4.9. Crediting Translators and Converters
When someone else assists in the production of an LDP document,
you should give them proper attribution, and there are DocBook tags
designed to do this. This section will show you the tags you should
use, as well as other ways of giving credit where credit is due.
Crediting editors is easy - there is already an
<editor>tag in DocBook.
But there are two special cases where you need to credit someone,
but DocBook doesn't provide a special tag. These are translators
and converters.
A converter is someone
who performs a source code conversion, e.g., from HTML to DocBook SGML.
Source code conversions help the LDP achieve long term goals for meta-data,
and allow us to produce documentation in many different output formats.
Translators take your original document and translate it into other
human-readable languages, e.g., from English to Japanese, or from German
to English. Each translation allows many more people all over the world
to make use of your document, and helps Linux achieve the ultimate goal -
Total World Domination(tm)!
As you will see in the following
sections, there are several ways that these folks, as well as other
contributors to your document, can be given some recognition for the
help they've given you.
4.9.1. The <othercredit> Tag
All translators and converters should be credited with an
<othercredit> tag entry.
To properly credit a translator or converter, use the
<othercredit> tag with the <role>
attribute set to "converter" or "translator",
as indicated in the example below:
<othercredit role='converter'>
<firstname>David</firstname>
<surname>Merrill</surname>
<contrib>Conversion from HTML to DocBook v3.1 (SGML).</contrib>
</othercredit> |
4.9.2. The "Acknowledgements" section
Your document should have an "Acknowledgements" section,
in which you mention everyone who has contributed to your document in
any meaningful way. You should include translators and converters, as well as
people who have sent you lots of good feedback, perhaps the person who taught
you the knowledge you are now passing on, and anybody else who was instrumental
in making the document what it is. Most authors put this section at the end
of their document.
4.9.3. The <revremark> tag
Within the <revision> tag hierarchy is
a tag called <revremark>. Within this tag,
you can make any brief notes you wish about each particular revision of your
document. We recommend that you acknowledge converters in the comment for the
initial version released in the new format, and we recommend that you credit
translators in each version which they have translated.
