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| When someone says there's a 90% overlap without specifying
| units, I grow skeptical. It's easy to take up 100KB with a
| single screen shot, but 100KB of text is more labor-intensive.
| Is the 90% overlap one of words, or simply bytes?
Oh, I see. I meant that 80-90% overlap in the text content is not
unusual in technical documents. Sometimes it's less, occasionally more.
These metrics only tell part of the story, though, so one should not
give them undue weight. For example, if there are two 500-page
documents, one of which will be delivered both in print and online, the
other of which will be delivered in print only, one could say there is
only 50% overlap. That would be misleading, though, because the omission
of an entire document from one or the other output medium usually does
not create additional labor.
| Are you saying you do not recognize the similarity
| between compiling source code and single-sourcing information
| using XML? (If your "solution" doesn't
| involve XML, I apologize; you haven't been specific.)
I am saying that the method of producing binary executables for the
Macintosh platform has little or nothing to do with the methods for
single sourcing content in technical documents.
XML is only one of the technologies you can use for single sourcing.
Single sourcing is not by definition based on XML. I haven't been
specific about a solution because there is more than one solution. I am
trying to address the merits of an approach (single sourcing) and not a
specific product.
| >> Simply disparaging the arguments of others without offering
| >> substantive replies does not, it seems to me, advance your case.
|
| I agree. Maybe a sample page in MIF would help?
I'm confused here. What would a 1-page MIF file demonstrate?
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