[ic] Frustrated with IC 4.8

Kat Turner interchange-users@interchange.redhat.com
Tue Sep 18 00:04:01 2001


>The would be the beginning of the end. It doesn't make sense. It's not the
>responsibility of the developer to make sure, that the documentation gets
>understood by everybody  independent of their level of knowledge or
>expertise.
>
>There is no science, where the scientist adapt to the level of
>understanding of a highschool student, just to make sure everybody
>can understand quantum physics. If a chemist develops a drug his
>documentation for that drug will not be watered down to a level
>a ninth grader can read it like a science fiction novel.
>
>Somewhere along the road you can understand, that it's up to you to
>learn the tools you need. I wouldn't know any field where that wouldn't
>be the same.
>
>Birgitt Funk


I started this thread out of frustration of trying to understand why a great 
program with great features had to be so difficult to learn and use. The 
thought process needed in making your comments would fully explain why IC is 
the way it is, close to a perfect program for it's intended purpose in 
operation but harder to learn to use than it should be.

Most scientists are also teachers in our colleges and universities. They 
take pride in sharing their knowledge with others. They document each step 
of what they learn and making it available. If they kept what they knew to 
themselves and expected others to catch up, as you seem to suggest, we would 
find ourselves on the cutting edge of medieval technology.

If a chemist produced a drug that ended up available to the general public 
for free, I think you would agree that we should expect reasonable 
documentation on how to take it and what to expect when a ninth grader takes 
it before it would be widely accepted.

I agree that anyone using a program with the complexity of IC should have 
some knowledge of software programming, be it perl, html or whatever. I 
don't believe we should have to start from scratch each time we want to make 
a change in IC. I'm sorry I don't have the skills that you apparently do but 
I can't apologize for not knowing everything.

Kat



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