Re: use directly section childs with sectiontoc, set USE_NODES 0 for HTML

[Gavin Smith]

On Sun, Nov 01, 2020 at 01:37:04AM +0100, Patrice Dumas wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> Why is there no sectiontoc for the @top?

Because the index.html file usually has @contents or @shortcontents
as well as the Top node.

At https://www.gnu.org/software/texinfo/manual/texinfo/html_node/index.html
there are actually three tables of contents: @shortcontents, @contents,
and the menu.  This is unnecessary.

> Wouldn'it be better to simply output the section toc of the section, and
> not the 'current_node' associated section section toc?  For some manuals
> it would make a difference and, in my opinion, an incorrect output, for
> example when there is a construct like
> 
> @node mynode
> @section sec1
> 
> @section sec2

You are probably right.

> It also seems to me that FORMAT_MENU set to sectiontoc for HTML would be
> more consistent with USE_NODES set to 0.  Otherwise nodes without
> section would each be in their files, but not appear on section tocs,
> and their subnodes would be completly unreachable.

I'm not sure how sensible it is to use @section without a @node or vice
versa.  A @node without a section wouldn't be in the section toc anyway,
if I understand correctly.

I don't have a strong opinion about it, but I feel that the primary
meaning of @node is to define a named unit of the manual, rather than
define a cross-reference target.  This would mean that each node
would be in a separate HTML file when output is split, which means
that USE_NODES should be on.

A node without a section could be part of a manual with an irregular
structure and it might be reachable by other means.

  In that case, 
> _default_node_direction() should probably be changed, to give something 
> reasonable when there is no node associated with the section.  Actually,
> it would probably make more sense to use sections for directions if
> USE_NODES is set to 0.

I haven't investigated what happens currently but this might make sense
so that the section has "Next" and "Prev" links.