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OS/2 Shareware BBS: 16 Announce
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devco.zip
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1993-07-30
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PROPOSAL:
That we form a co-operative to develop a publishing package for OS/2.
STRUCTURE:
A Limited Partnership. The General Partner, a corporation, will handle business
and marketing. The contributors will be Limited Partners. All profits will be
distributed to the partners. A Management Committee will supervise and control
the process.
PACKAGE:
A package of tools for creating publications or documents (paper or
electronic). Four basic tools:
Composition Tool. Designed for composing and proofing text. Emphasis on content
not format. Would include a somewhat novel approach to outlining and drafting
text. Also dictionary, thesaurus, usage, etc.
Graphics Tool. Designed for importing, viewing, transforming and manipulating
graphics. Other tools can be added for drawing, painting, etc.
Text Format Tool. Designed to control the appearance of text within columns or
on the page. Largely concerned with applying Styles -- fonts, type size, type
style, leading, etc. -- to blocks of text.
Page Format Tool. Designed to create page layouts and place text and graphics
within them.
These tools would act together on the data. In other words, one might have all
four active on the desktop simultaneously. For example, in the Page Format
Tool might set up a newsletter and assign certain space for an Editorial. I
would define Text Styles in the Text Format Tool and begin entering my ideas in
the Composition Tool. I could link my text to both the Text Format Tool and
Page Format Tool and interact with it in any one of the modes. Each would be,
in essence, a different window on the same data. I would import special
graphics through the Graphics Tool and link it to the Page Format Tool.
COMPOSITION TOOL CONCEPTS:
This tool would be flexible -- allowing the user to configure it to suit his or
her needs. There would be three types of text:
Draft. Stuff which will eventually be read in the final document. The user will
be able to apply attributes to this text identifying it as rough or final or
some stages in between. These would be user definable. This text would exist in
linear form in the main document or within subsidiary processes. Or some might
be collected in a card file for future use. These would be iconized and moved
by drag and drop. Any selected block of text could be objectified this way.
Comments. These would be post-it type notes by the author reminding him or
herself to do something or change something, etc. They might also be comments or
suggestions from collaborators. Each would be an object attached to the
document. They could be of any size. They would be activated by double clicking
the mouse on them.
Outline. This is text not designed to be read, but holding the place of text to
be written later. It might be formal outline material. It might be a quick
narrative of events to allow the author to skip ahead to another part of the
story. It might be a line of reasoning which will be fleshed out and fully
articulated later. Each paragraph would be objectifiable -- that is, double
clicking on the paragraph would launch a new process for composing text, of any
type, under that heading. The new process would be linked to the original.
These outline paragraphs could be hierarchical. The user could elaborate them
as part of an outline process or replace them with fully articulated text.
Eventually, they would all be smoothed into a linear whole, based on the
linkages.
The three types of text would be easily convertible one to another. A
suggestion posted as a comment might be integrated as text. A particularly well
written outline paragraph might be retained in the draft.
The user could collapse subprocesses back into the main document at any time.
A process would keep track of comments, the states of text and outline material
and display to the user, upon request, areas needing attention.
The general idea is that brief outline material would gradually be replaced by
draft text, which would be molded into the evolving document.
This tool would allow a writer to skip around within the composition as his or
her muse dictated, while maintaining in control of the overall shape and
structure.
TEXT FORMAT TOOL
This would probably be pretty straightforward. We might provide a way of
creating style objects or brushes that the writer could brush across blocks of
text. For example, one might create a Body Text, an Indented Sub-paragraph Text
and a Headline brush and "pain" the appropriate text with them. Or one might
create font brushes with alterable size and style settings, etc.
PAGE TOOL
Perhaps each virtual page would be a thread. In effect, each page would be an
object, linked dynamically to other objects. One would interact quickly with
the active page while background processes managed changes to others. Since
threads are finite, I suppose that some allocation of resources would be
necessary. Pages just after the active page or linked to it with some
proximity would be background processes. All other less critical pages might be
handled serially by one process.
OPEN ARCHITECTURE
The design of the product would facilitate the development of additional modules
-- math modules, sound modules for electronic publishing, etc.
WORK IN PROGRESS
Elementary versions of each of the tools might have a market while the whole
package takes shape. This would allow them to be tested in the real world of
work. It would also bring in cash flow to offset expenses.
FEEDBACK
Contact me with comments or ideas at:
Chris Barr
Internet: p00544@psilink.com
Compuserve: 75320,2055
or send me mail here.