20:06:17 <mchua> #startmeeting
20:06:17 <zodbot> Meeting started Mon Feb 28 20:06:17 2011 UTC.  The chair is mchua. Information about MeetBot at http://wiki.debian.org/MeetBot.
20:06:17 <zodbot> Useful Commands: #action #agreed #halp #info #idea #link #topic.
20:06:38 <mchua> Emichan: and we'll have PM for anything that needs to be discussed off-channel.
20:06:57 <mchua> Thanks for meeting on such short notice! I know you've got a ton of things going on.
20:07:10 <mchua> #meetingname POSSE design
20:07:10 <zodbot> The meeting name has been set to 'posse_design'
20:10:04 * mchua scratches head
20:10:11 <mchua> connectivity problems? :)
20:21:53 <Emichan> mchua, sorry - i just had a major desktop meltdown. but I'm back now :)
20:23:21 <mchua> Emichan: No worries, I thought it might be something like that.
20:23:32 <mchua> So! POSSE material design...
20:23:52 <mchua> for context for those listening in, we realized that we're going to need some materials for POSSE and that we'd like 'em to look good :)
20:24:33 <mchua> sdziallas and I were thinking first of the handouts/worksheets materials that actual POSSE folks will be getting, but also thinking about extending the design from that to things like flyers, etc.
20:24:55 <mchua> and we're talking with Emily here about what could be done for that, as Emily is a freelance design ninja. :D
20:25:31 <mchua> Emichan: I think the first question is, what medium - and this is where my design ignorance rears its head... should we be thinking about print and web very, very separately here?
20:25:52 <Emichan> not necessarily
20:25:56 <mchua> because we were discussing all sorts of things like scribus, inkscape, etc. for print but I don't know if that goes out the window if we go "okay, css print stylesheet."
20:26:01 * mchua nods
20:26:23 <mchua> Ok - how do folks usually make that sort of decision?
20:26:59 <Emichan> generally, you do web and print separately, there are different tools, etc, but there are definitely ways of integrating the two
20:29:01 <Emichan> you would generally make decisions like this based on your anticipated workflows; how important one medium is versus the other; and that sort of thing
20:30:05 <Emichan> also keep in mind how comfortable the people creating the materials are with the tools for print or web
20:31:32 <Emichan> so, if you're comfortable with latex or scribus, and it's okay to archive the materials on the web as pdf rather than html/css...
20:31:53 <Emichan> then that would suggest to me that it would be best to stay print-oriented
20:32:05 <Emichan> for example
20:32:15 <mchua> Emichan: Ok, that makes sense.
20:33:06 <mchua> Emichan: I think I would say that pdf is fine, and LaTeX/Scibus would be great.
20:34:05 <mchua> Emichan: Do you have a preference/recommendation between the two?
20:34:15 <mchua> Because we can always distribute sources afterwards as well, and they'll look nicer in print and such.
20:34:25 <mchua> (although the text will be less searchable - that's the downside i can think of.)
20:34:57 <Emichan> yeah, the downside to archiving as pdf, is they won't be as easily searchable on the web, and they won't be accessible
20:37:04 <Emichan> and, keep in mind, that it'll be easier to build html/css integration or conversion into the process now, at the beginning
20:37:29 * mchua nods.
20:37:36 * mchua considers
20:37:59 <mchua> Emichan: so, how would this sound (and I'm curious what your gauge on time/work estimates would be, roughly)
20:38:12 <mchua> we'd like a web presence for POSSE that looks snazzy.
20:38:30 <mchua> FOSS CMS, of course. :) I noticed you seem to be an old hand at Drupal - that's something sdziallas and I were both looking into.
20:39:02 <mchua> Fairly basic Drupal skin and site flow, with a nice css print template, plus a LaTeX stylesheet for generating pretty-printable PDFs for worksheet materials?
20:39:14 <mchua> (we're both LaTeX fluent)
20:39:52 <mchua> I'm thinking that the "here, print this out on dead trees for the actual workshop" materials would then be LaTeX-generated PDFs, but the rest of the materials (how to use the worksheets, what's POSSE, etc) we could write up in the CMS.
20:39:57 <mchua> EOF
20:40:56 <Emichan> i'm a huge drupal fan ;) and we can definitely make that work
20:41:49 <Emichan> would you be more comfortable creating/editing the materials directly in the cms? or would you prefer to be able to upload latex markup
20:42:41 <mchua> Emichan: LaTeX markup into Drupal?
20:42:44 <mchua> You... can do that?
20:43:17 <Emichan> honestly, i haven't tried it, but i don't see why not.
20:43:50 <Emichan> we'd have to store it internally for printing, and also convert it into html/css
20:44:21 <mchua> Emichan: Also in terms of timing - I think a LaTeX stylesheet would probably be the first thing... not sure if it would be possible to get a first round of that out for March 7th (which I realize is really soon!) but if so then we could use it at the big CS edu conference coming up on the 8th.
20:44:38 <mchua> Emichan: Ok, trying to get an idea of what you're visualizing here...
20:44:54 * mchua was thinking of a separate "generate stuff for print" workflow, but integration sounds potentially cool?
20:46:03 <Emichan> well, if we set up a nice integrated, automated workflow, it'll make things easier for you in the long run. You'll only have to create your materials once.
20:50:17 <mchua> Emichan: Ok - would the LaTeX generate both web and print, then?
