[Rd] CRAN task views: markdown? better .CSS?

[Achim Zeileis]

Michael:

> CRAN task views are useful, but they seem difficult to write and 
> maintain because the XML format is rather limited (no sectioning)

What type of sectioning would you like to have? In the HTML part, you can 
use the usual structuring tools like <h*>, <p>, etc. It's not

> and the <packagelist> must be maintained manually.

Yes, but I recently started adding tools to help checking this. Hopefully 
I'll also get round to add some more convenience features for this.

> They are also difficult to read because the generated html and .css used 
> are extremely basic, giving an overly dense page.
>
> Is it possible to apply a custom .css to a CTV?

In principle yes. When generating the HTML pages, you can supply the 
desired .css file. It defaults to the CRAN_web.css file also used for the 
rest of the web area on CRAN.

So when you generate your own web pages on your own server, you can plug 
in any .css you like. But as a CRAN user/viewer, I don't think you can 
modify the already existing .html pages.

> Are there any markdown-like tools for writing a CTV?

No. When I wrote "ctv" XML seemed to be the natural format to go with. 
If I were to write it again today, I might use something different. But so 
far XML worked well enough for me.

Best,
Z

>
> -Michael
>
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> Michael Friendly     Email: friendly AT yorku DOT ca
> Professor, Psychology Dept. & Chair, Quantitative Methods
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