Re: [gentoo-dev] Anyone interested in maintaining the Gentoo Handbooks?

[AllenJB]

Joshua Saddler wrote:
> On Sat, 03 Oct 2009 15:54:31 +0100
> AllenJB <gentoo-lists@××××××××××.uk> wrote:
>
>> I have tried to bring up the issues on the docs team list but pretty
>> much get shot down and told everything is fine and dandy.
>
> Going to have to call "bullshit" on this one. Who told you that on the lists? Have you *seen* *any* of the posts *I've* made? Take a look back at the list for the last, oh, year's worth of posts from me.
>
> We know there's stuff to do. There just aren't enough people. I do what I can, but I'm but one man.

As an example, quoteth one Joshua Saddler on 2009-07-19 on the -docs list:
I dunno if new blood is needed . . . we have perfectly capable folks in
the docs team. They've been around for a few (or more) years, and
they've invested the time and trouble to write perfect GuideXML. The
problem is getting them up *off* their asses to do the work.

>
>> I personally would happily donate my time to working on the docs, if
>> only it didn't involve a markup language nobody else uses. I suggested a
>> closed wiki for official documentation, but was again shot down saying
>> that the existing team (who seem to be doing nothing) would need to
>> reskill and that the server admins dislike wikis.
>
> "Who seem to be doing nothing."
>
> Thanks. Thanks for shitting all over my work for the last month/year/years. All the hours I spend each week (each day) even when I'm devaway maintaining docs in /doc/, /proj/, and our other www pages in /main/. Thanks for saying I do nothing.
>
> I know you're not aware of everything that's going on behind the scenes, but to make such a blanket statement is just uncalled for. I suggest you take a look at http://sources.gentoo.org/gentoo/xml/htdocs/ (doc/en/ and proj/en/) to see some commit history before making such an unkind statement.
>
> We're not totally dead. Not all of the team is inactive. I'm active. The translators are active. Our lead has been fielding the bugs as they come in.

I have no intention of "shitting all over" anybodys work. My apologies
if that was the interpretation. I'm simply escalating an issue I have
raised before to somewhere I think it'll get more attention.

Maybe you're not totally dead, but my criteria for activity has been the
multiple bugs I've been sitting on and the number of times I'm having to
tell new users "the handbook is wrong, ignore it and follow my
instructions in this case" or "oh dear! You seem to have installed a
version of Portage so ancient that 99% of our package tree can't be
installed" (or words to that effect) - mostly to do with the lack of
up-to-date handbooks, which as per my original post is now becoming a
dire situation, in my opinion.

>
> The problem with the English side of the docs is that I'm basically the only person doing anything. That means that while I can *sorta* keep up with the regular influx of non-handbook doc bugs, I can't do the entire handbook revamp on my own.*

>
> * Actually, I could, but some of the changes I have in mind are so far-reaching that I'd prefer not to go over the head of my team lead and instead stick to our existing policies rather than start breaking things left and right.

And you still want to claim you don't need new blood? For some odd
reason I seem to be hearing two different things from the same person.

If the rest of the team is dead, why not escalate the issue to, say the
-dev list. At least from what you've said in your most recent post you
seem to think _something_ does need to be done about the current situation.

AllenJB