discuss: Al Devs HOWTOs (was Re: Is PHP-HOWTO some kind of joke ?)
Subject:
Re: Al Devs HOWTOs (was Re: Is PHP-HOWTO some kind of joke ?)
From:
Tabatha Marshall ####@####.####
Date:
11 Nov 2003 20:43:23 -0000
Message-Id: <1068583375.16724.31.camel@mysticchild>
Hi all,
I've sent a message directly to Al Dev, explaining that issues have been
raised with his work. He responded to me last night advising he's not
aware of what the issues are, and asked me for a link to the message
archive so he could read about it.
I've sent him a link, but also suggested to Al Dev that he post to the
discussion list directly for feedback regarding his work. He is
concerned that the LDP staff would remove his work in a non-democratic
fashion, without explanation, and I have assured him that the decisions
are not made by one person alone.
When/if he sends a message here, I encourage everyone who has issues
with his work to respond, to help him understand what it is about his
work that isn't satisfying people.
I've offered to go through his documents one-on-one when I'm finished a
couple of larger projects, so that we can find ways to re-work his
material. I don't know if this will lead to anything productive, but
it's part of my nature to at least give it a try.
Please give Al Dev some feedback if he asks for it; I hope this will
help him understand where the issues are. He's also asked specifically
which documents are in question. I've seen some specifics on this list
about certain documents, and encourage those who posted to re-send the
mail to Al Dev. He's very receptive to the feedback, and seems to want
to try and find a solution.
Thanks everybody,
Tab
On Tue, 2003-11-11 at 11:59, Colin Watson wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 11, 2003 at 02:47:15PM -0500, Randy Kramer wrote:
> > There was another issue that I tried to imply at the time (I don't think I
> > explicitly raised it, well come to think of it, I did dance around the issue
> > a number of times in posts to the list, but still, it was dancing). You
> > (David) have touched on it above. I strongly suspect that Al Dev took over
> > someone else's document(s), but, IIRC, there was little or no credit given to
> > any previous author in the credits.
> >
> > Aside: My suspicions were aroused because some of the writing was very good
> > and factual, and then there were the other things that were clearly his
> > (referring to programs he had written, etc.) that were just wierd. (IIRC, at
> > the time, part of the C++ document was a rant trying to explain why Java
> > would be so much better than C++ for any particular project.)
>
> A few months ago, I flicked through the PHP-HOWTO and wondered to myself
> whether I should be shipping it as part of Debian's LDP packages. Since
> I don't know much about PHP myself, I went and talked to our php4
> maintainer to get a second opinion. According to him, at the time, the
> only remotely valuable content in the document had been more or less
> directly copied from the documentation on php.net; the rest was mere
> invective or just plain wrong.
>
> Of course, we no longer ship the PHP-HOWTO.
>
> Cheers,
--
Tabatha Marshall
Web: www.merlinmonroe.com
Linux Documentation Project Review Coordinator (http://www.tldp.org)
Linux Counter Area Manager US:wa (http://counter.li.org)
