(DON'T DELETE!!) ZSNES HTML Help Topic

[Clements]

[UPDATE]

All files needed to compile the CHM along with step-by-step instructions are now available in SVN.

This has several advantages:

- When I am unavailable, any doc team member (with the time and right software) can compile and commit the CHM to SVN. It only takes about 5 minutes or so to edit, compile and commit when you know what to do.

- Any doc writer can edit and update the Project and Contents Files. Every time a new section is added, or a section is moved, the Contents needs to be updated for the links to remain working. Sometimes it is hard for me to spot every change, so now anyone can update these files rather than just me. If you have any questions on doing this, I may be able to help. There is some documentation with the compiler as a first port of call. It's fairly simple to figure most stuff out.

Instructions should make compiling clear to everybody, but if you want to clean the file up or edit stuff to make it easier, be my guest.

Original Post:

The ZSNES HTML Help file, based on the latest HTML source available from Sourceforge.

Here is a list of my full changes to the appropriate files when compiling the CHM for the sake of reference:

Code: Select all

==============================================================
About.htm
==============================================================
Before </HTML> tag:

<img src="./images/corner.png" style="display:none;">

==============================================================
Radio.css
==============================================================

Split these merged groups by copying/pasting this:

#navigation
{
  background-color: #C8CFD8;
  border: solid 1px black;
  color: inherit;
  padding: 1px 1px 0.5em 1px;
  display:none;
}

#content
{
  background-color: #C8CFD8;
  border: solid 1px black;
  color: inherit;
  padding: 1px 1px 0.5em 1px;
}

--------------------------------------------------------------

#nav_column {
...
  width: 0em;
}

--------------------------------------------------------------

#content_column {
   margin: 0.65em 0.65em 0.65em 0.65em;

--------------------------------------------------------------

#footer {
...
  display:none;
}

--------------------------------------------------------------

Copy contents of shared.css into Radio.css

CHM is now available at Sourceforge:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/zsnes-docs/

[Noxious Ninja]

Hmm, I see. I'll try to find the cause.

[xamenus]

If future ZSNES releases are going to have chms, we might as well delete the firefox and navigation html code from the source.

However, that would be a somewhat major change for the docs. I reckon that we should make a team decision on whether we want to do that.

[Nach]

I don't know if we're only going to do CHM releases.
Although CHM is readable on Linux, I don't know how popular it is to read a CHM file.
A browser though is a perfectly standardized way to read docs.

We'd probably only make CHMs for ZSNESW.

[xamenus]

Actually, a chm would be a great way to unify the docs for the 3 ports, as you were wanting Nach. This way, all 3 ports could have documentation for the other 2 ports as well. So there's a plus.

[Nach]

Regardless you'll still have 3 directories to throw in the CHM, I don't want that.

I really want it unified. Not just for myself, but for the development of it.
Do you like that every time you find some typo in gui.htm you have to modify 3 files instead of one?

[xamenus]

The problem is that there are still lots of small differences for the ports, for readme.htm and gui.htm (eg. the dos port has the debugger, some gui and video features are in windows but not dos and linux, etc.). The FAQ isn't the only thing with differences. How should we deal with that?

[Nach]

In a case where a feature is a certain port only, lable it as such.

The FAQ should be broken into All:, DOS:, Windows:, SDL:.

For the GUI, the buttons in the upper right corner are no big deal.

[Richard C.]

however, there are major differences in the dos gui. we could seperate the windows, dos, and linux gui like we would the faq.

this is definately a good idea, and i just might begin working on it once i have more time (like friday night, sadly, if i have more time, or maybe some day i have off work).

[Richard C.]

forgot something:

since the documentation should be completely skinnable just by editing the css file, would it not be a good idea to make a new layout for the docs - one more like other documentation projects. for example, the gentoo docs. easy to read, very clean with little distraction, non-graphic intensive, and most importantly, also in html.

[funkyass]

stick with HTML.

chm is just bleah.

[Noxious Ninja]

forgot something:

since the documentation should be completely skinnable just by editing the css file, would it not be a good idea to make a new layout for the docs - one more like other documentation projects. for example, the gentoo docs. easy to read, very clean with little distraction, non-graphic intensive, and most importantly, also in html.

I've been playing with things along this line after being pleased with my recent site design, but I haven't come up with anything I really like yet.

[xamenus]

So what about the DOS port? Will it have a chm, or should the docs be text only (for those running under pure DOS)?

[Agozer]

So what about the DOS port? Will it have a chm, or should the docs be text only (for those running under pure DOS)?

I think they should be text only, exactly for those who run ZSNES in pure DOS.

