DocBook V5.0b1

Volume 8, Issue 139; 28 Oct 2005; last modified 08 Oct 2010

It's official! The DocBook Technical Committee has approved the first release of DocBook V5.0.

Although it's taken me a couple of weeks to get the release ready, at the 12 October 2005 DocBook Technical Committee Meeting, we approved publication of DocBook V5.0b1 as the first official (test) release of DocBook V5.0.

I expect a fairly long series of “beta” releases to follow, then a series of “candidate releases”, before we get to an official V5.0, but we are at last on our way.

As the TC chair and release manager, I probably get more than my share of the credit for all the hard work that goes into maintaining DocBook. I'd like to thank everyone on the TC for their hard work in getting to an official 5.0 release:

<foaf:name>Steve Cogorno</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Gary Cornelius</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Adam Di Carlo</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Paul Grosso</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Dick Hamilton</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Nancy Harrison</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Scott Hudson</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Mark Johnson</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Jirka Kosek</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Larry Rowland</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Michael Smith</foaf:name>

<foaf:name>Robert Stayton</foaf:name>

. For the 5.0b1 release, I'd like to thank Jirka in particular. He wrote the majority of the transition guide and tested each of my attempts at a release build, catching a number of what would otherwise have been embarrassing errors on my part! Thank you, thank you, thank you everyone!

In support of the 5.0b1 release there is DocBook V5.0: The Transition Guide to help you get from 4.x to 5.0. There is also the “5.0” version (still a work-in-progress) of DocBook: The Definitive Guide and the specification itself.

The XSL Stylesheets supportMostly. New features, such as XML linkbases and annotations may not yet be (completely) supported. DocBook V5.0 documents, so you can begin using DocBook V5.0 today.

Let the testing begin in earnest!