From hp_lexicon at yahoo.com Fri Aug 9 19:46:30 2002 From: hp_lexicon at yahoo.com (hp_lexicon) Date: Fri, 09 Aug 2002 19:46:30 -0000 Subject: FAQs: Your Help Please Message-ID: Hey: I'm going to update and upload all pending FAQs before the end of this month. Please do me a favor and someone put all the files that I will need into one folder in our Files section. When I get the word that they're all together, I'll download the whole lot, format them, and upload them to the FAQs. Can this be done within the next four days? I'll be camping on Lake Michigan until Thursday, at which time I'd like to see that folder ready for me. Steve not looking forward to the new school year From mike at aberforthsgoat.net Sat Aug 10 11:33:10 2002 From: mike at aberforthsgoat.net (Aberforth's Goat) Date: Sat, 10 Aug 2002 13:33:10 +0200 Subject: [HP4GU-FAQ] FAQs: Your Help Please References: Message-ID: <001d01c24061$b64166a0$0200a8c0@shasta> Steve wrote, > I'm going to update and upload all pending FAQs before the end of > this month. Please do me a favor and someone put all the files that > I will need into one folder in our Files section. When I get the > word that they're all together, I'll download the whole lot, format > them, and upload them to the FAQs. Can this be done within the next > four days? I'll be camping on Lake Michigan until Thursday, at which > time I'd like to see that folder ready for me. Hiya Steve! Good that you should pipe up just now, since we were just talking the about FAQ-hosting problem in the moderator group. Some of the completed FAQs (including my own piece on Pettigrew) are now over a year old and out of date - but still unpublished. I have a question: do you think the FAQs should stay on your site, or would it make more sense to move them to a server to which other HPfGU members can publish? (I *believe* we could have space on the FA servers ... ) Or could you consider giving a few people in this group access to your server - at least the portion where the HPfGU FAQs are. (We might even find a way of integrating the FAQs more closely with your HP Lexicon ... ) One way or another, I'm convinced that we need to get a more fluid connection between the stages of FAQ-writing and FAQ-publishing. Ideas? Baaaaaa! Aberforth's Goat (a.k.a. Mike Gray, who wishes Steve patience, fortitude, guts and chutzpah for the new year.) _______________________ "Of course, I'm not entirely sure he can read, so that may not have been bravery...." From hp_lexicon at yahoo.com Sat Aug 10 14:03:46 2002 From: hp_lexicon at yahoo.com (hp_lexicon) Date: Sat, 10 Aug 2002 14:03:46 -0000 Subject: possible solutions to the FAQ problem In-Reply-To: <001d01c24061$b64166a0$0200a8c0@shasta> Message-ID: Hey, gang: When I originally offered to place the FAQs on the Lexicon server it was because nothing else was being offred and everything was at a standstill. The result was that we went from a lot of talk and a bunch of files in different formats that no one could access to a working site. At that time we talked about the fact that I was already very busy with the Lexicon and wouldn't have time to do frequent updates and that no one would be able to do the final uploading except me, but even with those things it was still the best alternative we had. We tried to find ways for the files written in various formats, from Word to pure text to heavily-tagged HTML, to be standardized into a form that would be easily uploaded to the server, but there didn't seem to be a way to do that. Paul had some kind of conversion thing going for a while there, but it still didn't do all editing that was necessary, such as placing the index at the top of the page, making the layouts consistent, and so on. As a result, any file uploaded required quite a bit of my time to get it into usable form. That really was a problem for me since I don't a lot of extra time, especially during the school year. I have absolutely no problem with moving the FAQs to another server so that someone else could take over editing and maintaining them. It's fine with me. What we would need to do is set up the space and just move the files. There aren't very many of them. Depending on how we move them, we may need to do a bunch of link-tweaking, but so be it. There is a better solution, in my opinion. If we want to leave them on the Lexicon server, we need to attack the problem of all the time it takes for me to convert the wide variety of formats and layouts and styles of the original files. The way to do that is to enlist someone to do that formating for me so all I have to do is the final upload. It's not that hard to do--it's pretty simple, actually. If someone wants to take the time to learn to use an editor like Composer (sorry, no FrontPage or Word, they mess up the code