Re: <FAQENTRY> 3.2 update needed

Richard Cornford wrote:

> As to the FAQ being a wiki; I have said from the outset, and it is
> stated in the notes, that anyone wishing to contribute an article to the
> FAQ notes is free to do so, so long as they accept that the article be
> subject to public technical scrutiny on the group (and accepted as
> accurate/useful) and may be subject to unrestricted future editing (in
> the event that it becomes inaccurate at some future point).
>
> The total number of articles proposed for inclusion in the FAQ notes in
> the last two years is one. And that written by VK; factually incorrect,
> confused and misleading, and so not included because it did not (and
> could not) pass the scrutiny of the group.

The problem is that complete elaborate, technically perfect articles are
expected from one contributor. Who will take the time for that? I'd
rather think of a FAQ as a collection of solutions to known problems a
majority of active posters can agree to, mainly short, if possible.

A FAQ (list) should precise, but not too long and too detailed in itself.
Links to detailed explanations are OK. But what would you think if it
takes less time posting a FAQ to the newsgroup and probably get it
answered than reading the FAQ list and finding the answer there? Would
you not rather post the FAQ?
 
> And we are not even restricted to whole articles, there is the
> miscellaneous tips and tricks page, where any well explained specific
> technique might be presented, but no contributions there either.

What about postings like <1722634.4r3MeLGxf7@PointedEars.de>?
Are they not worthy to be considered or what is the matter?
 
> So given that nobody seems willing or able to contribute anything
> substantial to the FAQ what would you expect to appear in such a wiki?
> Fragmentary arguments? We can get plenty of those from the group
> archives. And to retain the usefulness of the FAQ it would be necessary
> to weed out the wrong, inaccurate and superficial. If asking for
> contributions yields nothing then allowing contributions and then
> weeding out the worthless is also likely to yield nothing, only in the
> latter case it requires a constant effort to achieve that.

True, because the initial condition is wrong :)

PointedEars
Received on Mon Nov 21 03:15:38 2005