Make the XML files more easy editable

[klacol]

It is great to have the docs here online, and to be able to bring in a requests for change (RFC) by making a pull request (PR).

Editing a markdown file (Documentation-md) is easy, e.g. this one:

https://github.com/buildingSMART/IFC/blob/master/Sections/Core%20data%20schemas/Schemas/IfcKernel/Entities/IfcSimplePropertyTemplate/Documentation.md

But editing a XML file (DocEntity.xml), that contains most of the article content requires some knowledge, e.g. like this:

https://github.com/buildingSMART/IFC/blob/master/Sections/Core%20data%20schemas/Schemas/IfcKernel/Entities/IfcSimplePropertyTemplate/DocEntity.xml

It would be good to find ways, to edit the DocEntity.xml - files more easily.

How are these files structured?

[jmirtsch]

Thanks for the question, it's a good point. At present the attributes are nested into xml files to preserve the order, and increase efficiency in terms of writing lots of files (at present, ifcdoc saves everything, not just what might have changed).

There's another side effect from the point you raise, Ifcdoc forces a UTF8 encoding, but this isn't (necessarily) preserved when editing the file directly on github, and will cause a "ghost" change next time the file is processed by ifcdoc.

We need to consider the best approach. The xml file is structured based on the datamodel within Ifcdoc to store the definition of IFC.. You can find this here: https://github.com/buildingSMART/IfcDoc/blob/development/SchemaDoc.cs

[klacol]

Ok, Jon, we could offer a very small piece of software, e.g. like a Notepad++ Plugin, that can open the XML files and offer a nice editing experience, e.g. like a markdown editor. Or we offer a plugin to another open editor, like Atom.