What I would like to hear from everyone else is, what things should be covered and how, to which other resources and how-to's I should link to and -- the most important part -- ' Hey nice idea, I could write about this thing' or 'yes, I commented to the wiki just a couple of minutes ago'.
You are doing a wonderful thing. I would like to make a few suggestions... I've noticed that many people who start with Zope are coming familiar with basic web concepts and, more importantly, are coming from work on other application servers that, for whatever reasons, were not providing the functionality needed. Newbies need a context and a paradigm with which to work FIRST, before the other things begin to make sense. Aside from navigating (plus cut/copy/paste) in the management screen, the first thing would be: 1. Object Publishing (how to make an object appear on the web via a URL. That seems elementary, and it is. Moreover, there is some instant gratification and the hope that they can do something useful (and are not wasting their time). There is also a list of "common things" that people do on a web site that force the site builder to add certain functionality. Consequently, the newbie asks basic questions like "How to I list objects on the site?" How do I link to objects within the site? How do I list only _certain_ objects?" etc. What they want in those instances is a brief explanation and some sample code (sometimes they just want the code). Don't belabor the explanation. Be brief and just state how to do it. You can always add a link to documentation that explains it in full, if they are interested (most often, however, they won't be interested). The list of "how you do this and that" would form the bulk of your work, and would be a huge help to the newbie community (and a reference to those who are experienced but can't quite remember how to do it). The next chapters would be _intermediate_ explanations on fundamental issues, such as aquisition, security, etc. -- but in a way that adds only to the practical functionality of web sites. This is more in the line of "tips and tricks" as opposed to detailed explanations. Again, show functionality and only _link_ to the detailed explanations. The final chapters would be devoted to links to detailed documentation AND provide the various options available in Zope for solving problems, such as building things with ZClasses versus Products, CMF, etc. In short, the last section of the book is a road map of where to find other things in greater detail, with an explanation of what potential those solutions offer. That is what I would do. (More importantly, that is what I always wanted when I was a newbie.) Good luck and best wishes, Ron