics for inclusion. (And yes, I would suggest that you not do API documentation.) --- Stan Seibert <p>--- >8 ---- List archives: http://www.xiph.org/archives/ Ogg project homepage: http://www.xiph.org/ogg/ To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to 'vorbis-dev-request@xiph.org' containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body. No subject is needed. Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.