chris@mimsy.UUCP (Chris Torek) (07/22/87)
>In article <23262@sun.uucp>, guy%gorodish@Sun.COM (Guy Harris) writes: >>(Besides, getting [pre-troffed documentation] wouldn't do you any good; >>we use our own macro packages and other tools, and it would be too >>much trouble to supply and support them.) In article <1499@ncc.UUCP> lyndon@ncc.UUCP (Lyndon Nerenberg) writes: >... If you use your own macro packages to produce the doc >then they (the macros) already exist, so there is no (non-politcol) >reason that they can't be shipped with the troff source. True. >Nobody says you have to support the macro package. I think experience tends to prove otherwise: Some customers complain about bugs in things released as `unsupported'. This is no one's fault but said customers'; these people make things harder for everyone by tending to convince companies not to ship unsupported tools. (Moral: If you get something that says `unsupported' and it does not work, keep quiet. :-) ) -- In-Real-Life: Chris Torek, Univ of MD Comp Sci Dept (+1 301 454 7690) Domain: chris@mimsy.umd.edu Path: seismo!mimsy!chris
lyndon@ncc.UUCP (Lyndon Nerenberg) (07/24/87)
In article <7642@mimsy.UUCP>, chris@mimsy.UUCP (Chris Torek) writes: > In article <1499@ncc.UUCP> lyndon@ncc.UUCP (Lyndon Nerenberg) writes: > >... If you use your own macro packages to produce the doc > >then they (the macros) already exist, so there is no (non-politcol) > >reason that they can't be shipped with the troff source. > True. > >Nobody says you have to support the macro package. > I think experience tends to prove otherwise: Some customers complain > about bugs in things released as `unsupported'. This is no one's > fault but said customers'; these people make things harder for > everyone by tending to convince companies not to ship unsupported > tools. Guy was swift to jump on this via mail as well! I don't give up that easy though :-) Don't package it with the standard distribution, but make it available as a seperate "Unsupported Program Offering" and charge a reasonable amount of money for it to cover the media, distribution, etc. That way, those of us who want this type of material will still have access to it, with a clear understanding that "you pays your money & takes your chances". This is essentially the idea behind the AT&T Toolchest (and boy do they charge for distribution :-) [If this discussion carries on it should migrate elsewhere] -- Ollie for president: the tradition continues.