Using a wiki for FOSS application documentation


 
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Old 05-09-2008
Using a wiki for FOSS application documentation

Fri, 09 May 2008 08:00:00 GMT
For a lot of programmers, writing an application is fun, but writing its manual is not. Adding new features, refining the product, and responding to users' input are all more rewarding than writing instructions on how to use the software. However, good documentation is necessary to have happy, informed users who can contribute meaningfully to future development. A few months ago, Gilbert Ashley, the author of src2pkg (Slackware's "magic package maker") invited me and two other people to help him manage the user documentation for his program. The process we used to create the src2pkg wiki may be a useful example for other free and open source software (FOSS) application developers.


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OpenGuides::JSON(3pm)					User Contributed Perl Documentation				     OpenGuides::JSON(3pm)

       emit_json
	   Renders the given node as JSON

       output_as_json
	   Renders the given arbitary data as JSON

NAME
OpenGuides::JSON - An OpenGuides plugin to output JSON. DESCRIPTION
Does all the JSON stuff for OpenGuides. Distributed and installed as part of the OpenGuides project, not intended for independent installation. This documentation is probably only useful to OpenGuides developers. SYNOPSIS
use Wiki::Toolkit; use OpenGuides::Config; use OpenGuides::JSON; my $wiki = Wiki::Toolkit->new( ... ); my $config = OpenGuides::Config->new( file => "wiki.conf" ); my $json_writer = OpenGuides::JSON->new( wiki => $wiki, config => $config ); # JSON version of a node. print "Content-Type: application/javascript "; print $json_writer->emit_json( node => "Masala Zone, N1 0NU" ); # Ten most recent changes. print "Content-Type: application/javascript "; print "Last-Modified: " . $self->json_timestamp( items => 10 ) . " "; print $json_writer->make_recentchanges_json( items => 10 ); METHODS
new my $json_writer = OpenGuides::JSON->new( wiki => $wiki, config => $config ); "wiki" must be a Wiki::Toolkit object and "config" must be an OpenGuides::Config object. Both arguments mandatory. emit_json $wiki->write_node( "Masala Zone, N1 0NU", "Quick and tasty Indian food", $checksum, { comment => "New page", username => "Kake", locale => "Islington" } ); print "Content-Type: application/javascript "; print $json_writer->emit_json( node => "Masala Zone, N1 0NU" ); Note: Some of the fields emitted by the JSON generator are taken from the node metadata. The form of this metadata is not mandated by Wiki::Toolkit. Your wiki application should make sure to store some or all of the following metadata when calling "write_node": postcode - The postcode or zip code of the place discussed by the node. Defaults to the empty string. city - The name of the city that the node is in. If not supplied, then the value of "default_city" in the config object supplied to "new", if available, otherwise the empty string. country - The name of the country that the node is in. If not supplied, then the value of "default_country" in the config object supplied to "new" will be used, if available, otherwise the empty string. username - An identifier for the person who made the latest edit to the node. This person will be listed as a contributor (Dublin Core). Defaults to empty string. locale - The value of this can be a scalar or an arrayref, since some places have a plausible claim to being in more than one locale. Each of these is put in as a "Neighbourhood" attribute. phone - Only one number supported at the moment. No validation. website - No validation. opening_hours_text - A freeform text field. json_maker Returns a raw Wiki::Toolkit::Plugin::JSON object created with the values you invoked this module with. make_recentchanges_json # Ten most recent changes. print "Content-Type: application/javascript "; print "Last-Modified: " . $json_writer->json_timestamp( items => 10 ) . " "; print $json_writer->make_recentchanges_json( items => 10 ); # All the changes made by bob in the past week, ignoring minor edits. my %args = ( days => 7, ignore_minor_edits => 1, filter_on_metadata => { username => "bob" }, ); print "Content-Type: application/javascript "; print "Last-Modified: " . $json_writer->json_timestamp( %args ) . " "; print $json_writer->make_recentchanges_json( %args ); json_timestamp print "Last-Modified: " . $json_writer->json_timestamp( %args ) . " "; Returns the timestamp of the RSS feed in POSIX::strftime style ("Tue, 29 Feb 2000 12:34:56 GMT"), which is equivalent to the timestamp of the most recent item in the feed. Takes the same arguments as make_recentchanges_json(). You will most likely need this to print a Last-Modified HTTP header so user-agents can determine whether they need to reload the feed or not. SEE ALSO
o Wiki::Toolkit o <http://openguides.org/> o <http://chefmoz.org/> AUTHOR
The OpenGuides Project (openguides-dev@openguides.org) COPYRIGHT
Copyright (C) 2003-2009 The OpenGuides Project. All Rights Reserved. This module is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. CREDITS
Code in this module is mostly pirated from OpenGuides::RDF, those authors deserve all the credit. Chris Prather did the pirating. perl v5.14.2 2013-01-11 OpenGuides::JSON(3pm)