[TYPO3] Complicated documentation? No reference guide? Do you know any good documentation?

[Karol Martinka]

Hello Dimitry,

thanks for the tip, I've already read those :)). The first think (two weeks 
ago), what i've made was to read them briefly to understand the concept (as 
I usually do for new systems) ...
I'm a programmer (mostly C++ & Delphi), I do understand object-oriented 
concepts, but Typoscript was harder to understand from the doc's as 
Smalltalk is ;-)..

Let me say some comments :
- I think the major question for a begginer is - how to create a template 
(since the installation is quite easy and quick)

For example :
- There are several ways, how you can substitute text by typoscript - I know 
now "marks" and "subparts".

Let me show you a simple example from the Daniel Koch's book : 4&5. 
Templates (page 80-107) - 27 pages!! Ohh man!
BUT in those 27 pages, there isn't anything about substituting content like 
: "marks.FEATURED_TEXT < styles.content.get" ?!?! And there are MANY MANY 
block's of different code, described under separate headings :( .. Should 
you rewrite it again and again to test the functionality?

IMHO it would be better to provide one FINAL code example and explain 
row-by-row, what you can do with this and that property, object etc... And 
also, there is a missing "object description" . - What is a "page" ??? 
Everybody knows, but why you have to initialize page=PAGE? what is typeNum ? 
what else can page contain? which properties? what does it mean if you write 
"temp.mainTemplate" ? should it be temp.mainTemplate or can it be 
something.someThing ? Lot of unanswered questions - BUT there are simple 
things described - like "check the file extension to find out the file type" 
:-D . I don't think that a Typo3 beginner does not know, what is a file type 
and extension but I'm sure he definitely will not know what does it mean 
temp.mainTemplate..

And about the reference - let me explain it on an easy thing - 5.8. typolink 
:

O.k. it wraps the incoming value with link.. Hey-stop! what does it actually 
mean?? typolink is a important function but no explanation at all.
Why there isn't a short sample on the beginning, how it should look like in 
the typoscript? Or for example the "additionalParams" property - there is a 
sample '&print=1' . Why this sample is not written like 
typolink.additionalParams = &print=1 ?  It's a little more of text, but 
everybody can read it. If you write '&print=1' a beginner will not know on 
the first sight if it is a sample of URL string in the browser and he has to 
read more about figuring out, how to do that, or if it is the VALUE of the 
property of the typolink OBJECT..

That's all for this moment. After I will learn Typoscript I may think to 
help the community with a "simple" and beginner's reference guide to Typo3. 
I will need it for myself as well, since I'm preparing ONE site and maybe I 
will do ONE more, and that's all... And I think, after two-three months of 
inactivity, I would not be able to read the code again :))..

Have a nice day and thank you!!
Karol







"Dmitry Dulepov [typo3]" <dmitry at typo3.org> wrote in message 
news:mailman.1.1197570656.3456.typo3-english at lists.netfielders.de...
> Hi!
>
> Karol Martinka wrote:
>> I'm wondering, if you agree with me, that almost all of the documentation 
>> to TYPO3 is really non-intuitive.
>
> Books and online manuals are written by programmers and it is for users at 
> at least in intermediate level. Even beginner's books sometimes assume 
> some things, which are known to developer's and not to newbies. You can 
> take a look at my blog (link is at the bottom) for TYPO3 book reviews. 
> There is at least one book, which is very good for beginners. Do not look 
> at book titles, look what's inside.
>
> There are some old tutorial, which still apply to TYPO3.
>
> Unlike commercial products, TYPO3 does not have any paid documentation 
> team. I think old documentation team ceased to exist now. So we are on our 
> own.
>
> -- 
> Dmitry Dulepov
> TYPO3 core team
> Web: http://typo3bloke.net/
> Skype: callto:liels_bugs
> "Nothing is impossible. There are only limits to our knowledge"