Re: Anybody out there?

[Rebecca Ore <rebecca.ore@op.net>]

On Fri, Jan 08, 1999 at 10:23:46PM -0500, Roger Scudder wrote:
> On Fri, 8 Jan 1999, Rebecca Ore wrote:
> 
> 
>   I'm getting a sense of script phobia from this group. ;-) I've always
>  enjoyed writing them.  Perhaps having always been a natural at
>  programming leaves me a bit insensitive toward those who are not. 
>  The thing about it is this...  Having someone tell you what buttons 
>  to click on is nice, especially when it works.  Taking the time to read 
>  the HOW-TO and really understand how it works is "very" nice indeed.
>      

RedHat's configure tool and then a search through /etc/ for newly
changed files is an education in itself.  When I first tried to sign on
to netaxs about two years ago, I was a newbie who'd never owned a
computer with a modem before.  I would never put anyone through that,
myself.  My assumption with anyone asking for help in setting up ppp is
that it's quite likely that they are (a) not programmers used to the
opaque language of man pages; (b) rather nervous about annoying their
ISP by screwing up the connection and looking like a hacker or
something.

I use scripts when it's approprite -- writing up an alias for a command
line so I can hook it to a GUI :).  There's an implicit agenda in some
people's insistance of doing things first the hard way -- that the only
people who "deserve to use Linux" or "deserve to be on-line" are active
programmers.  So, of course, I'm going to steer people through getting
on line the first time in the least painful and most rewarding way
possible.  Once on-line, they can learn what they will.

For programmers to expect programming skills of everyone smacks of
immaturity or the sort of ridiculousness that some artists display when
they say that the only people who count in society are artists and
everyone else should go away (yes, there are artists who are as arrogant
as programmers, with better justification as the money on the
top is much better and most artists are better gardeners and cooks than
programmers and have better taste in clothes).

Guy wanted to get on-line.  It's a panicky time for a lot of people and
attempting to teach a moderate level skill in the middle of a clueless
attack is a peculiar kind of aggression that I take delight in
countering.  I've countered it when I've seen novice despammers have the
same attacks.  I've learned how to manage it when programmers get bad
ass about a non-programmer finding a bug (these days, I know when it's
me and when it's the program and when it's a combination of the two, and
I go on a post-in strike until the programmer listens to me).  I've been
through this on two different mailing lists -- and there's an XEmacs bug
named for me that nobody else found before I did.

Let's get him on line.  That world can teach him so much more than
keeping him off line until he learned how to read bad documentation
will.

I take delight in helping people get on line.  After they get on-line,
they can learn scripting.  Or programming.  Or how to write better.  Or
how to do properly formatted third party cancels, any number of things.
Even how to report bugs in programs that haven't written proper
configure scripts because of what "everyone" knows.

-- 
Rebecca Ore

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