From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from mimir.eigenstate.org ([206.124.132.107]) by ewsd; Mon Jul 27 16:01:34 EDT 2020 Received: from abbatoir.fios-router.home (pool-74-101-2-6.nycmny.fios.verizon.net [74.101.2.6]) by mimir.eigenstate.org (OpenSMTPD) with ESMTPSA id e1b2a8af (TLSv1.2:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:256:NO) for <9front@9front.org>; Mon, 27 Jul 2020 13:01:19 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: To: 9front@9front.org Subject: Re: [9front] The 9 Documentation Project Date: Mon, 27 Jul 2020 13:01:18 -0700 From: ori@eigenstate.org In-Reply-To: <44A75FA2-F810-45DA-8264-6DBB810C53F1@stanleylieber.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit List-ID: <9front.9front.org> List-Help: X-Glyph: ➈ X-Bullshit: scale-out standard-scale HTTP over SOAP hardware persistence-based grid just-in-time-scale control > 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.