Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2004 20:48:58 -0800 From: Wes Peters <wes@softweyr.com> To: Eivind Eklund <eivind@FreeBSD.org>, Diomidis Spinellis <dds@aueb.gr> Cc: Dag-Erling Smorgrav <des@FreeBSD.org> Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/usr.bin/fetch fetch.1 Message-ID: <200401262048.58375.wes@softweyr.com> In-Reply-To: <20040126150550.GA1383@FreeBSD.org> References: <20040126150550.GA1383@FreeBSD.org>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Monday 26 January 2004 07:05 am, Eivind Eklund wrote:
> On Sat, Jan 24, 2004 at 11:27:34AM +0200, Diomidis Spinellis wrote:
> > Let us not forget that the Unix manual pages provide reference
> > material; they are not a user guide. They historically have been
> > terse, to the point, and honest in admitting shortcomings (bugs).
> > While a user might find it helpful to read the environment variable
> > documentation in fetch(1), the correct thing to do in reference
> > material is to document the variables where they are implemented,
> > namely fetch(3), and provide a cross reference.
>
> My feeling about this is that we are giving our users a lot of
> inconvenience in the search for some kind of "idelogical purity" (in
> the form of consistency), where the purity does not buy us much.
> Purity should not be a goal in and of itself. Purity is a tool for
> making the system as a whole easier to deal with - a powerful,
> important and good tool, but a tool.
>
> I've had repeated cases of support on these variables because users do
> not find them. I agree with DES about duplication - I just think that
> the variables should be documented in fetch.1 instead of fetch.3.
I agree with you in general, Eivind. Have you had a change to read the
change I committed? It reads:
All environment variables mentioned in the documentation for the fetch(3)
library are supported. A number of these are quite important to the
proper operation of fetch; you are strongly encouraged to read fetch(3)
as well.
I hope this is strong enough "encouragement" for them to read the
definitive source.
--
Where am I, and what am I doing in this handbasket?
Wes Peters wes@softweyr.com
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?200401262048.58375.wes>