20:52:28 <Emichan> mchua, as I'm envisioning it, yes. we'd have to write or find a latex parser (i think there are some written in php), and convert the latex markup to valid html markup for the web.
20:53:28 <Emichan> then, we'd have a css stylesheet to take care of styling the markup for the web, and a latex stylesheet to style it for print
20:54:23 * mchua nods
20:54:30 <mchua> That all sounds awesome.
20:55:55 <Emichan> I'm proposing latex since you're familiar with it, but we could also use xml for the basic documents, and use xsl-fo to format it for both web and printing
21:00:10 <mchua> Emichan: I think I'd prefer LaTeX since it's more standard academia.
21:00:23 <mchua> Emichan: What sort of info do you need to be able to pull together a proposal/quote?
21:00:42 <mchua> Emichan: And would it be possible to start out with the latex stylesheet as the first milestone (is 3/7 too soon?)
21:00:48 <mchua> just that alone, no web stuff yet.
21:01:57 <Emichan> mchua, yeah, we can go ahead and start with latex and then work on the converting-to-html and the other web parts of it later. that shouldn't be a problem.
21:02:28 <Emichan> Do you want me to work up a quote for the project as a whole? just for this milestone?
21:04:20 <mchua> Emichan: both, but definitely at least for this milestone first. :)
21:04:38 <mchua> Emichan: Oh! also, are you okay with stuff made for this being CC-licensed?
21:04:58 * mchua wants to make it all remixable-happy
21:05:48 <Emichan> mchua, i have no problem with cc. This is work-for-hire, so you guys will be the copyright holders anyway. :)
21:05:57 <mchua> w00t!
21:06:02 * mchua is a newbie to this
21:06:24 <mchua> Emichan: What sort of info do you need from us to spin up a quote?
21:07:30 <Emichan> mchua, i'll make an estimate based on how many hours I think it will take me to complete it. So, mostly i need information about the documents you plan to make.
21:07:58 * mchua nods. Ask away!
21:08:38 <Emichan> what kind of content will they contain; do you need tables, figures, graphics, lists, mathematical formulas, or any other specialized structures?
21:08:58 <mchua> Emichan: The ones intended for print/binding in book-ish form are going to be largely like http://teachingopensource.org/index.php/IRC_and_wiki_introduction_exercise
21:09:20 <mchua> basically, step-by-step instructions... imagine them as cookbook recipes or textbook chapters.
21:09:29 <mchua> Being able to incorporate graphics (screenshots) with captions cleanly would be excellent.
21:09:32 <mchua> And code snippets.
21:09:37 <mchua> And terminal input.
21:09:52 <mchua> (if there's a way to distinguish code snips from "this is what your terminal will look like" that would be great.)
21:10:12 <Emichan> okay, good to know
21:10:40 <mchua> Not much in the way of mathematical formulas - or if so, the default LaTeX rendering is going to be fine.
21:10:47 <mchua> Lists and bullets, though, yes.
21:11:08 <mchua> The best example I have is Mo's Inkscape worksheets, http://mairin.wordpress.com/2010/01/08/inkscape-class-day-1/
21:11:12 <mchua> of what we're thinking of.
21:11:25 <mchua> Emichan: Another feature that would be extremely nice to have is the ability to do little call-out sidebars
21:11:42 <mchua> (the kind that usually have text like "Did you know?" "Penguins like cheese.")
21:11:58 <mchua> (to tuck away as a small sidebar or in a corner.)
21:12:11 <Emichan> asides :)
21:12:50 <mchua> asides! yes.
21:13:11 * mchua worries that this might all be too vague
21:13:17 <Emichan> mchua, would it be possible for you to create example latex markup with all the various structures for me to use as a reference?
21:13:32 <mchua> Emichan: Absolutely, let me see if I can get that to you tonight.
21:13:41 <mchua> It'll be incredibly basic LaTeX - I'm a syntax minimalist. :)
21:14:44 <Emichan> mchua, the best thing will be for it to be as similar to a typical document as possible. so if that's how you'll normally want to markup the documents, that's what I want!
21:14:49 * mchua nods
21:14:59 <mchua> Okay, will see what I can get you tonight then. :)
21:15:10 <mchua> So milestone one for us would be a latex-->pdf stylesheet by march 7th
21:15:21 <mchua> (we leave for the conference march 8th)
21:15:31 <mchua> (so "before Mel wakes up march 7th" worksforme)
21:15:35 <Emichan> mchau, okay, I'll write up a quote for this milestone and get it to you asap!
21:15:39 <mchua> and then figuring out drupal/web stuff afterwards.
21:15:42 <mchua> yup yup!
21:15:56 <mchua> milestones for the rest are far less urgent - we're talking june for the rest, or so. :)
21:16:01 * mchua nods
21:16:12 <mchua> Thanks, Emichan - I think that covers all the q's from my side. Anything else I can do for you?
21:16:22 * mchua apologizes for this conversation taking so long!
21:16:51 <Emichan> mchua, it's no problem at all! it's better to get this stuff right from the beginning (as much as is possible anyway ;))
21:17:16 <Emichan> i think I'm good. The example document will be a big help! :)
21:17:25 <mchua> ok, thanks!
21:17:32 <Emichan> i'll email you if I have any other questions, and please do the same!
21:17:35 <mchua> I'll get to work on that later tonight after some emails I need to hack up now.
21:17:38 * mchua nods
21:17:39 <mchua> Thanks, Emichan!
21:17:46 * mchua will close logging now and send out notes
21:18:17 <mchua> #endmeeting