If I may add my 0.5c here too, the MySQL manual, like so many of its kind
was obviously written by a highly skilled developer(/s) but who, like
virtually all of that ilk, lacks the ability to impart knowledge to others.
As always, the issue is largely that of ignoring countless items considered
trivial by those of developer status but which are critical to others. Most
of us are aware that open source developers don't draw a wage etc like eg
Microsoft staff, however that doesn't change the fact that the "official"
documentation format is far from explicit enough for many non-experts. I
personally believe the MySQL docs are probably a bit better than the average
for unix related applications but they still leave a lot to be desired. Its
a similar situation to that existing with most unix / linux man pages ....
time & time again we see experts going on about RTFM, however all those
things do is totally confuse newbies.
Now before all the experts around here start yelling about how much they
like the format of manuals etc etc, consider the amount of traffic on this
list. I'm subscribed to a number of lists, but none of them generates
anywhere near the traffic of [EMAIL PROTECTED] . That alone should
provide clear indication that a heap of mysql users just can't get the
answers they need from the documentation. A similar situation existed with
FreeBSD for many years ..... newbies bugging the mailing lists because of
inadequate explanation in official documentation .... experts going hoarse
from screaming RTFM .... then fairly recently a few relative newbies went
out & built some user-friendly tutorial sites that cut the level of newbie
frustration dramatically. Hopefully someone who is new enough to MySQL to
recall the needless frustration but experienced to make a contribution will
do something similar in the near future.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Matt Wagner" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Neff Patrick K" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 7:43 AM
Subject: RE: Please read the manual
> Neff Patrick K writes:
> >
> > <cut>
> >
> > I in fact finally got mysql up and running last night but not one
> > word in your manual helped me do it. So in fact all the reading in
> > the world would have left me sitting in the same position.
>
> Neff,
>
> What stumbling blocks in the documentation did you run across? What
> can we add (new sections, rewordings, etc) to help the many that will
> likely follow the same frustrating path you just did?
>
>
> Matt
>
> --
> __ ___ ___ ____ __
> / |/ /_ __/ __/ __ \/ / Matt Wagner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> / /|_/ / // /\ \/ /_/ / /__ MySQL AB, http://www.mysql.com/
> /_/ /_/\_, /___/\___\_\___/ River Falls, Wisconsin, USA
> <___/ Developer
>
>
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