Re: gEDA-user: test repo

[Bob Paddock <bob.paddock@xxxxxxxxx>]

> Thanks for setting up such a service, a well kept secret until now

Its been discussed before.

> let's keep this one quite as not to waken the wild hoards of windoze users
> ;-)

> Should windoze "users" file bug reports in LP for these nightly windows
> snapshots too ?

Bugs are bugs, they need reported.

This anti-Windows attitude is not helpful to the project, and I'm not
trying to pick on you specifically Bert. sorry if it seems that way.

In my personal view there seems to be a fear that a bunch of people
from Windows will show up asking annoying questions.
Yet I see the same questions over-and-over from new users on
non-Windows systems, and no one gets annoyed with them.

There are two groups of people involved in using EDA tools.  Hobbyist
trying to learn and have fun, and professionals that just want to get
work done.

Those in the professional category often have no choice but to use
Windows due to IT departments or uninformed management policies.
I know of at least one person that was here for a while, who is
extremely knowledgeable in Analog Design, that left because of lack of
Windows support.
He is now quit vocal about it in other groups driving potential users,
and more importantly contributors, away.

In the hobbyist group we have to be aware of the Baby-Duck-Syndrome.
When a Baby-Duck is born, it imprints the first moving thing it sees
to be its Mother.
In software the first tool a person is exposed to is the one they may
stick with for a life time.  Do we want to be a tool that a first time
user can be productive with in a few minutes, or at least hours?
No, that does not mean things get broken for current users that like
Makefiles.  First time users and long time users can be supported by
the same tool, and constant wining about something maybe getting it
broken by a change to improve usability is no more productive for the
project than wining about Windows, and has driven off contributors.
If it gets broken, it gets fixed.

Outside of our group here gEDA/PCB/Et.Al. are seen as toys and hard to
use.  Maybe we should all asks ourselves why? [Which does not mean
that my message here needs any kind of reply telling use why, we all
know if some issue or other that needs addressed, starting an other
wining sessions is not my goal with this message.]

The attitude of 'Things would be so much better if the customers would
all just go away' and stop complaining about real usability problems
is sure to cause a long slow painful death of any project.


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