Quality vs. Quantity (Was: Re: RTFM? IWMITWAFM! (Was: Re: [Zope] WebDAV, Zope, M$ and implications...))

[Chris McDonough]

On Sat, 9 Mar 2002 14:46:41 -0800
 "Howard Hansen" <zope@halfmagic.com> wrote:
> number of
> questions, but answer them as fully as you can, assuming
> that the user knows
> essentially nothing.  Pepper those answers with links,
> explanations, and
> philosophical asides.  Make it a mini-howto and a seminar
> on advanced topics
> in Zope.  And be sure to spend exactly the same amount of
> time, don't add to
> your burden.

This seems like pretty sage advice.  Tim Peters does
essentially this on the various Python newsgroups and
maillists.  His answers are almost always correct and
utterly comprehensive.  It can be exceedingly difficult to
be not only correct but clear and comprehensive when
replying to maillist questions.  I have lots of respect for
Tim and other supermen like him who successfully dispense
wisdom with clarity and style.

I think Howard's suggestion is a good one and I will for one
recommit to doing things this way even if it means I need to
answer fewer questions.

That said, everybody has their own style of helping out; a
prod in the right direction from Dieter is miles better than
no answer.  I appreciate Dieter's Zope contributions very
much.. he is sometimes terse, but he helps many people who
would otherwise be left without reply.  And this makes him a
sort of maillist hero. ;-)

- C