WikiWish - Documentation Accessiblity Concern - NON-TECHNICAL

[Chris Johns]

Robert S. Grimes wrote:
> Okay, in a way I hate to do this, as I'm voicing a complaint with no 
> obvious solution, nor no clear idea of how, as a RTEMS novice, I can 
> help.  On the other hand, it feels like it might be helpful in the long 
> run, and as I get started in earnest next month with actually using 
> RTEMS, perhaps opportunities to help will present themselves to me.
> 
> Sorry for the long disclaimer, but my complaint is that there are no 
> great table of contents or index or guide to some of the most useful 
> pages on the Wiki.  I've looked at the Wiki from time to time, and it 
> certainly has grown in leaps and bounds since the early days several 
> years ago, but I'm constantly seeing references in the mailing lists to 
> pages I didn't know existed.  The most recent example is the Capture 
> Engine thread from the last few days.  Now here is a great tool that, 
> until this thread, I had no idea existed.

This is my fault. I never really made a public announcement about the 
Capture Engine. You are not the first person to have made this statement.

I suppose I considered it a work in progress which it is. The Capture 
engine filters are designed for a GUI and a GUI needs a TCP interface. 
The design should allow a filtered system to be monitored without the 
trace engine generating too any events that the system becomes unstable. 
Added to this I see a need to extend what is captured in the kernel. We 
need to be able to see other kernel calls. This is a little more complex 
as a new API needs to be added to RTEMS that does not change the current 
performance.

With a remote capture system logging real time data I hope we can 
attract research for post processing type tools.

>  Now it is true that I could 
> have found it from the main page, by going first to DebuggingHints, and 
> seeing the reference to it under "Debugging a BSP", but a) the 
> description there is very vague, and b) if I'm using an existing BSP 
> that works, and trying to debug my application that doesn't, I'm not 
> sure I would have picked up on it.

Agreed.

> 
> So, this is really a complaint that applies to Wikis in general.  I know 
> my few forays into Wiki deployments have suffered from the same 
> problem!  What can we do to improve the accessibility of all the useful 
> information?  What can I do?  Am I the only one who cares?
> 

Everyone has different needs and differing view points. Can I suggest 
you look over the Wiki, consider what you need to see and then develop a 
page of links.

Regards
Chris