Timwi wrote:
Tim Starling wrote:
Why don't you find something else to do for a change?
If I remember correctly, you are the one who has the nerve to refuse to
move even a single finger for any project that you deem inappropriate
(such as the Klingon Wikipedia), and if I also remember correctly, you
were the one who most vocally told *me* not to tell other people what to
do when I was new.
I *very strongly* suggest you not tell other people what to do.
Comments like the one above can very easily shatter all motivation
someone may have to work on something voluntarily in their free time. I
would hate to see that happen to Thomas, with all his great and hard
work on Enotif going to waste. A lot of people are looking forward to
this feature.
You may have your own opinions about things; you may think that everyone
here is a really crap programmer and you could do it all much better if
you had the time. You might think Enotif is a piece of shit just like
you do with my Recent Changes Patrol feature and flexbisonparse. But,
man, you gotta learn to keep it to yourself.
Timwi
"Work on something else for a change" was exactly what I told Mark Ryan
after he said on what is now [[Talk:Perth, Western Australia]]:
"Aaaargh! somebody give me some feedback!!!! Somebody tell me what they
think of the Perth page now, what it still needs etc etc... I can't do
this alone."
Strangely enough he didn't take offence. What I said to Tom just then
was meant in the same way. Sometimes people can get emotionally involved
in a single pet project. The project becomes everything, they worry
constantly about what other people think of it, hang on every word of
criticism or praise and try to do everything they think will make
everyone repect their work. This applies equally to Tom now and to Mark
then, as well as many other situations. Unfortunately Mark didn't see my
advice until much later, he lost interest in Wikipedia in the same week
and didn't come back for 18 months.
Sometimes obsessive people forget that there is more than one way to
earn the respect of others. Email notification is good, but even if it
was perfect, it wouldn't be respected to the same degree that a
continuing, diverse contribution to the community might be. Working on a
range of things is a great way to avoid stress -- if you put all your
eggs in one basket, you're in trouble if the basket fails.
We're working on including email notification in 1.5, there's nothing
more that Tom has to do for this to occur. I'm committed to this, it
won't be removed. That's why my advice to him is to stop assuming the
worst every time it's disabled on a wiki somewhere, to stop posting to
wikitech-l every week accusing us of some injustice against it, and to
find something else to do which will earn him the appreciation he sorely
needs.
I see you've taken the opportunity to list all the wrongs I've done
against you in the past. I'll say a few words about each of them.
* I honestly thought refusing to contribute to the Klingon Wikipedia was
a fair compromise. Several people argued vociferously against it, I
could have easily joined them, and done whatever I could to prevent the
wiki from being created. Would you have preferred that? Instead I
decided to live and let live.
* The "don't tell other people what to do" thing shattered my confidence
in my ability to communicate with other people. I tried to be honest and
explain the situation, but you wouldn't believe me when I told you I had
nothing against you, and you took offence at everything I said. It was
an unpleasant experience. Unable to explain myself without making
matters worse, I resigned myself to hoping that perhaps you would
forgive and forget with the passage of time. I guess you haven't.
* I don't think anyone here is a crap programmer, least of all you. Your
skills are among the best on the team. I admit I was disappointed with
the recent changes patrol feature from a design/usability perspective,
but if I recall correctly, you agreed with me that its design was
provisional rather than ideal.
* Flexbisonparse is in a class of its own, I think it's amazing. Writing
something like that is far beyond my capabilities. I can't imagine
myself saying that there's something wrong with it. I may have said that
I want to see benchmarks of the speed, and I may have said that it's not
much use without HTML output, but both statements were intended to be
encourage development towards a drop-in replacement, not to put you down.
-- Tim Starling