But it's the best open way for us to distribute documentation. If you want to read MS documentation while not using a MS OS, you're out of luck. SGML helps us get there. It doesn't matter. Try using your computers for grunt work.
Nothing is perfect.
SGML tools were a pain. They're getting better now that there's better documentation. Don't ask how many days it took me to get sgmltools 1.0.9 to actually validate some old SGML I had. Standardizing on DocBook is going to help us greatly, especially now that the rest of the world is using DocBook too. I'm adding to the H-H to gear it even more towards new SGML users.