Re: Most minimal configuration challenge

[Felipe Contreras <felipe.contreras@gmail.com>]

On Fri, Sep 2, 2022 at 12:41 AM Lawrence Velázquez <larryv@zsh.org> wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 1, 2022, at 9:49 PM, Felipe Contreras wrote:
> > On Thu, Sep 1, 2022 at 8:27 PM Lawrence Velázquez <larryv@zsh.org> wrote:
> >> On Wed, Aug 31, 2022, at 10:17 AM, Ray Andrews wrote:

> >> > Only people who have just now learned something can
> >> > explain it in a way that other people who want to learn it can relate to
> >> > because
> >> > only the learner has the mind of a learner.
> >>
> >> Someone who has "just now learned something" has the shallowest
> >> possible understanding of it and can only perpetuate that shallow
> >> understanding.
> >
> > That is not quite true. Yes, the vast majority of newcomers have the
> > shallowest understanding of zsh, but not necessarily of shells,
> > programming languages, configuration systems, or any number of things
> > that might be relevant.
> >
> > This would be like saying a programmer entering the world of economics
> > only has the shallowest of understandings and therefore cannot provide
> > anything of value.
>
> You are misrepresenting what I said.

No, I'm pretty certain you said newcomers "can only perpetuate that
shallow understanding", but that's not true, that's not the *only*
thing they can do. Sometimes they can come up with a new
interpretation, or maybe an analogy nobody had thought of before.
Sometimes they can even make suggestions to change things so this
understanding is simplified, or perhaps even unnecessary.

I don't think you meant to say that, but that's what you literally said.

> > Ultimately the people who should judge prose meant for newcomers, are
> > newcomers. If they say it isn't clear, then it isn't clear.
>
> Obviously.

Then we are in agreement. A zsh veteran expert saying "this should be
good for all newcomers" is not proof that it's truly good for all
newcomers, the feedback from newcomers is still important.

Cheers.

-- 
Felipe Contreras