[Python-Dev] The docs, reloaded (original) (raw)

Armin Ronacher armin.ronacher at active-4.com
Tue May 22 17:02:57 CEST 2007

Hoi,

Martin Blais <blais furius.ca> writes:

About possibilities: I'm sorry but that is simply not true. LaTeX provides the full power of macro expansion, while ReST is a fixed (almost, roles are an exception) syntax which has its own set of problems and ambiguities. I was speaking of rst in comparison with other lightweight markup languages. (textile, markdown, wiki syntax).

That, and the ability to already parse it from Python and more easily convert to other formats (one of LaTeX's weaknesses), are the only benefits that I can see to switching away from LaTeX. I have to admit I'm afraid we would be moving to a lesser technology, and the driver for that seems to be people's reluctance to work with the more powerful, more complex tool. Not saying it is invalid (it's about people, in the end), but I still don't see what's the big problem with LaTeX. The problem with latex is that it requires more knowledge thus the amount of people that can contribute is a lot lower. It's a lot harder to generate a searchindex, do interlinking, generate a dynamic documentation with comments etc.

Don't get me wrong, LaTeX is a powerful tool and I use it for every bigger document i type. I just think it's not the best choice for documenting scripting languages.

Regards, Armin

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