Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2008 03:43:24 +1100 From: jonathan michaels <jlm@caamora.com.au> To: Astrodog <astrodog@gmail.com> Cc: fbsd_chat <freebsd-chat@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: on content versus presentation [ was: Re: Why the FreeBSD license will not be changing ] Message-ID: <20080318034324.37638@caamora.com.au> In-Reply-To: <2fd864e0803170542p3c0ce2cscd5279c57e0cfc25@mail.gmail.com>; from Astrodog on Mon, Mar 17, 2008 at 07:42:49AM -0500 References: <20080110170010.GA16567@volatile.engineering.cwru.edu> <20080111115804.T2095@klein.bigpond.com> <47DAF203.40106@emailrob.com> <47DB7009.1020606@highperformance.net> <20080315212432.45787@caamora.com.au> <47DC0756.4050304@highperformance.net> <Pine.SOC.4.64.0803151256380.27121@libra.sfsu.edu> <20080316032755.GB74896@kobe.laptop> <47DDD5E5.4020001@daleco.biz> <2fd864e0803170542p3c0ce2cscd5279c57e0cfc25@mail.gmail.com>
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On Mon, Mar 17, 2008 at 07:42:49AM -0500, Astrodog wrote:
> Dear god, this is sad.
>
> To all of you attacking the rules of capitalization, spelling and grammar...
>
> These rules exist to aid in allowing others to understand what you're
> writing, much as style(9) exists to help make code more
> understandable.
> For example:
>
> int func() {
> if (blah == 2) {
> otherfunc(blah2);
> return 0;
> }
> else {
> return 1;
> }
> }
>
> is MUCH easier to understand than:
>
> int func() {if(blah==2){otherfunc(blah2);return 0;}else{return 1;}}
>
> Just as "I really enjoy drinking heavily then driving like Mario
> Andretti, Officer Smith" is much more understandable, and can be read
> faster than, "ireallyenjoydrinkingheavilythendrivinglikemarioandrettiofficersmith"
>
> These rules do not exist for your, personal, outgoing communication's
> benefit. They exist to assist people reading what others have written.
> I know of very few people who follow these rules when writing notes
> for their own use. While you can elect to ignore these rules in
> communication with others, doing so makes understanding things you
> write more difficult. These kinds of mistakes also make ambiguous
> sentences more likely to occur, as the building blocks of the sentence
> are not recognizable by others.
>
> Needless to say, fluency with these rules will not be consistent
> across a large group of people. However, the fact that some people do
> not know the rules as well as others, is no excuse for not working to
> make your material easier to understand. Soccer players cannot pick up
> the ball and run with it... even if a majority of people are not aware
> of the rule. If they elect to do so, they will encounter problems. I
> do not begrudge someone learning English for not understanding these
> rules or someone with a disability that prevents their use, and
> mistakes happen, though I certainly frown upon someone reveling in
> doing it incorrectly.
>
> In as far as Jonathan's point of, "not everybody read writes presents
> american english in teh way 'some' americans read write and present
> thier version of english."... The various rules of American English
> are not something that individuals in the population are able to alter
> for personal reasons. The fact that someone is unable, for whatever
> reason, to follow the rules of the language doesn't change the fact
> that they are using the language incorrectly, nor does that incorrect
> usage necessarily reflect negatively upon the thoughts that person is
> attempting to express.
>
> --- Harrison
a best as i can work out whats been written is mostly what i tried t
say
thank you fro translating the 'jonathanesque' into something it is, in some
senbalance, that others may be able to understand. i true wish i could
communicaet like a normal person but no amount of wishing is going to
fix the skill set that i (and those like me) operate with on a daily
basis.
if i may be permited to add a little postscript, i think it was said
earlier perhaps we should spend more time worrying about the content
and less time about the presetations esp if its consistantly wrong,
lazy people are just that lazy they are so lazy that they do not
consistantly make the same "mistakes" whereas somebody like me makes
teh same "mistakes" consistantly not because i like to be consistant
in my lasziness rather this is how my data processing system makes the
same errors, consistantly, sees teh same cobination of characters and
triggers the same kind of responces ..
ten years and point out where i do not make teh same "spelling
mistakes" fro me it is not a mistake this is how my brain interpretes
sorry, resolves the patches of light and dark into words sentances
paragraphs and eventually into context and then finally thought that i
hopefully have been albe to lucidly express.
i am not trying to pelad for myself, its too late fro me, thats the awy
that it is i'm not being defeatist its time we all need to accept teh
'status quo' .. i'm tryint to explain the process as best as i can see
it so that others like me won't have to, hopefully, won't need to go
throught the same nightmare that i did.
it is easy to say i didn't know, but its harder to justify treating
people like jcw did, as per example, i'm not picling on ou jason, your
post and responce is teh best example of this process that i have seen
since a few nolonger present in public freebsd community made sport of
broken people and those fro whom english is not a second or third or
even a fourth language.
thankfully, its no longer a bad as it used to be for teh "different".
take care all and keep up teh good work
most kind regards and sincere best wishes
jonathan
ps, thanks gk, much appreciated and yes i'm still using, freebsd, amonst
other things
--
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