PHP Documentation

[Martin Maney]

Ben Last <ben at benlast.com> wrote:
> on the big pages that can be quite a slow process.  That's not such a big
> deal, but the second drawback is that there's no way to edit a comment once
> made, so the pages have gradually filled up with junk remarks.  Those who
> have the power to edit don't seem to.

That last sentence is of the first importance.  A collaborative work
*needs* editors.  Thoughtful, careful editors who are not afraid to
Refactor Mercilessly when necessary, and wise enough not to do it too
soon.  Ideally.  :-)  In practice, it may be enough to allow the
community to edit.  Sometimes it is, sometimes not - it depends on what
audience is drawn to the wiki.

> A Python docs Wiki sounds like an interesting idea; I'll certainly be taking
> a look at the one quoted.  Offhand, does anyone know if the license on the
> Python Docs would allow them to be freely copied and used as the basis of a
> Wiki?

My first thought was "of course!"  Then I thought, "maybe I should take
a look."  That stopped me: every document I've checked says to find the
licence and permissions at the end (in "About this document..." - BTW,
what's with the ellipses?).  Not one of the identical "About" sections
I've looked at has had any hint of a license in it.

My fallback position is a little roundabout: Debian distributes the
Python docs, therefore the docs are [almost] surely under a license
that's free enough to meet the DFSG rules, which should more than cover
this use.  The weakest point in this is that the licenses for docs have
sometimes not been scrutinized as carefully as licenses for the code
(and cleaning up free-but-not-DFSG-free bits seems to be high on the
post-Sarge-release to-do list).

-- 
...that obsessive conviction, so common among authors and composers,
that all similarities between their works and any others which appear
later must inevitably be ascribed to plagiarism. -- 2nd Circuit, 1945