SEUL: Re: sdoc draft spec - Question tags

["Pete St. Onge" <pstonge@trentu.ca>]

Roger,
     Kudos on the new spec. Simon hinted that something was up with
SDOC, but I didn't imagine it would be this big.

[One small thing: it took me a little while to figure out that the new
sdoc is command line driven, and not automated behind the scenes as it
was before (ie. I can't just add it to the cvs tree and have it all
happen automatically, I understand). Perhaps that could be clarified in
the final docs]

> People who are interested in any of these applications should start
> thinking now about what tags they want supported. That is, in
> seul-research, we should come up with each "type" of question we'll
> have, and maybe how they should look in terms of final html. If you
> give me adequate specs, the actual implementation of a handler will
> be trivial.

     Okay, here are some ideas ;-). Suggest that most questions could be
set up using single or balanced tags:

<Question %type%>Foo</Question>
<Question %type%="Foo">

     ...where type is the answer type expected. This would allow for
existing HTML shells to build it without having the user losing sight of
the tags (especially when the tags themselves are hidden - my pet
peeve). This would also make it easier to adapt existing docs to the
standard. As for types of answers, here are some ideas:

<Question Check="Foo">   ... Check mark box
<Question YesNo="Foo">   ... radio buttons with Yes and No
<Question ButtonX="Foo"> ... X radio buttons, choose one.
<Question NumberX="Foo"> ... as ButtonX, but buttons are numbered
<Question Text="Foo">    ... text box for typed answer
<Question Parag="Foo">   ... big text box for typed answer (multi-line)
<Question Group="Foo"></Question> ... see below**

Examples of this would be (yes, I am switching between both 'formats'
here...
<Question Parag>Tell me about your childhood:</Question>
<Question Number7>How many siblings did you have?</Question>
<Question YesNo="Were you the oldest?">
<Question Check>Please check this box if you have sisters</Question>

     and of course...

Please rank the following in terms of satisfaction, from Excellent to
Very unsatisfactory
<Question Button5="OS Stability">
<Question Button5="clarity of documentation">
<Question Button5="completedness of documentation">

I imagine there would be some occasions where several radio buttons are
needed, with some associated text:

"How much do you make?
under 5K, 5-10K, 11-30K, 31-100K, over 100K" could set up as...

<Question Group="How much do you make?">
under 5K</Q>
5-10K</Q>
11-30K</Q>
31-100K</Q>
over 100K</Q>
</Question>

It might be possible to set up this tag like the others, in that if the
first tag itself does not contain the question, it would be found in the
first slot:

<Question Group>
How much do you make?</Q>
under 5K</Q>
5-10K</Q>
11-30K</Q>
31-100K</Q>
over 100K</Q>
</Question>


The "Unknown" option could also be set up this way:
Please rank the following in terms of satisfaction, from Excellent to
Very unsatisfactory
<Question Group="OS Stability">
</Q>
</Q>
</Q>
</Q>
</Q>
Unknown</Q>
</Question>

     Anyhow, just something off the top of my head. 

     Cheers and thanks,

     Pete

-- 
Pete St. Onge - McGill U.  Limnology - Fun with Ropes & Buckets
pete_st_onge@iname.com         http://wwp.mirabilis.com/4322052