Re: [9front] The 9 Documentation Project

[ori@eigenstate.org]

> part of the problem for new users is that plan 9 assumes any user
> understands the fundamentals of computing at a deeper level than even
> "power users" of other systems.  this was already a stumbling block in
> the 1990s, and it has only deepened as operating systems drag the user
> experience farther and farther away from the underlying mechanisms.

That's a part of it. But a part of it is that there's a lot
of documentation that either sucks or doesn't exist. For
example, I'm not aware of anything that documents the rather
unique ways we handle scrolling, where how far up the window
you are affects how quick the scrolling goes.

NDB also seems like a constant source of confusion -- and
while it largely makes sense when you get it, I don't think
that the manpages lay it out very well.

So, while I don't think we want to fix the assumption that
you understand how your computer works, a combination of
picking better defaults and documenting things better is
something that *I* will appreciate, and I've been around
9front for a while.