[Bf-docboard] Propsal: fundamentals, citation

[Francesco Siddi]

Hi Tobias,
thanks for writing! Before further discussing your proposal I have a couple of questions:

- did you get in touch/connected with any of the current documentation maintainers? (on IRC or https://developer.blender.org/project/view/53/)
- have you used the current manual, and what is your opinion about it?

I think the high quality, high level introduction text you are talking about would be great to have, but we still need more people to take ownership of existing sections of the manual.

Best regards,
Francesco

On 18 January 2016 at 21:23:40, Tobias Heinke (heinke.tobias at t-online.de) wrote:

Hello documentation folks,
I'm Tobias a graphics designer and visualisation enthusiast.

Motivation/ proposals:
|> restructuration discussion (*again):
The wiki shouldn't be the place where only Blender features are described.
The wiki could also be a place to learn: fundamentals!

This is inspired by Mike Bailey's (Oregon State University) annual Siggraph seminar: "Fundamentals Seminar"
both free at http://cs.oregonstate.edu/~mjb/fundsem
or http://www.siggraph.org/learn/conference-content
at sg 2015 courses

Fundamentals that means separating basic knowledge (static) from version specific feature descriptions (dynamic).
It's solves the problem of migrating content between versions at some degree.
Of cause it has do be newly written content at the start parallel to the existing.
To combine the best out wiki-books linearity and the classical tree structure.
Adding it to the branches is no alternative, because the clarity gets totally lost.

The grand structure (prealpha)
The aim is 2 print paper sides per section:

I. Blender Introduction

II. Computer Graphics Fundamentals
0. Introduction
1. Simulation
2. Modeling
    light, light transport, matter, materials (matter-light interaction)
2.1 Mathematics
2.2 Physics
2.3 Animation
3. Interdisciplinary

III. Blender Manual

(+) pros:
minimal educated community members. Turning noobs into beginners™
avoid frustration
give orientation
interdisciplinary knowledge
maintainability (independence of blender versions)
easier wiki writing
continuous reading
not only implemented content, flexibility (add-ons, future)
answer FAQ-questions

(-) cons:
spending time, if the existing isn't even finished
challenging to fit the wide scope
separation of connected content
it already exists (somewhere, scattered)
if full implemented: skinny feature desc. (place for how to lists)

|> Citation: Don't send people to tutorials - link to: Science!
I propose a recommended literature hint "further reading" at the end of each side.
this could be: paper name, authors, year, trivial name; + DOI - number...

"Phong-shader":   "Illumination for computer generated pictures", Phong B.-T., 1975

To be then googled by the user - avoids dead links and law issues.
Research papers contain in the appendix always the same set of citation reference,
the count of these papers is not high - it should be doable.
There are also surveys, state of the art reports (star) and dissertation for the degree of doctor.
Maybe we can connect the citation with BibTex.xml files.

If the fundamental proposal is not declined, I gonna elaborate the idea further.

Tobias


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