So, where's the =users= guide? Where's the intro?

[Mike Robinson <mi...@sundialservices.com>]

Sigh...
In the opening pages of the Cocoon documentation web-site, there are some very excellent promises that you'll talk to "users" and to "developers."  Furthermore, you say that "users" don't need to plunge deeply into Java-land to know how to use and produce content with Cocoon.
But then, after having given a nodding-glance to the non-developer, the documents promptly plunge headfirst into an intricate and seemingly free-association based tangle of details where "one thing leads to another and another."  Your documents talk all about Cocoon in all of its messy developer-oriented detail, without fulfilling the original promise made to the "user." 
In http://cocoon.apache.org/2.1/userdocs/index.html, you said ...
If you are a usual user, then you can use Cocoon without ever coding Java or knowing how exactly servlet containers work. If you become an experienced user of Cocoon you might want to tweak and tune your application. Therefore it is helpful to know Java and some basics of servlet containers.
However, if you want to develop with Cocoon (building own components to extend Cocoon for example), then you need to program Java. So, we split up this description into two sections: one for users and one for developers.

As far as I can readily tell, this is the first and last point anywhere in the docs where the slightest thought is given to "without ever coding Java or knowing exactly how servlet containers work" (this last bit having casually slipped a mouthful like "servlet container" with nary a second thought as to how unintelligible that might actually be).
So I'm still scuffing around looking for "how do I use Cocoon?  How much can I do without  having to know 'how' it works?"
There isn't, yet, a clearly-defined track that I can see through this jumble of documentation-objects that does not plunge headlong, again and again and again, through a rather-giddy expose of extremely geeky subject matter.
Mind you, I happen to be a seasoned developer, so it's not that I don't understand what has been written here.  But, the promise made to fully half of the potential user-base who might be reading this stuff, simply isn't addressed (imho) beyond that opening page.  

Re: So, where's the =users= guide? Where's the intro?

[Bertrand Delacretaz <bd...@apache.org>]

On 11/5/06, Mike Robinson <mi...@sundialservices.com> wrote:

> ...So I'm still scuffing around looking for "how do I use Cocoon? How much can
> I do without having to know 'how' it works?" ..

You might want to have a look at the Supersonic Tour, which is part of
the samples that come with Cocoon. There's a link to the online
version at http://cocoon.zones.apache.org/

-Bertrand