terribly) they could easily make the final pages and then just email them to me. I've had people do that with Lexicon pages they were working on and it works great. It just means appointing an editor. I'll work with them so they know the style/formating requirements for the page and just upload whatever is sent to me. Really, that would be the easiest and best solution in my opinion. No one has to move the files or fix the links or anything. If there's someone who would be willing to take on that job, our problem would be solved. To recap: The problem boils down to the fact that I don't have time to do all the editing required to turn raw files into finished pages. If someone would be willing to do that, they can email them to me and I'll upload them within a day or two. If everyone would rather move the whole site, that's fine too, but it would be more work up front. Steve From joyw at gwu.edu Sat Aug 10 16:01:50 2002 From: joyw at gwu.edu (- Joy -) Date: Sat, 10 Aug 2002 12:01:50 -0400 Subject: [HP4GU-FAQ] possible solutions to the FAQ problem References: Message-ID: <002101c24087$3e09fdc0$53263244@nrockv01.md.comcast.net> Steve wrote: <> I'd be happy to help with the reformatting. The problem is that I don't use Composer... I handcode in Notepad. Would that still help, or do you need someone that uses a WYSIWYG editor? ~Joy~ From heidit at netbox.com Sat Aug 10 16:16:00 2002 From: heidit at netbox.com (heidit at netbox.com) Date: Sat, 10 Aug 2002 11:16 -0500 Subject: [HP4GU-FAQ] possible solutions to the FAQ problem Message-ID: We have space on the server. We have access to yael's ms word stripping problem. And knowing the faqs as I do, there's no reason why hand coding won't work. My fanfic faq was all hand coded. I'll work with anyone who wants to get the faqs up at hpfgu.org.uk if the mos want. --- Original Message --- From: joyw at gwu.edu, Subject: Re: [HP4GU-FAQ] possible solutions to the FAQ problem Real-To: - Joy - Steve wrote: <> I'd be happy to help with the reformatting. The problem is that I don't use Composer... I handcode in Notepad. Would that still help, or do you need someone that uses a WYSIWYG editor? ~Joy~ To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: HP4GU-FAQ-unsubscribe at egroups.com Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ From kippesp at yahoo.com Sat Aug 10 16:49:23 2002 From: kippesp at yahoo.com (Paul Kippes) Date: Sat, 10 Aug 2002 09:49:23 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [HP4GU-FAQ] possible solutions to the FAQ problem In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20020810164923.89937.qmail@web13803.mail.yahoo.com> I've checked with Heidi about using the FA server. Space is not a problem. And I would have no problem setting up a special area (or two) for HPFGU stuff and give everyone on this list the FTP info to do updates. This would allow us to distribute the upload effort. The only reason I used that initial MS Word converter is it was the ONLY one I found that handled footnotes correctly. If we could place a ban on footnotes, I'm certain we could maintain everything as a MS Word document for those of us who have no decent HTML editor. FictionAlley uses a decent MS Word converter although it doesn't maintain footnote info. Since the files are few, moving shouldn't present much of a problem. If you package them up send them my way. Yahoo Mail will allow up to a 2 meg attachment. --- hp_lexicon wrote: > Hey, gang: > > When I originally offered to place the FAQs on the Lexicon server > it > was because nothing else was being offred and everything was at a > standstill. The result was that we went from a lot of talk and a > bunch of files in different formats that no one could access to a > working site. At that time we talked about the fact that I was > already very busy with the Lexicon and wouldn't have time to do > frequent updates and that no one would be able to do the final > uploading except me, but even with those things it was still the > best alternative we had. > > We tried to find ways for the files written in various formats, > from > Word to pure text to heavily-tagged HTML, to be standardized into a > > form that would be easily uploaded to the server, but there didn't > seem to be a way to do that. Paul had some kind of conversion thing > > going for a while there, but it still didn't do all editing that > was > necessary, such as placing the index at the top of the page, making > > the layouts consistent, and so on. As a result, any file uploaded > required quite a bit of my time to get it into usable form. That > really was a problem for me since I don't a lot of extra time, > especially during the school year. > > I have absolutely no problem with moving the FAQs to another server > > so that someone else could take