[Nach]

I don't mind giving HTML docs to DOS users. Even though to my knowledge there isn't a decent graphical web browser for DOS, if you got it off the web, you got a web browser somewhere, and you can always read the HTML directly in DOS Edit if you're desperate.

[Agozer]

I don't mind giving HTML docs to DOS users. Even though to my knowledge there isn't a decent graphical web browser for DOS, if you got it off the web, you got a web browser somewhere, and you can always read the HTML directly in DOS Edit if you're desperate.

Eh, chalk my post up to being old school I guess.

[Nach]

I don't mind giving HTML docs to DOS users. Even though to my knowledge there isn't a decent graphical web browser for DOS, if you got it off the web, you got a web browser somewhere, and you can always read the HTML directly in DOS Edit if you're desperate.

Eh, chalk my post up to being old school I guess.

I'm old school too. You have a good point about pure DOS. Maybe I'm just biased because I read HTML like it's any other doc.

[Agozer]

because I read HTML like it's any other doc.

Me too... Anyway, nowadays people tend to forget that there are still people who run pure DOS (whatever their reasons for doing so might be) so we should provide them with the documentation in the simplest form possible; just plain text.

[xamenus]

Just a reminder for whovever converts the DOS docs to text: Don't forget to replace the hyperlinks with URLs.

That may be obvious, but hey.

[AspiringSquire]

I've already done some formatting for the text-only version of the docs from the "Unified" folder in CVS, using the latest revisions. As you can probably tell, I'd like to be in charge of the text versions. I'll make changes when necessary and cooperate with the team's ideas, of course.

Unfortunately, I have no form of online file hosting right now, so what method might you prefer for transmitting what I have so far? Could I just e-mail the zipped files? ...To IceFox, I suppose?

I haven't yet done the hyperlinks-to-URLs conversion, though.
I'll try to do that before sending the files.

[I guess I should have made a new topic... Move this post if you feel like it. ]

[Aerdan]

I *was* going to set up a wiki on zsnes.ownsjoo.info, but pf changed the root passwd and sudo is broken, so I can't unless I do it locally.

[xamenus]

Unfortunately, I have no form of online file hosting right now, so what method might you prefer for transmitting what I have so far? Could I just e-mail the zipped files? ...To IceFox, I suppose?

I use GeoCities. You could also use http://rapidshare.de

And thank you for helping out btw.



Has anyone managed to fix style.css for IE? After that's done, maybe Clements could then modify the html docs as necessary (remove navigation, Firefox logos) and make a chm.

[AspiringSquire]

I've put a zip file for you to download here:
http://rapidshare.de/files-en/544358/zd ... 1.zip.html

I couldn't add the latest hyperlinks because CVS doesn't show that update yet, but I think I know what you put there.

Tell me what you think.

Edit: Whoops, forgot to rename the files to "readme.txt", etc. Oh well. That will be done when they're ready to be used.

Edit 2: ...Or rather, "when we're ready to use them."

Everything is formatted and fully readable. I gave the sub-sections a numbering scheme so they could be found more easily from the Navigation listing. The only major thing that I haven't done is set a characters-per-line limit. I'd like to know whether we think that would be necessary because it would take quite a while to do it and make it work/look good with the rest of the formatting. But it is not beyond my capability.

Edit 3: I updated the GUI file. Nothing else was changed, but this includes all of the documents from the unified folder (hence, no FAQ):
http://rapidshare.de/files-en/551610/zd ... 1.zip.html

[xamenus]

Wow, looks great! However, there are a lot of unneeded * and + symbols throughout the docs, in places where there are list of things, like the what's new, etc. (I imagine they appear when copying and pasting). They should be removed. Other than that, things look great so far!

Sorry that it's taken me so long to respond to this, I haven't been around as much and I missed this post.

[AspiringSquire]

Wow, looks great!

Thanks. I've had some experience formatting simple text files. I know what I like.
Update here: http://rapidshare.de/files-en/577851/zd ... 2.zip.html

Only Changes, GUI, Netplay, and Readme were changed at all, as the version numbers indicate. The files have been relieved of superfluous markings at the beginnings of all lines that had them. I have the "find and replace" tool in metapad to thank for making the process much faster. [The best true "Notepad replacement" program available for Windows, because it is so small and fast, with added functionality. Free! — If you're at all interested, you should try it. See the feature list.]
It appears that the *, o, +, and # symbols are all signifiers for how far the text should be indented. At least, that was the text representation of something like that in the html.


Also, some more "bug reports":

Following are present in 16-bit graphics mode:

This should be "The following are...", like the others listed in the section.

Reverse Stereo - This function swaps the L and R volume levels in stereo mode.

Is that what it really does? Doesn't it swap which channel (left or right) goes to which computer speaker? If that's what it is meant to convey, the sentence needs rewriting.