[Ubuntu-manual] Collaboration between the Ubuntu Manual and Docs Team

[Alex Lourie]

I could not say any better.

Phil, you are the master of the words.

Alex.

On Thu, Jan 14, 2010 at 12:36 PM, Phil Bull <philbull at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Benjamin,
>
> On Thu, 2010-01-14 at 22:05 +1300, Benjamin Humphrey wrote:
> > Thanks for the feedback. I know it may seem like we are trying to do
> > the same thing as you, but in all reality we aren't.
>
> I think that this whole matter could be put to rest if you explain
> exactly how what you are doing is different to what the Ubuntu system
> docs are doing. All I can see when I read the wiki pages is that you're
> doing exactly the same but in a linear (book) format. Look at the table
> of contents for your manual [2] and compare it with what has already
> been written in the system docs [3]. The topics are almost exactly the
> same, they're just organised differently! Even the name, "Ubuntu
> Manual", is virtually indistinguishable from "Ubuntu System
> Documentation".
>
> In the "Justification" section on the wiki page [1], you say "The
> Community Docs are excellent, but unfortunately are not structured for
> complete beginners and do not necessarily follow one guideline". I
> assume, by Community Docs, you mean the system documentation which can
> be found by clicking System -> Help and Support. We try hard to
> structure them for beginners, and we follow pretty stringent style
> guidelines. In what ways are we failing? I don't think we're doing so
> badly that a complete rewrite in a different style is required.
>
> I'm also extremely confused about who your intended users are. You said
> in an earlier email that "We're aimed at a different user base than the
> docs team", but all I can find on the wiki pages is that you're
> targeting "complete beginners", "absolute newcomers migrating from
> Windows/Mac". This doesn't define a user base. A seasoned Windows system
> administrator, a professor of linguistics and a six-year-old child could
> both be absolute newcomers to Ubuntu, but that doesn't mean that they'll
> understand the same documentation!
>
> Please make sure you have good answers to these questions. I'm extremely
> concerned that you're making the same mistakes that everyone always
> makes, hence the proliferation of not-so-great documentation in the open
> source community.
>
> (As a matter of note, I'd like to encourage people to criticise our
> current documentation offerings. Constructive criticism leads to
> improvement. I don't mind people advertising for contributors or
> discussing other documentation on the ubuntu-doc list either.)
>
> Thanks,
>
> Phil
>
> [1] - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-manual#Justification
> [2] - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-manual/TableOfContents
> [3] - https://help.ubuntu.com/9.10/index.html
>
> --
> Phil Bull
> https://launchpad.net/people/philbull
>
>
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