over editing and maintaining them. > It's fine with me. What we would need to do is set up the space and > > just move the files. There aren't very many of them. Depending on > how we move them, we may need to do a bunch of link-tweaking, but > so > be it. > > There is a better solution, in my opinion. If we want to leave them > > on the Lexicon server, we need to attack the problem of all the > time > it takes for me to convert the wide variety of formats and layouts > and styles of the original files. The way to do that is to enlist > someone to do that formating for me so all I have to do is the > final > upload. It's not that hard to do--it's pretty simple, actually. If > someone wants to take the time to learn to use an editor like > Composer (sorry, no FrontPage or Word, they mess up the code > terribly) they could easily make the final pages and then just > email > them to me. I've had people do that with Lexicon pages they were > working on and it works great. It just means appointing an editor. > I'll work with them so they know the style/formating requirements > for the page and just upload whatever is sent to me. > > Really, that would be the easiest and best solution in my opinion. > No one has to move the files or fix the links or anything. If > there's someone who would be willing to take on that job, our > problem would be solved. > > To recap: > The problem boils down to the fact that I don't have time to do all > > the editing required to turn raw files into finished pages. If > someone would be willing to do that, they can email them to me and > I'll upload them within a day or two. If everyone would rather move > > the whole site, that's fine too, but it would be more work up > front. > > Steve __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? HotJobs - Search Thousands of New Jobs http://www.hotjobs.com From john at walton.vu Sat Aug 10 18:44:56 2002 From: john at walton.vu (John Walton) Date: Sat, 10 Aug 2002 14:44:56 -0400 Subject: Footnoting (was: possible solutions to the FAQ problem) In-Reply-To: <20020810164923.89937.qmail@web13803.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Paul Kippes said: > The only reason I used that initial MS Word converter is it was the > ONLY one I found that handled footnotes correctly. If we could place > a ban on footnotes, I'm certain we could maintain everything as a MS > Word document for those of us who have no decent HTML editor. > FictionAlley uses a decent MS Word converter although it doesn't > maintain footnote info. A solution for those who feel that footnotes are a problem is either endnoting -- i.e. "Members feel that Hermione is very stupid. See note 12. [link to endnotes in general]" or the Harvard System, which involves putting an abbreviated attribution in parentheses after the sentence -- "Members feel that Hermione is very stupid. (Message 123451) There's also the possibility of some of our HTML volunteers going through by hand and making A NAME tags for the footnotes. I've done this in the Humongous Bigfile and am happy to explain further. Thoughts? --John ________________________________ John Walton -- john at walton.vu "One, two! One, two! And through and through The vorpal blade went snicker-snack! He left it dead, and with its head He went galumphing back." --Lewis Carroll, "The Jabberwocky" ________________________________ From mike at aberforthsgoat.net Mon Aug 12 20:50:52 2002 From: mike at aberforthsgoat.net (Aberforth's Goat) Date: Mon, 12 Aug 2002 22:50:52 +0200 Subject: Next Step: the Server Decision References: <20020810164923.89937.qmail@web13803.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <007b01c24241$f31c49a0$0200a8c0@shasta> Hi all! First, I want to thank Steve for taking the initiative on this and for everything he's done in getting the project going, and continuing to take interest in the FAQ-project. * * * * We need to make a decision about our hosting situation so we can get the show on the road! I see a few advantages to remaining on the Lexicon server: (1) We're already there, so we wouldn't have to do a U-haul job. (2) It's close to the Lexicon, and might even (theoretically) be integrated into the lexicon - and some kind of integration between the two would be sensible. (At least to my mind: as a surfer, I like having as much information as possible indexed from a single site. It certainly avoids redundance.) CAVEAT: Of course, I'm not sure whether either Steve or the FAQ-authors would even want this. That is - on one hand - I don't know if Stve would even want our material to appear under the aegis of his site. (For example, a disquisition on fanfic isn't exactly prime Lexicon material.) And seen from the other side, I don't know whether we HPfGU folks wouldn't prefer to present the FAQ as a