In article <[log in to unmask]>,
Wirt Atmar <[log in to unmask]> writes
>Just a very few months ago, I finally switched for the first time from using
>paper manuals for the HP3000 (which I've been using for 25 years now) to the
>LaserROM format.
>
>When I first started using the LaserROM, I mentioned to Jeff Vance that I was
>a little underwhelmed by the LaserROM format. Jeff occasionally takes what I
>say too seriously and he forwarded my comments onto the people who put the
>LaserROM together. What he should have done instead was dismiss my comments as
>those of a new user who didn't fully understand the value of what he had.
>
>I've actually gotten to be very enthusiastic about the LaserROM.

It sure beats the cupboard full of manuals it replaces for *finding*
things.

But it was a bear for *reading* things from and the interface was
kludgy.

For instance, you could only search a bookshelf. To search just one
manual, I had the hoo-hah of posting it to a custom bookshelf of my own,
and then searching that one-book 'bookshelf'. Silly.
>
>Nonetheless, I did soon notice that I had a significant problem with the
>LaserROM: I only had one copy of it. Because I wander around here, working off
>of five different PCs, I could never remember which PC had my only copy of the
>LaserROM in it. In that, my problems here only tend to be a microcosm of the
>problems that any larger production shop faces.

If you subscribe for a while, you build up a back catalogue of not-very-
out-of-date copies, which you can leave one of by each PC.
>
>A further complication was (although one not faced many people yet) is that
>most of our Dell PC's have a DVD ROM player in them (Dell provides the DVD
>players at $105; a price too cheap to pass up) and I've learned to truly enjoy
>listening to a favorite movie playing in the background while I work.

Any law says you can only have one CD-ROM drive on a PC? I don't think
so...
>
>These two factors, one more serious than the other, tended to lessen the
>utility of the LaserROM simply because the LaserROM manuals were never
>immediately available. But just recently, the 5.0 and 5.5 documentation was
>put up on the web for everyone to see -- and that has made a dramatic
>difference, not only locally to me, but also in support of our customers.
>
>For me personally, because we have the internet on every machine, I've found
>that downloading the text-based manuals off of the web is virtually
>indistinguishably different in speed from accessing the LaserROM. I now always
>keep a web browser open to the manuals when I'm working and find that I now
>have greater and more immediate access to the manuals than I have ever had in
>the past when the manuals were paper- or laser-based.

Me too, working at HP, where my Apollo 400 doesn't seem to have a slot
for my Laser-Rom.
>
>But more importantly, in just the last half-month or so that the manuals have
>been on the web, they've already allowed me a half-dozen times to show remote
>customers the things they've needed to do to turn telnet and network printing
>on in their HP3000s. Most people aren't using these features yet -- and
>they're far too nice not to be using -- simply because they don't have access
>to the documentation for some reason or another. Having universal access to
>the manuals is going to make a great deal of difference, and I'm not
>exaggerating how much easier they've already made it for me to help other
>people get the new features of 5.5 up and running.
>
>If anyone is going to take the advice of someone who wasn't all that
>enthusiastic about the LaserROM format to begin with, I have come to greatly
>prefer the text-only version of the manuals over the Instant Ignition format.
>Not only is the text version significantly faster to download and visually
>search, it's actually prettier on the screen and much less cumbersome to
>manipulate.
>
>Mariann Tymn, Daniel Read, Lars Appel, Vikram and others who put this material
>on the web are to be congratulated. I think it is real step forward.
>
Yes, indeed, very useful for pointing people at. If you know where to
point them.

But one question. How do you *search* the web version effectively?
It's all bitty. Fine for focussed inquiry, or for sequential reading.

But what if you don't quite know where to look? (e.g. for 'can I vary
the order of tabbing between fields in VPLUS?', I know which manual but
not quite which section).
It seems to have gone from 'you can only search a bookshelf' (Laser-Rom)
to 'you can only search a chapter' (Web).

So how do I search a whole *manual* on the web? Am I missing something?
--
Roy Brown
Kelmscott Ltd
Kelmscott      'A convenient and seemly shelter from the weather -
                a place to keep books and pretty things in'.