Search for VMS documentation tool (VAX document ?)

Question

Many years ago I worked at a DEC-shop. We used a tool called Document (as far as I remember) to create documentation. It was provided by DEC and created the same layout as the original DEC documentation. Which is as far as I'm concerned a milestone in layout and typesetting.

Researching the web I found a more or less obscure company which sells this tool for Open VMS. But I would prefer an open source replacement.

Any help ?

Greetings Till

Answer 1

Touch Technology was, and perhaps still is, an interesting company with interesting folks like 'Mr Dan'. They picked up a good bit of Digital software in a fire-sale and had some good stuff such themselves such as performance tuning tools and a 4GL (Intouch... available on OpenVMS Freeware). The company appears to have moved one, judging by their current website front door which does not dwell on the old stuff , but you could do worse than try contact them. The back door still list DECdocument: http://www.ttinet.com/documentation.html

Good luck! Hein

Answer 2

I would think the best solution would be DocBook, since it is also an SGML-ish format. You might be able to translate a substantial portion using XSS.

Answer 3

If you're still looking for a solution, have you thought about LaTeX? The markup syntax isn't radically different from VAX DOCUMENT's SDML. They both have the same back-end; the final steps in processing an SDML file involved running it through TeX.