From: Paul Louden <paulthenerd_at_gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 22 Apr 2009 16:40:53 -0500

Erin M. Chaves wrote:
>
> Seems to me that lately, when ever someone asks a question or even
> gives a suggestion as Jürgen has done, he/she is answered with
> some patronizing comments by you.

Whether something seems "patronizing" depends on an interpretation of
"tone" from the reader's end. Unfortunately, short of reading messages
as an audio file and sending those attached, I don't think there's any
way to enforce the reader hearing the tone with which I meant any given
messages. I imagine if I said "This is not intended to be patronizing"
it would cause it to be read as moreso, or perhaps sarcastic, rather
than as a dry statement of fact.

I do request that you read over my previous messages and try to imagine
them without tone. I simply directed him to documentation. Yes, I'm
willing to spend more time discussing things other than the answers of
questions in many cases. This is because the answers are in the
documentation, while the things being discussed are not. So, if the
person wishes just to have the answer, rather than the discussion, at
any point they may go and read it.

There's a fairly well known saying: Give a man a fish, feed him for a
day. Teach a man to fish, feed him for life.

We point people at the documentation not to be cruel, but because we
spent time and effort creating this documentation so that questions
could be answered in advance for users. It's only natural for us then to
point users to it so that not only will their current question be
answered, but many future questions as well.

If you have a problem with the documentation itself (perhaps it is
insufficient?) or the site, we do welcome any suggestions that make it
more clear where the manual is located.
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Received on 2009-04-22