[tex-live] Fwd: Re: tlmgr query

Reinhard Kotucha reinhard.kotucha at web.de
Wed Aug 5 02:31:08 CEST 2009


On 4 August 2009 Rowland McDonnell wrote:

 >>These people which you decry in an absolut intolerable way spend
 >>most of their spartime to create, manage and support TeXLive.
 > 
 > They create and manage it.  They do not provide support to people
 > like me.

Hi Rowland,
I fear you are wrong.  They provide support and they tried to help
you.  But you said that their help was useless.  This was not a good
precondition for asking for further help.

You said that you answered questions from other users already and that
they appreciated your answers.  Didn't you enjoy helping other people
*because* you got positive feedback?

TeX Live is free software, you don't have to pay for the software
itself, nor for the support.  Support is provided by volunteers in
their spare time, and if you need support, the best thing you can do
is to ask politely.  You asked politely at the beginning, but you
claimed that the answers were useless and thus, many people felt
insulted, or at least annoyed. 

Regarding documentation: A normal TeX Live user usually doesn't have
to read documentation about the low level stuff.  From what you said,
I derive that you are a normal TeX Live user who just needs a little
bit more than what TeX Live provides by default.  Instead of learning
the innards of TeX Live, it's better to rely on its tools, or simply
do what people on the TeX Live mailing list propose.

Rowland, you said that you intend to leave the TeX Live mailing list
now and probably come back again later.  But what you are doing now is
quite problematic: You try to insult everybody.  It's not a good idea.
It's useless because nobody feels insulted: Nobody takes your insults
serious any more.  All you achieve is that everybody remembers your
name when you come back in a couple of years, even if you ask for help
politely.

You complained about Norbert Preining several times.  Norbert spends
his whole spare time, that is 48 hours per day and 14 days per week,
on TeX Live development.  In addition, he has a regular job.  He
doesn't get any money for TeX Live development.  Your complaints are
unjustified.  Of course, documentation can be improved, but we need
volunteers, unqualified complaints are useless.

I think we should cease the discussion now.  Neither Rowland nor
anybody else benefit if we continue.

Regards,
  Reinhard

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