A quality operating system

[Henry Olyer]

Baloney.

Sure, nothing human is perfect, that includes the people behind FreeBSD and
also the OS.

But compared to (gasp!,) windoz and linux, (not too bad, but it's as
non-secure as windoz!,) FreeBSD and OpenBSD standout for one reason, their
better.

I would like to see negotiate a deal to give us pre-built java-enabled
browsers.  A few other things, too.


On Wed, Aug 24, 2011 at 10:32 PM, Polytropon <freebsd at edvax.de> wrote:

> On Wed, 24 Aug 2011 21:02:18 -0500, Evan Busch wrote:
> > I didn't expect this much response.
>
> You always get what you deserve on this list. :-)
>
> No, seriously: There are participants of this list who
> understand complains and other statements in a critical
> tone as inspiration for improvement. But allow me to say
> that _if_ you are interested in contributing in _that_
> way, you should always bring examples and name _concrete_
> points you're criticizing, instead of just mentioning
> wide ranges of "this doesn't conform to my interpretation
> of what 'professional' should look like".
>
> As long as you are professional and fair, you will get
> a polite and substantial (!) response.
>
>
>
> > Every professional documentarian I've encountered agrees with you.
> > It's inconsistent, wordy, and has no concept of the order of
> > introduction of its concepts. No professional software package would
> > ship with documentation this bad.
>
> Depends.
>
> Have a look at IBM's mainframe or midrange documentation.
> For those who are working with this very special kind of
> documentation, it may appear fully understandable, helpful
> and direct. For hobbyists or newbies, it may look to be
> the complete opposite: Not understandable, no structure,
> way too verbose, and not helpful at all.
>
> You can also see how Sun publishes documentation for their
> Solaris OS. Did publish. Past tense. :-)
>
> In most cases, documentation requires you to have a minimal
> clue of what you're doing. There's terminology you simply
> have to know, and concepts to understand in order to use
> the documentation.
>
> Different kinds of users have different preferences. Some
> like to use the web, like to use Wikis and discussion boards.
> Others like to use structured web pages. Again, other like
> web pages too, but want to have as much information in _one_
> (long) page. And there are those who do not want to depend
> on the web - those like man pages.
>
> If you're used to some specific _way_ of documentation, you
> will maybe value anything that's _different_ from that way
> as being inferior, non-professional, or less helpful.
>
> Also keep in mind that especially for developers, the SOURCE
> CODE also is an important piece of documentation. Here FreeBSD
> is very good, compared to other systems.
>
>
>
> > The multiple grammatical errors only
> > enhance the sense of its fundamentally confused nature as a document.
>
> Oh, then don't visit the non-english translations of the
> documentation. :-)
>
>
>
>
> > On Sat, Aug 20, 2011 at 2:08 PM, Polytropon <freebsd at edvax.de> wrote:
> > >
> > > Well, in _this_ area, I would also agree that work should be
> > > done to concentrate documentation, e. g. make an "essence" from
> > > knowledge and examples in mailing lists, web forums and so on.
> > > But there are too many of them, and you simply cannot put all
> > > the possible things into "the one documentation" project.
> >
> > This isn't as big of a project as you make it seem. In fact, it will
> > reduce your workload and that of your users.
>
> I have worked on documentation projects (in the medical and
> technical sector) before, and it was relatively easy because
> you KNEW enough, e. g. who your clients are, how they read,
> what they need to know, and what they already do know, so
> you had a good basis for creating documentation that fits
> there needs.
>
> Here the "one size fits all" problem arises. It's really hard
> to make documentation "for everybody". What should be in there?
> How much detail is needed? What can the reader conclude himself?
> Which terminology is he already familiar with?
>
>
>
> > I think the comments above provide a good starting point for
> > actual discussion.
>
> It would help if you could just bring some examples for what
> is lacking in your opinion.
>
>
>
> > As far as people proving my point about the BSD community being
> reactionary:
> > [...]
> > These angry non-sequiturs just reek of defensiveness.
>
> Note the presence of ":-)" and the abilities of english native
> speakers who are much more able to express "between the lines"
> than I am, for example.
>
>
>
> > I think I predicted these behaviors when I spoke of "cliques" and the
> > nasty, elitist side of geek culture.
>
> You can "predict" that everywhere. Just go to any halfway
> specialized setting and make claims about something not
> meeting your requirements, telling the people they are
> not professional and lack the most fundamental things.
> Of course there will be some who thing you're just trolling
> them, because to _them_, that's exactly what you do, even
> if you have other intentions. Interpretation heavily depends
> on specific discussion cultures. The way you communicate on
> this list, for example, is very different from how you
> write Twitter messages, SMS, or act in a different "online
> community" (e. g. like WoW gamers with their terminology
> and "cultural techniques").
>
>
>
>
> --
> Polytropon
> Magdeburg, Germany
> Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0
> Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...
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