From owner-freebsd-doc Mon Sep 10 3:55:59 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-doc@freebsd.org Received: from bazooka.unixfreak.org (bazooka.unixfreak.org [63.198.170.138]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C331037B406 for ; Mon, 10 Sep 2001 03:55:53 -0700 (PDT) Received: by bazooka.unixfreak.org (Postfix, from userid 1000) id 3D7713E28; Mon, 10 Sep 2001 03:55:53 -0700 (PDT) Received: from bazooka.unixfreak.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by bazooka.unixfreak.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 314FD3C12F; Mon, 10 Sep 2001 03:55:53 -0700 (PDT) To: Giorgos Keramidas Cc: freebsd-doc@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: docs/30343: minor changes to ata(4) manpage In-Reply-To: <20010905233236.A5727@hades.hell.gr>; from charon@labs.gr on "Wed, 5 Sep 2001 23:32:36 +0300" Date: Mon, 10 Sep 2001 03:55:48 -0700 From: Dima Dorfman Message-Id: <20010910105553.3D7713E28@bazooka.unixfreak.org> Sender: owner-freebsd-doc@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Giorgos Keramidas wrote: > On Wed, Sep 05, 2001 at 12:30:02PM -0700, Dima Dorfman wrote: > > > > I don't see the reason behind this. This change just makes the manual > > page inconsistent with itself (since it wouldn't describe how to > > disable hw.ata.tags) and probably most others as well. > > > > Am I missing something? > > True. I did not read the manpage very very carefully, just noticed > that I found that part a bit confusing. Perhaps I was too tired to > understand it correctly. If it seems more proper, we can close this > PR and let me read the manpage again. Then, if it's ok with Soren I > could write up how the sysctl's are enabled and how they're disabled, > and send diffs that change all of them and not only one. > > I feel that both enabling and disabling sysctl's should be explained, > but consistency is more important. This seems to be necessary, since > some of the sysctl's are not disabled when put to 0, while others are. > So if it's ok to add text that explains disabling too for those > sysctl's that do support it, I'll go through the text again. I wasn't strictly objecting to the change, I just didn't understand the purpose--and I still don't, really. We have many, many boolean sysctl variables where 0 means 'off', and !0 (typically 1) means 'on'. Since this is pretty much the norm, we should be documenting things that *don't* follow this convention rather than those that do. Of course, this doesn't apply to sysctls that don't have an integer value in the first place. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-doc" in the body of the message