[mythtv-users] Mailing list and a Wiki... and a dessert topping

Peter Valdemar Morch swp5jhu02 at sneakemail.com
Tue May 18 08:26:59 EDT 2004


Isaac Richards ijr-at-po.cwru.edu |Lists| wrote:
> And let me point out that this isn't offical, nor will I link to from
>  the main website.
<snip>
> "If you would like to submit an update or contribution, please send 
> it as either SGML or as plain text."
> 
> What are the last 2 words of that sentence?

Kevin Kuphal kuphal-at-dls.net |Lists| wrote:
> I wish you could see that your tone and tenor seems to be more 
> abrasive than helpful for people trying to contribute to this 
> project.

+1!

Do we all agree that everybody has the same motivation here: To make  it 
easier to find information? Our means differ, but our objectives are the 
same. Please, I encourage us to keep that in mind.

David, John, Henk and others are putting in *a lot of work* here, and we 
can decide to throw that enthusiasm away, which is a little odd in my eyes.

Isaac, a number of us see a need for somewhere to add odds and ends, 
that frankly don't have either the universality or quality to end up in 
the docs.

Take for instance my http://mythtv.info/moin.cgi/XmlTv/MythChannelSetup 
page. Honestly, I don't understand the problem thoroughly, and so the 
quality is probably poor. But here in Europe, this hacking has worked 
for me and has helped others already. Would you be ready to incorporate 
this into the docs as-is? Or would you like to finish it of? (I don't 
think I would if I were you...) Should this have no place in the 
universe, even if it helps many people? What would you suggest I do with 
this sort of information? Or "how to get jabberwocky to work with 
borogove in release X of Tumtum"? Isn't that just noise in official docs?

Just curious, but is this the same reasoning you've used when deciding 
not to link to Jarod's guide from http://www.mythtv.org, even though so 
very many of us have used it to set up our MythTV boxes? I've always 
been a little puzzled by how the community can find this such an 
invaluable piece of work, and still there is no link on the official 
site. (Or isn't this really a concious decision? Just one of those 
things that slipped through the cracks? Been there!) I've tried buidling 
a MythTV box from scratch twice, once with each set of docs. Using 
Jarods guide was - by far - the fastest and the least headache-prone. It 
"cheats" - uses a particular distro, apt-get, rpms etc. so no surprise 
its faster. The two approaces are just very different - for different 
audiences.  Would you care to include that into the docs too? (Jarod may 
not, but would you?) If not, why?

Isaac Richards ijr-at-po.cwru.edu |Lists| wrote:
 > Telling people to look in multiple locations
 > for information is _not_ contributing to the project in any way.

<tounge-in-cheek>
Cool, then lets move the wiki into http://www.mythtv.org/wiki
</tounge-in-cheek>
Sorry, I just couldn't resist the temptation...

May I suggest that:

a) The Pro-Wiki people (myself included - needless to say) are 
encouraged to refer others to the official documentation whenever 
possible - also on the wiki. Instead of creating a half-assed, 
rudimentary alternative, as e.g. I did in 
http://www.mythtv.info/moin.cgi/LiRc - such a wiki page should have no 
place on the Wiki, but should be either a link or proper, versioned 
reproduction of http://mythtv.org/docs/mythtv-HOWTO-8.html, so that any 
additions / user contributions can be fed back and forth to the official 
docs in a controlled fashion? (See another post by me in this thread 
about that)

b) The Not-so-Pro-Wiki people please consider what other alternatives I 
have if I want to answer a recurring question with a link to some new 
documentation *right now* and not have to submit a patch, wait for a cvs 
ci + cvs update of http://mythtv.org/docs/ . Mailing lists and gossamer 
threads are not really suitable for getting an overview. How many times 
in the last month have we heard variations of the question "Please 
suggest a good TV-out card"? Should *this* be a part of the official 
docs? I vote no. Where then? 50 * http://mydomain.com/tvout.html?

We really all want the same thing. To write down what we know that 
others don't know so that everybody may know. We all agree that 
redundancy is *EVIL*

One side hates the redundancy with thread after thread containg the same 
questions over and over again. The other side sees the legitimate danger 
of competing documentation projects. We needn't be separated - unless we 
choose to.

Peter
-- 
Peter Valdemar Mørch
http://www.XXXXXXXXX


More information about the mythtv-users mailing list