Re: DOCBOOK-APPS: Use of titleabbrev in list of figurea and tables

[Bob Stayton <bobs@sco.com>]

On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 01:49:25PM +0200, Joachim Ziegler wrote:
> Bob Stayton wrote:
> >>Hmm, maybe I don't quite understand the meaning of title and titleabbrev 
> >>here. Especially in figures with "scientific content", I often have a 
> >>large explanation of what is depicted in the figure. In LaTeX, I do that 
> >>with
> >>
> >>\caption[short explanation]{very long explanation}
> >>
> >>There, the list of figures only shows the [short explanation], because 
> >>the {very long explanation} were just too long.
> >>
> >>Maybe <title> and <titleabbrev> is not what I need? But what else then?
> > 
> > 
> > Yes, I think you are looking for something more like
> > a caption for such explanations.  The mediaobject element
> > inside figure will take a caption element.
> > Also, a table element will take a textobject element
> > after the title and before the tgroup element.
> > I haven't tried these so I don't know how they
> > format.
> 
> The <textobject> inside <table> is ignored in FO output.

That is a bug and should be fixed.  I think it is the right
mechanism for what you want to do.

> In HTMl output, a link called "D" (why "D"?) appears. Following this 
> link, a new browser window pops up which shows the text inside the 
> <textobject>

I think D is for Description.  
This linking mechanism follows that used for the longdesc
attribute for the HTML img element.
In the HTML 4.0 DTD, longdesc is commented as a
"link to long description (complements alt)".
 
> I have a table with nonttrivial information. How do I markup additional 
> explanations about the content? Everything in <title> appears when I 
> make an <xref> to this table and is listed in the table of contents.
> Shouldn't <titleabbrev> be used instead?

Yes, and it will when the stylesheets are next released.

Like I said, I think the textobject is the right element,
but the fo stylesheets need fixing.  You could file a 
bug report to get it working.

-- 

Bob Stayton                                 400 Encinal Street
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