[General] Nitpicker on TextMorphs, documentation, forum content, wiki

[Dan Ingalls]

Hi, Richard -

>I still have no clue how to enter and manipulate text in a TextMorph. 
>Is there some intention to document that aspect of this fantastic 
>system?

Er, did you say document?  ;-)

Seriously, though, perhaps you could help us to produce a relatively
simple guide for first-timers.  I'll take a stab at this in the next day or two,
you can critique it, and then we can move on to the next thing.

If you have not already done so, please do refer to the new Technical
Overview that Antero wrote up just two weeks ago,

	http://research.sun.com/projects/lively/LivelyKernel-TechnicalOverview.pdf

If you find that to be useful, then we may want to focus on
improvements to that document, rather than starting something new.

I'm anticipating, though, that you may be after something simpler for first timers;
the kind of thing that would just let you, eg, give a demo and do something really simple.

>Some of the referenced papers are not available without substantial 
>memberships or purchase. Will that remain true, or will more current 
>papers eventually eliminate the need for the historic morphic documents?

Well, I hope so.  Morphic is really simple and, if we can't cover it in a page or two,
then something is really wrong.  Again, please critique what's in the Technical
Overview from the standpoint of your needs.

>Now that this mailing list has replaced the forums, is all the text 
>that I entered therein lost forever? I hope it can reappear as 
>content within a historical section of a new wiki until the best of 
>it is converted into better wiki pages and the old pages removed, 
>except from the historical archives.

The forums were supposed to remain accessible after we locked them.
I'm now tracking down why they are not.

>What is the current thought about having a wiki for this stuff? I've 
>considered various ways to coordinate content between mailing lists 
>and forums and wikis. To me, there seem to be fairly natural ways to 
>maintain the advantages of each with all the content made available 
>in the wiki. That permits the continuous improvement of the content 
>while ensuring that the history automatically preserves everything 
>entered. Only the wiki medium serves the function of enhancing the 
>reader's experience continually, in a natural way.
>
>Eventually, I will want to create multi world content with chosen 
>constraints on who can access and who can modify each screen/window/
>page/world or whatever we call the parts. For my purposes, as long as 
>many browsers will permit viewing and limited choice and data entry, 
>it will be fine to require specific browsers for fully functional 
>development of new content.
>
>The notion of a wiki implemented in Lively Kernel is terminally 
>attractive.

We, too, want to explore Wiki-like functionality in the Lively Kernel.
Perhaps we can work together on this.  Before it can serve as a
community vehicle, though, we need either

	A way for LK to run in all browsers
	(probably a plugin of some kind)
or
	Some little proxy-projector sort of thing that
	at least lets users of other browsers view the
	content.

Mind you, this needn't inhibit us from exploring life in an LKWiki,
since everyone in the community (sort of by definition ;-)
has found a browser that works.

	- Dan