Contributing Documentation

Thanks for your interest in contributing documentation to the Higher Education Mac OS X Lab Deployment Initiative. When the project was first formed, we set out to document a number of topic areas. Many of those documents have not yet been written, so we're hoping to find others who can fill in some of the missing pieces.

We're willing to accept almost any work that fits into the goals of this project. We would prefer to receive documents that are completely finished and well polished, of course, but we're happy to take unfinished work that could serve as a starting point for someone else.

Below is the current list of topics that need to be completed. Our documentation has a standardized format, so we've provided a template set of pages as a starting point. A download link and instructions for the template appear in the second section. The last section has directions for submitting your work.

Available Topics

Current topics that need an author are:

• Assistive technology/508 legislation
• Authorization
• Automation and Programming Tools
• Backups
• Classic & OS 9
• Font Management
• Home Directory storage options
• Language Support
• License Servers
• Network File Systems
• Physical Security
• Root Access
• Security Scanners
• Teaching labs
• Virus Protection
• Other lab-related topics are welcome

To get an idea of what we would like to cover in each topic area, see the details in the Topic Outline. If you would like to contribute documentation for a topic not listed above, just let us know. All topics that apply to lab deployment are welcome.

Documentation Template

All the articles on our web site have a common layout and organization. We're providing a template so you can simply insert your text and other content into the provided HTML files and immediately see how it will look on the web site.

To make it easier to add your documentation to our site, please use the standard organization. Each article is divided into this set of pages:

• Introduction - a brief overview
• Requirements - knowledge and/or applications needed in order to accomplish tasks described
• Configuration - basic configuration steps
• Details - details of configuration
• Issues - any open questions or concerns about tasks described
• Links - pointers to web sites where readers can learn more and download tools or applications
• FAQs - Frequently Asked Questions

The template files include more information on what is expected in each section. Not every document needs to include all seven parts. For example, if you don't have any FAQs to include, feel free to leave that page blank.

You may download the template at:

http://www.macosxlabs.org/documentation/template/template.sit

The template can be uncompressed with StuffIt Expander. It will create a folder with the following contents:

• README.html (this file)
• default-new.css
• images/
• documentation/
  • template/
    • intro.html
    • requirements.html
    • config.html
    • details.html
    • faqs.html
    • issues.html
    • links.html
    • faqs.html
    • images/

This structure matches the layout of our web server. The "default-new.css" and "images" folders at the top are included so you can preview the pages with our style sheet and navigation button images in place. You'll need to put them at the root level of your computer or at the document root of your web server.

If your document includes images, they belong in the "images" folder inside the "template" folder. Your html files should refer to them using a filename of the form "images/figure1.jpg". If you have a lot of images, you might want to sort them out using a subfolder for each page.

Submission Directions

When you have a draft copy of your article, send us a message using the Contact Us page. A member of the steering committee will contact you shortly and tell you where to e-mail the draft article.

All submissions will go through our standard review process before being published. We can't guarantee that every contribution will be available on our web site.