Date: Sat, 1 Aug 1998 21:53:15 +1000 From: Sue Blake <sue@welearn.com.au> To: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com> Cc: "Michael R. Wayne" <wayne@msen.com>, FreeBSD Questions <questions@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: technical lists [was: Install problems with FreeBSD 2.2.7-RELEASE] Message-ID: <19980801215315.37947@welearn.com.au> In-Reply-To: <19980728134151.K716@freebie.lemis.com>; from Greg Lehey on Tue, Jul 28, 1998 at 01:41:51PM %2B0930 References: <m0z10x7-0003cUC@ilium.troy.msen.com> <19980728134151.K716@freebie.lemis.com>
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On Tue, Jul 28, 1998 at 01:41:51PM +0930, Greg Lehey wrote: > On Tuesday, 28 July 1998 at 0:01:28 -0400, Michael R. Wayne wrote: > > > >> Moved to -questions. I see nothing in this message that suggests it's > >> a detailed technical discussion. > >> > >> On Saturday, 25 July 1998 at 5:18:40 -0400, wayne@msen.com wrote: > > > I felt it was a TECHNICAL problem because any error message like that > > should HALT the install process, not cause the machine to reboot giving > > no indication that there was a problem. You two seem to have a shared understanding of the word "technical" which is light years away from mine. Where I'm coming from, using computers is technical, and mounting a floppy disk or copying a file without splattering another one is *very* technical. Hooking up the kitchen terminal and talking to it is way over the moon unthinkably technical. I thought everyone felt the same, but apparently what is or is not technical is subjective. Whenever discussion of mailing list use refers to "technical", you should not be surprised if people without your years of experience to use the word as I do, and obligingly send their how-to-login questions to -hackers. The list charters page warns not to send "how to" questions to "technical lists", which clearly includes freebsd-questions. Not sure? Take a look. Yep, most of this stuff is so technical it makes my brain hurt. There is no ambiguity here: freebsd-questions is a technical list, so no "how to" :-) Good communication does not necessarily follow from linguistic purity, and FreeBSD users are no longer exclusively programmers and computer geeks. It's time to start using words everyone can understand and avoiding words whose meanings rely on shared experience. > -hackers is less about bugs than about > (actively) improving the system by way of code modification. Wow, is that what technical means to you? Aieeee... no wonder... > Check out http://www.lemis.com/questions.html and let me know if > there's anything that could be improved there. That side of it is quite clear. Great, now I have two sets of information (how to ask questions, and the -questions list charter) which convey opposite advice about -questions. Finding one (the charter) embedded in the other does not do anything for my understanding of the lists, nor change the meaning of the old familiar term "technical". -- Regards, -*Sue*- To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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