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MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 8:18 am
by 8tpercent
Here's a useful manual being updated for all cores:

https://github.com/adreeve/MiSTerManual ... Manual.pdf

As it's on github you can add/correct:

https://github.com/adreeve/MiSTerManual/

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 9:19 am
by Newsdee
This is a great effort! The keyboard on the Apple II should probably be a //e though (it has more keys).

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 9:45 am
by keilmillerjr
Correction: Neo geo aes didn't have a cd attachment. It was a separate console from the aes.

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 9:58 am
by akeley
Nice, though Amiga's omission is a big gap, similar to this one its based on: MiSTer Computer Cheat Sheet v1.8.8 FAQ

I wonder if it would be possible to add the essence of these manuals to OSD as a "Help" option.

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 11:09 am
by jlancaster86
Nice work, but is a PDF really the way to go? Would it not be better to add this information to the respective cores on the MiSTer wiki?

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 1:07 pm
by redsteakraw
Nice content but it looks like it was a word doc, and the Typesetting doesn't look great. I would love to help port this to Asciidoc to get a better output Asciidoc is like Markdown but less limited and scales to be able to make textbooks. Github also does native asciidoc rendering so you would be able to read the whole thing from github directly! The PDF exports from asciidoc look amazing, you could also export to html and other formats. Furthermore you can edit the whole document from a simple text editor like notepad so the barrier to making changes is very low. It also works better with version control like git so managing changes and commits from other users would be easier. Asciidoc also allows for external files so each core could have it's own file which could all be imported in the Huge every core manual but you could also re use those filer and make a console manual or a computer manual all without having to change anything!

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 1:23 pm
by redsteakraw
jlancaster86 wrote: Sun Apr 11, 2021 11:09 am Nice work, but is a PDF really the way to go? Would it not be better to add this information to the respective cores on the MiSTer wiki?
PDF is good if you want to print it out or share it or keep for offline uses. PDFs could also if rendered correctly can have superior typesetting to a webpage.

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 4:31 pm
by keilmillerjr
redsteakraw wrote: Sun Apr 11, 2021 1:23 pm
jlancaster86 wrote: Sun Apr 11, 2021 11:09 am Nice work, but is a PDF really the way to go? Would it not be better to add this information to the respective cores on the MiSTer wiki?
PDF is good if you want to print it out or share it or keep for offline uses. PDFs could also if rendered correctly can have superior typesetting to a webpage.
Github uses markdown and can be community driven. You can print as well as save as a pdf with most modern computers. No one needs a summary of every type of computer or console printed, so the argument is irrelevant.

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Sun Apr 11, 2021 4:42 pm
by redsteakraw
keilmillerjr wrote: Sun Apr 11, 2021 4:31 pm Github uses markdown and can be community driven. You can print as well as save as a pdf with most modern computers. No one needs a summary of every type of computer or console printed, so the argument is irrelevant.
Yes a wiki may be fine for one page but if you want to send a person a single file and have everything they can reference offline then a pdf is fine. I would say that most typsetting of wiki markdown ends up as HTML and it looks like garbage. This version was typed in Word so it also looks like garbage but it has potential to be great. Having an offline backup manual or simplified quick reference is a good idea.

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Mon Apr 12, 2021 12:54 pm
by keilmillerjr
Perhaps each core having a readme.md or man file installed on the mister would be better suited.?

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Mon Apr 12, 2021 1:44 pm
by aberu
keilmillerjr wrote: Mon Apr 12, 2021 12:54 pm Perhaps each core having a readme.md or man file installed on the mister would be better suited.?
I like this method personally. A proper markdown viewer (like https://brettterpstra.com/2015/08/21/md ... -terminal/) can be installed on the the MiSTer linux image and potentially a new option in the OSD for help could be added which is populated by the readme.md from each core automatically.

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Mon Apr 12, 2021 11:31 pm
by redsteakraw
So man pages are using Groff / Troff typesetting, you can convert to it from Markdown but it is far better to use Asciidoc for those purposes as it isn't as limited and more things map 1:1 without any hacks. So a good Asciidoc manual can be outputted to pdf, html, manpage, epub and more! Github also renders asciidoc so you can use it instead of Markdown which I would recommend doing as Markdown is great for simple things but breaks down when you want to do anything complicated.

Re: MiSTer Manual

Posted: Mon Apr 12, 2021 11:47 pm
by aberu
Very true, all good points.