self-contained project; close integration with the Lexicon *might* make it less of an explicitly HPfGU project. (Of course it might actually be possible to have two separate ways of accessing the FAQ-essays: one through hyperlinks at appropriate points on Steve's site, another through an HPfGU FAQ index page.) Any thoughts would be welcome! I see two significant advantages in moving to the FA server: (1) I have the impression that the FA conglemaration has a *lot* of experience at getting submitted material into a publishable form. HTML-ising a fanfic and HTML-ising a FAQ are very similar processes. (2) It seems to me that the FA-server route would create a publishing process involving a maximum of two persons (author, formatter-publisher), as opposed to a three-person process (author, formatter, Steve). Since we could also involve quite a few html-literate people at the "formatter-publisher" stage, I think we would be avoiding potential bottlenecks. Those are my thoughts so far - what do you guys say? I've cc'd this post to the HPfGU moderator group and have also written a summary of the discussion preceding it. I would suggest that we moderators come to a final decision (with further input from anyone involved in this group!) by Friday so that we can all begin tooling up next weekend. Baaaaaa! Aberforth's Goat (a.k.a. Mike Gray, writing on his own initiative, but with his HPfGU moderator cap on.) _______________________ "Of course, I'm not entirely sure he can read, so that may not have been bravery...." From mike at aberforthsgoat.net Tue Aug 20 19:54:01 2002 From: mike at aberforthsgoat.net (Aberforth's Goat) Date: Tue, 20 Aug 2002 21:54:01 +0200 Subject: [HP4GU-FAQ] Next Step: the Server Decision References: <20020810164923.89937.qmail@web13803.mail.yahoo.com> <007b01c24241$f31c49a0$0200a8c0@shasta> Message-ID: <003801c24883$55c08070$0200a8c0@shasta> Hi guys - And sorry for the long wait on this - I'm juggling a bit much at the moment! Having talked things through in the mod group, we've decided to pack the U-Haul and move the FAQs to the FA server, were we'll be able to greet the world at http://www.hpfgu.org.uk/faq. In fact, Heidi has an example up at http://www.hpfgu.org.uk/faq/fanfic.html. Before we go: thanks again to Steve for everything he's put into the project. Also, we'll need to talk through formatting. I would assume that we should stay with the formatting Steve has already developed, since it looks great and is already done. Open questions: Do we need some new HTML people? Joy has offered to help on this, but I should expect that she'll need a few people to help her out. What say, Joy? We could troll the MEG group first, then ask in the main group if we still need some more help. Also: what shall we put completed FAQs that still need to be HTML-ized (or have their HTML vetted before uploading)? My suggestion would be to create a folder in the files section called http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HP4GU-FAQ/files/upload/ (don't click yet - I haven't actually created it!) and place all such files there. Then the HTML people can pull them down for editing and delete the copy in the "loading" folder to avoid confusion. Does that sound good? Baaaaaa! Aberforth's Goat (a.k.a. Mike Gray) _______________________ "Of course, I'm not entirely sure he can read, so that may not have been bravery...." And there's proof that he can't write either - check out the Viagramus Curse at http://www.riddikulus.org/authors/agoat/VC01.html From kippesp at yahoo.com Tue Aug 20 20:10:12 2002 From: kippesp at yahoo.com (Paul Kippes) Date: Tue, 20 Aug 2002 13:10:12 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [HP4GU-FAQ] Next Step: the Server Decision In-Reply-To: <003801c24883$55c08070$0200a8c0@shasta> Message-ID: <20020820201012.80914.qmail@web13804.mail.yahoo.com> Good to hear a decision was made. Is there a mod group I don't know about???? I looked in on HPfGU-Mod just yesterday going back about a month. What were the subject lines? I'll get things configured to make this swift. Paul --- Aberforth's Goat wrote: > Hi guys - > > And sorry for the long wait on this - I'm juggling a bit much at > the > moment! > > Having talked things through in the mod group, we've decided to > pack > the U-Haul and move the FAQs to the FA server, were we'll be able > to > greet the world at http://www.hpfgu.org.uk/faq. In fact, Heidi has > an > example up at http://www.hpfgu.org.uk/faq/fanfic.html. > > Before we go: thanks again to Steve for everything he's put into > the > project. Also, we'll need to talk through formatting. I would > assume > that we should stay with the formatting Steve has already > developed, > since it looks great and is already done. > > Open questions: Do we need some new HTML people? Joy