Fix up action list in Appendix A.

[ibg.git] / README.md

diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 6c0485f6718730ec3b88c6b23cd14f7d9ad934bf..eb05a28441f8bb27bab0be603111494d2d4f604e 100644 (file)
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -1,17 +1,22 @@
-Inform Beginner's Guide, 4th Edition
-====================================
+Inform Beginner's Guide
+=======================
 
 Introduction
 ------------
 
-This repository contains the sources for the 4th edition of the
+This repository contains the sources for the
 [Inform Beginner's Guide](http://www.firthworks.com/roger/IBG.html),
-henceforth known as the IBG.  The new edition will be in a new source
-format that's more contributor-friendly (see below).  It's a
-work-in-progress; see the [issue tracker](https://github.com/i6/ibg/issues)
-for how it's going.
-
-The rationale for this 4th edition is:
+henceforth known as the IBG.  This version is in a new source format that's
+more version-control and contributor-friendly:
+[Sphinx](http://sphinx-doc.org), a documentation build tool written in
+[Python](http://python.org).  With Sphinx, the source files are in a very
+readable format called
+[reStructuredText](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ReStructuredText).
+
+This version of the IBG is a work-in-progress; see the
+[issue tracker](https://github.com/i6/ibg/issues) for how it's going.
+Initially it will be a straight conversion of the 3rd edition.  After that,
+the 4th edition will be prepared.  The rationale for a 4th edition is:
 
 * There have been quite a few updates to Inform and its support libraries
   in the time since 2004, when the 3rd edition was published.
@@ -25,17 +30,33 @@ The rationale for this 4th edition is:
 Building from source
 --------------------
 
-The new source format is [Sphinx](http://sphinx-doc.org), a documentation
-build tool written in [Python](http://python.org), which you will need to
-install if you want to build the document.  You can find the complete
-installation instructions
-[here](http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/install.html).
+As well as these document sources, you will need:
+
+* Sphinx.  You can find the complete installation instructions
+  [here](http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/install.html).
+
+* Sphinx makes use of [Blockdiag](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/blockdiag)
+  for some of the diagrams; you'll need that too.
+
+If you have `pip`, this command will be all you need:
 
-After you have Sphinx installed, you can build the HTML version of the
+    pip install sphinx blockdiag
+
+After you have everything installed, you can build the HTML version of the
 guide from a command prompt, like this:
 
        make html
 
+For building the PDF version, you need a reasonably recent installation of
+TeX Live.  Release 2014 will do.  You will also need the Emerald font
+package from https://www.ctan.org/tex-archive/fonts/emerald/.  This cannot
+be installed with `tlmgr`, nor does it seem to be packaged by the usual
+Linux or BSD distributions.  Scripts for installing and uninstalling
+Emerald are provided in the `tools` directory.  When you're ready, type
+this:
+
+       make latexpdf
+
 Other formats are available; just type `make` for more details.
 
 Conversion strategy
@@ -58,7 +79,7 @@ So, it's back to my original plan: use the PDF file.  Here's the first
 (major) part of the work:
 
 * Dump the text out of the PDF file
-* Convert all the text to Sphinx format
+* Convert all the 3rd edition text to Sphinx format
 * Get the online version to look good
 
 After that comes the 4th edition changes, hopefully in collaboration with