Progress?

[James McKenzie]

On 8/1/11 11:46 PM, Ian Malone wrote:
> On 1 August 2011 17:52, Stuart McGraw<smcg4191 at frii.com>  wrote:
>> On 08/01/2011 03:31 AM, Fernando Cassia wrote:
>>>
>>> On Mon, Aug 1, 2011 at 04:14, Gilboa Davara<gilboad at gmail.com<mailto:gilboad at gmail.com>>  wrote:
>>>
>>>      ... Because if you were actually trying to be constructive, oh man, you
>>>      chose the wrong way to do it.
>>>
>>>
>>> I always applaud civilized and well-argumented rants. They are good lists of annoyances (real or perceived) from end users, and people on the list end up learning one thing or another as part of the exchange of opinions.
>> I agree.  I always thought it sad and counter-productive
>> that user complaints are not more welcomed as indicators
>> of where developers' view users' needs and users' view of
>> same, differ.  But I suppose that is ignoring the reality
>> of human nature and the desire to do what one wants, free
>> of critisism.
>>
> Possibly the key phrase there is "well argued". I didn't see any
> arguments, just a list of wishes. None of which I particularly
> empathise with in relation to F15. (I've have my problems with F15,
> but none of those.) As others have said the last two:
> * Give us back the assurance of never having to reboot.
This is a silly requirement.  There are always reasons to reboot.  What 
you mean, from what I gather, is don't make me reboot unless it is 
absolutely necessary (major kernel upgrade type stuff...)
>
> * Give us back the legendary reliability that was the hallmark of
> Linux and Fedora.
Who are you kidding here.  Fedora != reliability.  RedHat === 
reliability (I work with RH 5.6/RH 6 servers and they HAVE to be reliable.)
>
> Are simply misleading anyway.
>
>> If complaints were less suppressed here, maybe the situation
>> could even be turned into a positive...Fedora could perhaps
> Constructive criticism and suggestions are far more useful than just
> enumerating grievances.
Amen said the choir.  Bellyaching about something you cannot change is 
not going to change it and might just dig the heels in of the developers 
more.  I've been of that ilk for YEARS.  If you have something to say, 
say it, but coat it with HONEY.  Remember, the song in Mary Poppins "A 
Spoon Full of Sugar Make the Medicine Go Down"?  That is what we should 
be doing.  Something like this:
'Hey Gnome devs:  I know that you are trying to attract new Linux users 
by giving them an easy to use, hard to mess up interface in Gnome3.  
Good work and I think you've made great strides in that direction.  
However, in the process, you have made things more difficult for me, the 
experienced Gnome user.  Can you help me out by keeping Gnome2 alive 
until I learn all the tweaks and tricks for Gnome3?  That would be 
really nice on your part and it would give me a fall-back position in 
case something goes horribly wrong with my use of Gnome3."


> Many of the items originally listed were bugs,
> but I don't see bugzilla ids next to them. In any case, this complaint
> is hardly suppressed, it's been posted to everyone on the users list,
> is in the archive, will sit in my email account till I finally run out
> of server space and has generated about a dozen responses.
I'll agree here as well.  Bugzilla is YOUR FRIEND.  If they do nothing 
else than mark the bug 'Invalid' at least you told them in their forum 
that something is not right.  Do expect to see the following:
Worksasdesigned.  Yep, that's the direction the developers are moving 
and you are not going to change their minds.
INVALID.  Same as above, or there is no bug.
WORKSFORME.  You are just going to have to figure out what the 
developers wanted to do here or ask for help from them (or someone else 
who figured it out.)

I like the idea of a 'Survived Fedora 15' tee shirt.  Add that to the 
collection of miscues and broken software that I've worked with over 
thirty years.  What is happening here, happens to most folks who fiddle 
with 'bleeding edge' software.  Sometimes the edge is a little too 
'sharp' and we get 'cut'.  However, what we find will help the overall 
project and RedHat and the Linux community in general.

James