has offered to > help on this, but I should expect that she'll need a few people to > help her out. What say, Joy? We could troll the MEG group first, > then > ask in the main group if we still need some more help. > > Also: what shall we put completed FAQs that still need to be > HTML-ized > (or have their HTML vetted before uploading)? My suggestion would > be > to create a folder in the files section called > http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HP4GU-FAQ/files/upload/ (don't click > yet - I haven't actually created it!) and place all such files > there. > Then the HTML people can pull them down for editing and delete the > copy in the "loading" folder to avoid confusion. Does that sound > good? > > Baaaaaa! > > Aberforth's Goat (a.k.a. Mike Gray) > _______________________ > > "Of course, I'm not entirely sure he can read, so that may > not have been bravery...." > > And there's proof that he can't write either - check out the > Viagramus Curse at > http://www.riddikulus.org/authors/agoat/VC01.html > > > ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor > > To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: > HP4GU-FAQ-unsubscribe at egroups.com > > > > Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to > http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ > > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? HotJobs - Search Thousands of New Jobs http://www.hotjobs.com From mike at aberforthsgoat.net Wed Aug 21 09:16:48 2002 From: mike at aberforthsgoat.net (Aberforth's Goat) Date: Wed, 21 Aug 2002 11:16:48 +0200 Subject: [HP4GU-FAQ] Next Step: the Server Decision References: <20020820201012.80914.qmail@web13804.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <000501c248f3$7b79d530$0200a8c0@shasta> Paul wondered, > Is there a mod group I don't know about???? I looked in on HPfGU-Mod > just yesterday going back about a month. What were the subject > lines? Sure - sorry for the confusion, Paul. There's yet another a smaller group, composed of only the eight HPfGU moderators - wheels within wheels within wheels, so to speak. Theoretically, we can make decisions more quickly by using that group. (Unfortunately, the bearings have a habit of getting stuck ... ) > I'll get things configured to make this swift. Brilliant! Do you mean configured on the FA end? I knw you're involved in FA - but what *do* you do there? Baaaaaa! Aberforth's Goat (a.k.a. Mike Gray) _______________________ "Of course, I'm not entirely sure he can read, so that may not have been bravery...." And there's proof that he can't write either - check out the Viagramus Curse at http://www.riddikulus.org/authors/agoat/VC01.html From heidit at netbox.com Wed Aug 21 11:14:51 2002 From: heidit at netbox.com (heidit at netbox.com) Date: Wed, 21 Aug 2002 11:14:51 -0000 Subject: [Re: [HP4GU-FAQ] Next Step: the Server Decision] Message-ID: <20020821111451.7087.qmail@uwdvg001.cms.usa.net> "Aberforth's Goat" wrote: > > > I'll get things configured to make this swift. > > Brilliant! Do you mean configured on the FA end? I knw you're involved > in FA - but what *do* you do there? > He means on the server end - Paul is our Tech Admin, server honcho, vbulletin dude, semi-irregular programmer (with Jon, who does a bit more programming). We have a flowchart somewhere - need to make it public... And mike - we totally need new HTML people. Actually, I think asking for html-only volunteers on the main list is a great idea - even if we have people on MEG who want to help, it would be a great way to get relative newbies involved. People who want to help have to give samples of their work, though - links to pages they've done. And we can say that a 10 hour time committment over 2 weeks is fine, or a more continuous one. Do we need an email address for potential volunteers to send their info to? ____________________________________________________________________ This message was sent from my Palm wireless email account. From joyw at gwu.edu Thu Aug 22 00:33:23 2002 From: joyw at gwu.edu (- Joy -) Date: Wed, 21 Aug 2002 20:33:23 -0400 Subject: [HP4GU-FAQ] Next Step: the Server Decision References: <20020810164923.89937.qmail@web13803.mail.yahoo.com> <007b01c24241$f31c49a0$0200a8c0@shasta> <003801c24883$55c08070$0200a8c0@shasta> Message-ID: <006901c24973$85be67b0$f5243244@Joy> Mike asked: "Do we need some new HTML people? Joy has offered to help on this, but I should expect that she'll need a few people to help her out. What say, Joy?" Joy says: I definitely think that having more people to help out never hurts. Feel free and ask away! I want to help, but I'm not territorial in any stretch of the imagination. I'm just volunteering, not claiming ownership. Getting together a team of coders sounds like a good idea to me. ~Joy~