".. Life's like that - programmers write code, they don't write documentation.."
Programmers who do not, can not or will not document haven't earned their chops. If someone is coding a system to track their groceries at home and they don't want to document then fine. Any time someone is working on any system, open-source, closed-source, free-ware or charge-ware, documentation is part of the job.
DSig David Tod Sigafoos | SANMAR Corporation
-----Original Message----- From: mediawiki-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:mediawiki-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Michael Daly Sent: Tuesday, April 10, 2007 15:04 To: MediaWiki announcements and site admin list Subject: Re: [Mediawiki-l] Any leads on a basic wiki setup-and-configure instruction manual?
Monahon, Peter B. wrote:
It's like teaching someone how to drive a car and explaining the steering wheel like this: "turn the steering wheel by rotating clockwise or anticlockwise". Hello, isn't there something missing in that?
You don't learn to drive by building a car. If you want to learn how a wiki works, use a wiki - don't install and administer a wiki until you have learned that much. There are plenty of wikis out there - Wikipedia
has essentially every feature you will find in Mediawiki.
I learned to use a wiki before I installed one. That made life a lot easier.
Believe me, I can understand your frustration with open source software.
It is universally poorly documented. It helps to think like a programmer to understand what is documented and sometimes you have to open up the code to make sense of it. Life's like that - programmers write code, they don't write documentation.
However, I cannot accept your attitude, since it sounds like you think someone owes you something. If you want a product that comes with full support, find someone you can pay to get it. Please don't whine to the volunteers, that will be very counterproductive.
Mike
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