[mythtv-users] [RANT] mythtv-users] Deal with non-HD in SD only frontends?

[Robert McNamara]

On Mon, Dec 21, 2009 at 1:24 PM, Robert McNamara
<robert.mcnamara at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> You are "pointing out" thing that, as I mentioned and you edited out,
> we all already know about.  So again, it serves no purpose other than
> to unburden yourself and increase frustration of those in the position
> to do something about it.  There are a limited number of man hours to
> go around.  When they are devoted to one place, they are taken from
> another.  We just can't win.

I should follow on to this with one or two more thoughts that maybe
need to be spelled out.  Developer hours are a finite resource.  If
the hours were spent scouring the wiki, no coding would get done.  If
they're spent doing coding, people write self-admitted "rants" that
the documentation isn't good enough.  In this situation the *only* way
to address all issues is to increase the number of developer hours.
That means other people taking up the work and doing it themselves.
If the official documentation is poor, please help us improve it.  If
you think it's adequate to post to the users list (and I'm not saying
that it isn't), then you need to be satisfied with the users list as
your only resource.

Disclaimer:  I am a Myth dev.  But perhaps more relevant, I started
working in Myth with *no* C++ or Qt experience.  I opened the code one
day and using some basic logical thinking, made it do something small.
 Then I made it do a couple small things.  Then I did something a
little bigger.  I continued on this path, never buying a book or
taking a course, until my contributions started to get accepted.
Eventually I was asked if I would like to join the dev group.  There
wasn't anything magical or voodoo about it, just rolling up one's (my)
sleeves and getting something done.  The natural response to this is
generally "Well that's great, but I don't have the time for that kind
of thing."  OK, that's fine too, but given Myth's nature as a
spare-time project for 100% of the devs, the only worthwhile behaviors
are a) living with what one gets, or b) doing something productive to
improve it.  I don't doubt that the OP considers this message as
"help," but (this is intended in a respectful manner) a laundry list
of issues that everyone knows about isn't help.  I *welcome* you to
help us.  In fact, I'd be absolutely thrilled if you did!  But please,
please, don't just give us a list, help us out where you can!  If the
documentation is poor, *please* help us improve it!  I would be very
happy indeed if you modified it to be more complete and easy to
understand, and I'm sure I speak for all the devs when I say that.
So, how about meeting us halfway and addressing documentation issues,
and we'll do our best to address the code ones?

Robert