[TYPO3-UG US] Outline of "Learning TYPO3" documentation

[Michelle Heizer]

Hi Virgil,

On Sat, 2005-11-12 at 20:21 -0500, virgil huston wrote: 
> Outline of "Learning TYPO3" documentation. Comments and suggestions
> welcome.  I tried posting this to the test.typo3.us forum, but it
> would not hold my login.

I'm not having a problem here. You might want to check your
security/firewall settings and browser settings.

> Virgil
> 
> Manual 1. Installation and Configuration (separate manual without
> upgrade section)
> 
> a. Will cover the basic installation process, along with configuration
> and explanation of what is going on in the process (better explanation
> of database setup, ImageMajik, etc.)
> 
> b. will have operating system specific pages/sections (will need
> volunteers to write on specific OS, I can do Fedora)
> 
> c. the existing manuals will be used heavily, but updated and expanded

This looks good! I'd also like to see a section for securing a TYPO3
installation. 

> Manual 2. Learning TYPO3 (from a number of manuals, updated,
> rewritten, and expanded)
> 
> Section a. General principles
> 1. Backend and frontend	
> 2. Pagetree
> 3. Special pages	
> 4. Pages and Page content	
> 5. Backend modules	
> 
> Section b. Templates (combination of MTB and GoLive tutorials)

I think the basis of this section should be about TypoScript. The
template autoparser and TV are helpful "extensions", but TS is the heart
of template-building. 

>From my experience the autoparser and TV extensions have done more harm
than good for newbies. It would be better to start with the principles
of TS, and then have chapters on the different template-building
extensions. I personally find these extensions clunky and bloated.
Reminds me of using something like Visual Basic without learning the
fundamentals of programming. :)

If people learned TS first, it would actually cut down on the amount of
documentation and questions. Newbies are usually just looking for a
piece of TS that fits their template, but if they learned TS from the
beginning, they wouldn't need to ask such a specific question.

> Section c. Implementing extensions (will be a section on each
> extension in the package, as well as an explanation of what extensions
> are and how to use the Extension Manager). Note that each extension
> section will also be a separate manual.
> 
> Section d. Where to go from here - an explanation of the documentation
> structure, support forums, and where to find consultancies to provide
> TYPO3 services

Both of these sound great!


Michelle