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Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 11:01:25 -0800
From: Andrew Sharp <andy.sharp@onstor.com>
To: Jonathan Goldick <jonathan.goldick@onstor.com>
Subject: Re: tuxrx document
Message-ID: <20090114110125.4f37a193@ripper.onstor.net>
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On Tue, 13 Jan 2009 19:16:37 -0800 Jonathan Goldick
<jonathan.goldick@onstor.com> wrote:

> I try to start with logical arguments just as I did with MS Project.
> When it gets religious, as every Microsoft tool seems to be, I
> consider the rank argument the last resort against that religion.  I
> know you hate Microsoft and are happy to swim upstream but once in a
> while it would be refreshing if you first considered how your
> alternative impacts the rest of us, rather than forcing me to make
> arguments you find acceptably compelling.

Funny, that's exactly what I was going to say about you.  I don't hate
Microsoft and it isn't religion for me, but it seems to be for you.  I
realize quite well that you tell yourself, and anyone else dumb enough
to listen, that I hate Microsoft and so anything I think or say on
the subject can be discounted.  It's a comfortable excuse when you
need to allay your self doubt that stems from only knowing Microsoft
(when it comes to application software).  What bothered me about this
incident is that we already had this conversation and I was prepared to
deliver a .doc file and didn't really understand why you were
fish-slapping me with it again.

What is religion for me is wasting money, and/or being in a situation
where we are forced to write checks regardless of whether or not we
want to. For example, I would have proposed the whole company switching
over to Google documents, but from what I can tell about their cost
model, it would just be switching one slave master for another, albeit
for 1/20 of the cost, but also for only 25% of the functionality,
except for their obviously superior collaberative capabilities.  And
making a change like that would involve some pain and it would really,
really have to be worth it, and it just isn't.  We would be just as
beholden to them as we are to Office right now.

> Didn't you wonder why no one else wrote any feedback on TuxRX?  Did
> you really think it was because the first draft was without flaw or
> that going your own way without regard to how we did all the other
> documents had an impact?

That's also quite funny.

Other people did give me feedback.

I think it's quite a stretch, possible an injurious one, to try and
claim that the file format had anything to do with lack of huge feedback
response. The fact that you could somehow manage it is proof enough of
that.  For one thing, our headcount is below critical mass; for another,
it's a complex undertaking that not everyone is affected by or has a lot
of insight into; very little development is done on the TXRX these days,
so there aren't that many interested parties.  The truth is that the
Chief Architect is the number one reviewer, for obvious reasons.  Hell,
I didn't get any feedback from Brian or Bill when I sent it to them for
prerelease review.  They both claimed to have read it, apparently they
just had nothing to say.  Maybe the document is so massively flawed and
full of gaping holes that people are stunned into silence, I don't know.

> Not being able to edit a doc file and add comments in a changed
> tracking form, like we did for all of the other function reviews, has
> an impact.  Not being able to easily see the differences between
> revisions of a document has an impact.  Note that by easily I mean
> how the team does its work, not how they can be trained to log into
> Linux and run a tool that they had previously never tried.  Consider
> the level of written feedback on even the minor functional specs in
> the last couple of months and then the absence of review comments on
> your document.  

This is fine, perhaps a bit repetative.  And feedback on minor specs is
a lot easier than ones like this, so the amount of feedback is right in
line with my expectations.  The things you mention in the first part
of this paragraph, while not exactly bulldozers, are legitimate
requirements being requested by Mr. Title, and therefore are valid.
Which is why I believe I said would provide a Word document the first
time we had this conversation sometime last week.

> This is an important project, one on which two senior engineers are
> engaged in full time, and I personally believe that getting active
> participation from others will greatly reduce the surprise factor of
> something you didn't think of.  I would hope that getting that
> feedback would be a priority to you, not a pointless exercise in
> document writing that you consider some hoop I make the team jump
> through.

Please don't presume to tell me what I think, especially when you are
making up nonsense.  I've made it a point to tell you in no uncertain
terms, on multiple occassions, that I believe it's important to do this
document and get it out into the minds of folks, for the reasons you
state and for others. 

> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Andy Sharp 
> Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 3:21 PM
> To: Jonathan Goldick
> Subject: tuxrx document
> 
> Jon,
> 
> Couple of things.  One, I only discovered after I sent the first draft
> out that there was some kind of mistake that caused what should have
> been the first two pages to be broken up into something like 5 pages.
> That's been fixed.  Also, the table of contents works as you require:
> you should be able to click on the individual items and be taken to
> that page.  It works that way on xpdf 3.01 on Linux from 2005, and it
> works on whatever strange PDF reader that comes on the Mac.  I think
> the 6 pages of unnecessary clutter up front made it annoying to get to
> where you wanted -- hopefully that's been alleviated somewhat.
> 
> As for your other requirement, world editable, I will get you what you
> need. If that means I have to export it to Word, then that's what I'll
> do.  As you know, I would prefer some kind of open platform solution,
> but if there isn't one that is acceptable then there isn't.  The
> quality of the exported word document from this software isn't all
> that reliable, which is one of the reasons that I would generally try
> not to go there.
> 
> As for pulling rank, as you are well aware, when it comes to me, I
> would normally prefer a logical, technical, business or marketing
> reason over "do as I command."  I trust that doesn't bother you too
> much.  I'm sure you understand and possibly you feel the same way
> yourself on occassion.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> a
