[PD] Help Docs: element vs. item

[Jonathan Wilkes]

> > --- On Wed, 8/12/09, Mathieu Bouchard <matju at artengine.ca>
> wrote:
> >> Actually, "selector" would be the most sensible
> column name
> >> for the column that lists "the accepted
> messages"...
> > It would, but there currently aren't column names in
> the pddp template.
> > Are you looking at a different template than the one
> for [float] in
> > pd-ext?
> 
> I'm not looking at a template, why?

Because I'm using the pddp template to revise the help patches.  I don't 
see a simple way to add column headings to the templates.  Were you 
suggesting adding column headings, or something else?

> 
> > Hmm...I don't think these more general terms require
> definitions, because they are superficially describing what
> one types to produce the desired behavior.
> 
> I don't think that it's a good idea to directly connect
> "what you type" with "what you get", except in examples. The
> theory should connect "what you type" with an internal
> representation, and connect the internal representation with
> "what you get", or any other number of intermediate steps,
> whatever is needed to make people distinguish between "a
> symbol" and "the spelling out of a symbol by a user" and
> "the printing out of the symbol by pd" and other things.
> 
> It's more obvious (and more critical) if you think of the
> float situation.

I don't think I understand your point.  A float is referred to as 
a "float" in the help patches.  The patches don't refer to a "float 
message," or "float selector."  So I don't see a problem with how 
float is handled in the current docs.

So I wouldn't connect "what you type" with "what you get" in the case 
of float, but I don't see the problem of doing this with "the set message."

> 
> >  There's an implicit step when the term "message"
> is used (i.e., typing something in a message box and sending
> it to the object).  But if you look at the Max docs
> where they say, "the word 'set' followed by a number",
> there's not even that.
> 
> And so... how are the Max docs related to how Pd should be
> documented?...

I thought I could leave it unwritten:
But if you look at the Max docs where they say, "the word 'set' followed 
by a number", there's not even that.  Yet the wording is clear, succinct, 
and unambiguous.

-Jonathan