Re: [OT] Acronyms again [Re: [Usability] GNOME 2.6+ usability: points of critique]

[John Spray <jcs116 york ac uk>]

What the hell, in I dive...

On Mon, 2004-10-11 at 17:46, Alan Horkan wrote:
> In this case Havoc would have been shorter to type than Havoc Pennington
> but still reasonably clear, acronyms are rarely necessary if ever.
Particularly in the case of the GNU's Not Unix Network Object Model
Environment, acronyms are almost entirely unnecessary ;-)  Just kidding;
I thought he meant hewlett packard too.

> > This might be a nice occasion to get off you ass and write a script
> > instead of just complaining. You might make some people happy ...
> 
> robsta that attitude will get us nowhere, but maybe that reads as more
> harsh than you intended it.
I think this is one area where people have become justifiably touchy:
there have been umteen people writing whiny articles about how much
better gnome was back in the day.  I for one am sick and tired of people
threatening to stop using GNOME, as if to try and dignify their whining
with blackmail.

It's as if they expect that all the other GNOME developers and users
will throw up their hands and say "Were we stoned or something?  Let's
put everything back as it was in 1.2!".  It's bloody irritating, and I
don't think that anyone but callcentre staff has a duty to not express
their irritation.  A user complaining about a specific bug is fine, and
should not be dismissed with "fix it yourself".  A user making such
sweeping complaints about software that he claims he will not be
continuing to use invites scorn.

Mr. Fendt seems to be complaining not just about specific software but
the entire community that's behind GNOME, since software cannot be
arrogant, only those who make it can.  He wishes that GNOME's
development was guided by those who think like him.

While Alan is educating us all in netiquette, perhaps he'd like to tell
the original poster that referring to gconf as a "lousy 'regedit'
rip-off" might have somewhat lowered the tone of his message.  In fact,
in the spirit of the original poster's writing style, I shall refer to
his message hereonin as "that lousy post".  How's that?

John