notableofcontents() article(YODL - or, Yet Oneother Document Language) (Karel Kubat tt(karel@icce.rug.nl)) (1997) quote(This file double-serves as the announcement that goes to em(comp.os.linux.announce), and as a message to the maintainers of em(sunsite.unc.edu) and em(tsx-11.mit.edu). So it's a slightly unpersonal message... sorry 'bout that. What's more, this message is in the YODL document language. What better way to demonstrate? If you see a lot of parentheses, just read over them. This file in `source' format should be readable nevertheless. This same document is included at the end formatted to plain ASCII. If you want to see the full documentation, try http://www.icce.rug.nl/docs/programs/yodl/yodl.html.) nsect(What's YODL?) YODL (Yet Oneother Document Language) is a package that consists of programs, some shell scripts, and auxiliary "lib" files for which hold macro files. The whole purpose of the package is to provide a simple-to-use and extensible document language, that can be used to convert documents in the YODL format to a variety of other formats. In this purpose, YODL somewhat resembles generic markup languages, e.g. SGML footnote(Standard Generalized Markup Language) but: nsect(How easy to use is it?) YODL is easier to use. Well I find so. Typing parentheses is I think less work than typing <> or \{}. nsect(How good is the documentation?) YODL is very well documented. That my version of SGML isn't is, I guess, no fault of SGML, but I had a bf(very) hard time getting SGML to do what I wanted it to do! Well, YODL should be easier to handle. The docs include various manpages and a full document of approximately 60 DIN A4 pages. (If you don't like DIN A4, just make your own reference docs! The sources for the document, of course in YODL format, are included.) nsect(Does it use tags?) YODL doesn't insist on weird tags. YODL is not a markup language in that sense (starting and ending tags), YODL handles all its commands in a C-style manner; e.g. tt(em(...)) will set the text emphasized. Similarly, macros can have two arguments or more, also all in a parameter-list format. This is more of an advantage than you might think at first glance: e.g., my editor won't match a closing tag in HTML with the opening tag, but it bf(will) show the open-parenthesis when I type a closing parenthesis! nsect(Does it have conditional parsing?) YODL has support for conditional processing: by testing for some symbol, or say for the presence of an argument, you can do different things in a macro. Or you can redefine macros, and the such. nsect(What can it do?) Currently the package supports conversions to LaTeX, HTML, to the "man" format, to the "ms" format, and poor-mans conversions to plain ASCII and SGML (for compatibility reasons at our site). Other conversions are of course possible, but these are the formats that I use and hence the converters that I put some effort into. nsect(Where to get it?) If you want to obtain YODL and try it out, ftp to ftp://ftp.icce.rug.nl/pub/unix/ and look for a file yodl-X.YY.tar.gz, with X.YY being a version number (0.00 is of course the first). The YODL distribution is also on the `standard' Linux sites. Unpack it in a "sources" directory and type "make htmldoc" or "make latexdoc" and see for yourself... YODL - or, Yet Oneother Document Language Karel Kubat karel@icce.rug.nl 1997 This file double-serves as the announcement that goes to comp.os.linux.announce, and as a message to the maintainers of sunsite.unc.edu and tsx-11.mit.edu. So it's a slightly unpersonal message... sorry 'bout that. What's more, this message is in the YODL document lan- guage. What better way to demonstrate? If you see a lot of parentheses, just read over them. This file in `source' format should be readable nevertheless. This same document is included at the end formatted to plain ASCII. If you want to see the full documentation, try http://www.icce.rug.nl/docs/programs/yodl/yodl.html. What's YODL? YODL (Yet Oneother Document Language) is a package that consists of programs, some shell scripts, and auxiliary "lib" files for which hold macro files. The whole purpose of the package is to provide a simple-to-use and extensible document language, that can be used to convert documents in the YODL format to a variety of other formats. In this pur- pose, YODL somewhat resembles generic markup languages, e.g. SGML [1] but: How easy to use is it? YODL is easier to use. Well I find so. Typing parenthe- ses is I think less work than typing <> or \{}. How good is the documentation? YODL is very well documented. That my version of SGML isn't is, I guess, no fault of SGML, but I had a very hard time getting SGML to do what I wanted it to do! Well, YODL should be easier to handle. The docs include various man- pages and a full document of approximately 60 DIN A4 pages. (If you don't like DIN A4, just make your own reference docs! The sources for the document, of course in YODL ----------- [1] Standard Generalized Markup Language -2- format, are included.) Does it use tags? YODL doesn't insist on weird tags. YODL is not a markup language in that sense (starting and ending tags), YODL han- dles all its commands in a C-style manner; e.g. em(...) will set the text emphasized. Similarly, macros can have two arguments or more, also all in a parameter-list format. This is more of an advantage than you might think at first glance: e.g., my editor won't match a closing tag in HTML with the opening tag, but it will show the open-parenthesis when I type a closing parenthesis! Does it have conditional parsing? YODL has support for conditional processing: by testing for some symbol, or say for the presence of an argument, you can do different things in a macro. Or you can redefine macros, and the such. What can it do? Currently the package supports conversions to LaTeX, HTML, to the "man" format, to the "ms" format, and poor-mans conversions to plain ASCII and SGML (for compatibility rea- sons at our site). Other conversions are of course possi- ble, but these are the formats that I use and hence the con- verters that I put some effort into. Where to get it? If you want to obtain YODL and try it out, ftp to ftp://ftp.icce.rug.nl/pub/unix/ and look for a file yodl- X.YY.tar.gz, with X.YY being a version number (0.00 is of course the first). The YODL distribution is also on the `standard' Linux sites. Unpack it in a "sources" directory and type "make htmldoc" or "make latexdoc" and see for your- self...