in preparation for beta9...

[Matt Jones]

Hey Chris,

I agree with you in principle.  I think that we need to push very hard 
to get all of the modules documented.  At a minimum every module MUST 
have a "description" tag that is accurate and understandable.  We had 
talked about restructuring the other doc: tags anyways, so we could get 
them on the next pass if needed.  So, I guess I would argue that we 
should exclude from the release any modules that do not have a complete 
set of "description" tags but that the others could be filled in next 
time.  But the others MUST be filled in before the release candidate, 
because the documentation is what defines the specification.

Thanks for pointing this out,
Matt

Christopher Jones wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> Since we've been making major changes to the current beta8 release of 
> EML, we've been falling behind in a large portion of the documentation 
> for the elements, attributes, complex types, and simple types, etc... in 
> the .xsd files.
> 
> Some of the modules will need minor documentation fleshed out (~10%) 
> left, whereas many of the newer modules have very little documentation 
> (80%) left and/or the documentation does not at all conform to our 
> tooltip/summary/description/example/lineage convention.  Many of them 
> are merely pasted repeats through all of the doc: tags.
> 
> It seems to me that the documentation will be critical for anyone not 
> within the immediate development group to digest, understand, and use 
> EML as a community standard.
> 
> Since the pending beta9 release is intended to be the last beta prior to 
> a candidate release for 2.0, I feel like any modules that are not 
> completely documented should be tabled and should be included in the 
> next release when they have matured as a code base.
> 
> Does anyone feel that any of the EML modules should be released without 
>  the documentation and clean code conventions that we've agreed upon? It 
> would be great to hear from anyone interested.
> 
> $.02,
> 
> Chris
> -- 
> _________________________________________________________________
> christopher jones     cjones at lifesci.ucsb.edu      (805) 893-5144
> marine science institute  university of california, santa barbara
> _________________________________________________________________
> 
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-- 
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Matt Jones                                    jones at nceas.ucsb.edu
http://www.nceas.ucsb.edu/    Fax: 425-920-2439   Ph: 907-789-0496
National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS)

Interested in ecological informatics? http://www.ecoinformatics.org
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