[mythtv-users] Re:MythTV Help Website

[Ian]

Hi all.  Time for me to add my thoughts.

I'm in the process of researching and setting up my first Myth box.  I'm 
a developer and I know that I'll get it to work, BUT it is taking 
forever to go through all of the information.  Everything is so 
scattered.  Plus, I feel obligated to read this list so I can catch 
every bit of information that appears - this list is busy and that takes 
a lot of time.

Some thoughts below:

J. Donavan Stanley wrote:

> Maarten van den Berg wrote:
>
>> On Thursday 15 April 2004 06:56, Dan Conti wrote:
>>
>> Precisely!  And this fact is the single, strongest reason to deploy a 
>> wiki !!
>> When the answers are there for everyone to find, the flood of 
>> messages on this high-volume list will drop significantly. Everybody 
>> will be happy.
>
<snip>

> Searching the mailing list archives or using google for an OSS project 
> should be considered the equivalent of reading the help file of a 
> windows app.  That's just how things work.  The folks that come here 
> asking questions that are easily answerable are the same folks that 
> call tech support before reading the help files.
>
<snip>

>>> But the truth is that people dont read the documentation. 80% of the
>>> developer posts on this list end up being hyperlinks to places in 
>>> the docs
>>> where obvious questions are answered. And there are limits to how 
>>> extensive
>>> the documentation can be; just keeping it to a limited set of 
>>> distributions
>>> is a task in and of itself, since there are a significant number of
>>> dependencies for this project. Trying to keep on top of all the
>>> distributions and all the variations between versions would be a 
>>> nightmare.   
>>
>>
>> Sure thing. But, all the more reason for a wiki.
>
>
> Again, I'd have to see a wiki that works but every one I've seen is 
> full of holes, wrong information and useless info that it's impossible 
> to find anything useful.  The exception to that has been the various 
> "definition" sites that have a very focused scopes.


Obviously there can be problems with a wiki as stated above.  But in 
this case, I think that a wiki will work.  Why?  Because it fills in a 
huge hole that is currently missing - namely documenting setting up Myth 
on different hardware/linux distro.  It should be obvious why everyone 
uses Jarod's guide - because it is there (and good)!  But I want to use 
Gentoo and have slightly different hardware - Jarod's guide only helps 
so much.  Now if there was a related guide out there for me to read....

Other reasons for a wiki:
- A good wiki depends on the users, and in this case I think that the 
users are pretty knowledgeable and can at least document their 
soluctions to their problems.

- A wiki is organized better than a mailing list.  It has topics that 
you can read/browse in general - instead of searching a mailing list for 
specifics.

- The info in a wiki can be updated as people fix their misguided 
documentation - not so in a mailing list.

- Anyone can help with a wiki, but submitting patches to a master 
document can be daunting.

<snip>

> But the million dollar question is:  "Did you need to struggle with 
> that problem?"  i.e. if you had: Read all the docs, searched the 
> mailing list & used google would you have found the answer in a 
> reasonable amount of time?


Wouldn't it be nice to not have to go through all of that?  Read all the 
docs is an obvious one, but I think that searching the mailing list and 
using google can be REPLACED with looking through the wiki!  If a user 
doesn't find an answer, THEN they go to the mailing list and THEN that 
extra info can be added to the wiki.

> Personally, I think what Myth needs more than a Wiki is a FAQ and even 
> that could be rolled into the howto I think.  I'm not saying a wiki is 
> a horrible idea, I just question the usefulness of adding another 
> information source when the existing ones aren't being used properly.


Personally, I think that a wiki is a better source of information than a 
FAQ.  The FAQ for Myth would be _huge_.  As I said above, instead of the 
wiki being another source of information, let it be the main source 
after the official docs.  I think the docs are great, but general.  They 
need supporting documentation and a wiki is perfect because any user can 
add their experiences.

Someone mentioned that they are willing to set up a wiki.  Another 
person said, "If you want a wiki, then set one up.  No one is stopping 
you."  Well, it looks like the obvious course of action here is to set 
up that wiki!  But it will be only as good as its contributors, so it 
has to be officially supported.  That is why (I assume) that people are 
talking about it here.  Whoever said they'll set one up - go for it!  
And it will need a direct link from the official documentation.

I'm just throwing in my two cents here and I know that I haven't 
contributed yet, but I plan to (after getting dirty with myth and 
gentoo).  But doesn't the above sound reasonable?

Whew!  that was longer than intended...
Ian.