Re: [help-texinfo] glossary tips?

[lfinsto1]

> I've done the "Terminology" section, which is like a glossary, but
> there are some things I want to do with it that aren't obvious from
> the texinfo manual.  Specifically:
>
> 1. I want the terms to show up in the table of contents.  Why?
>    Because acroread and xpdf offer expanding TOCs, and being able to
>    click on the term you're interested in right from the TOC would be
>    beneficial.

I can't think of any way of doing this (except for Karl's incantations, of
course).  You could put the terms into the TOC using the @node command
(unless it's the @chapter, @section, etc., commands --- don't remember
off-hand), but I think these commands are rather sensitive and my
intuition tells me that trying to put a link in them wouldn't work.

My approach would be to generate a separate list:  List of Terms, or
something and keep well away from the TOC.

>
> 2. I want to be able to link to a term's definition from other places
>    in the document, much like sites like Wikipedia do - a use of a
>    word is a link but not otherwise decorated, that links to the
>    definition of that word.
>
> I'm currently using "@table @dfn" which is both easy to write and
> looks good in all of html/info/pdf.
>
> Suggestions?

For this, I might write something myself to use instead of @dfn that did
more-or-less what @dfn does, but with whatever extras I want.

When I say "write", I don't mean changing the code of Texinfo.  I've
written a preprocessor for Texinfo for a couple of features I wanted
(e.g., "mathimages") and it's really a simple way of making Texinfo do
"extra" things.  The main part of it is a reasonably simple Flex scanner.

It's simple to make the scanner recognize some new command that looks like
a Texinfo command but isn't and it doesn't matter how ugly the Texinfo
output is.  The preprocessor is called Texipp and is included in the GNU
3DLDF distribution.  It's here:
http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/3dldf/3dldf/Group/DOC/TEXINFO/TEXIPP/

I must warn you that I haven't touched it in quite some time.  The last
time I did, it worked as far as it went, but I don't remember how far that
was.  Not very, I'm afraid.  However, the basic framework is there and I'm
fairly sure you could adapt it to your purposes without too much trouble. 
Or you could just use the same idea and program something yourself.

By the way, I've installed DJGPP a couple of times when I was forced (much
against my will) to work on Windows machines and I think it's a great
package.

I haven't actually used Texipp for my manuals yet, but I have done some
other moderately tricky things in them.  They may be worth a look:

http://www.gnu.org/software/3dldf/LDF.html#Documentation
http://www.gnu.org/software/metaexchange/#Documentation

Laurence Finston