[mythtv-users] Please shut up!

Stroller linux.luser at myrealbox.com
Mon Jan 29 16:38:29 UTC 2007


On 29 Jan 2007, at 07:31, Phill Edwards wrote:
>> * A poster with 1,225 messages going back to December 2004 asked how
>>   to SSH from work through a firewall. His message achieved the
>>   dubious distinction of falling into all three of the above
>>   categories:
>> 3) because it was off topic ...
>> 2) because his message didn't contain enough information...
>> 1) because his message is very, very, very well-discussed elsewhere
>>    already...
>
> I was one of the ones that you picked out and I have two things to say
> ...

It is unfortunate that Yeechang was so specific in his examples - I  
don't really blame you for feeling attacked and the consequent  
strength of your response.

However your post irritated me, too, for all the reasons Yeechang  
describes. If it was off-topic but a difficult problem then I might  
have found it more interesting; were it posted on the your_distro- 
users mailing list I would surely make the effort to offer some  
pointers "to a n00b". As it was I found it irrelevant & dull clutter.

Just because _I_ thought this it doesn't mean yours is a "bad" or  
"wrong" question to ask, mind. (I'm an extremely irritable person by  
nature).
More it begs the discussion, "what kind of mailing list to we want to  
participate in?"

In many ways I enjoy chatty mailing lists to which one can post  
casually and with little research, but when I myself have a technical  
problem then I expect to post seriously and take an hour or two to  
document all the steps I have taken to troubleshoot the issue. I post  
log entries, configuration files & the outputs of `lsmod` or `lspci`  
which show what I'm stuck on - usually there are entries which seem  
to contradict each other and that's what confounds me. Usually I get  
either a very short yet helpful reply that resolves the issue for me  
near-instantly (or which immediately puts me on the right track for  
further reading & configuration) or I figure that no one can help me  
(I certainly know I've framed the question correctly).

Like I say, I don't mind some off-topic chatter & banter, but the  
number of questions posted here that are completely irrelevant to  
MythTV &/or which indicate NO EFFORT AT ALL made to solve them by the  
poster really do take the mickey. Sometimes I just want to reply to  
these: help us to help you.

Stroller.





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