How do *you* see PM

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Re: How do you see PM by kvale (Monsignor) on Apr 03, 2004 at 00:40 UTC
FWIW, I would have considered that a reasonable question that provided good information and and pinpointed the problem, worthy of an informative response. I think this sort of situation highlights the need to give people the benefit of the doubt when they ask for help. Politeness is a virtue especially in anonymous online environments, and Perlmonks is mostly wonderful in this regard. -Mark	[reply]
Re: How do you see PM by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Apr 03, 2004 at 03:15 UTC
The replies I saw are very similar to what I would have posted. With regards to politeness ... I tend to fall into the merlyn/Abigail-II camp. I'll be polite the first time I come across your question, but I expect you to help yourself. If you reply back with something like I tried it and it failed! as the whole of your response or if you repeat the question with a minor variation the next day ... let's just say that my gloves aren't very padded at the best of times. I don't suffer fools gladly, as the saying goes. Perl is a language of hackers, and hackers expect other hackers to actually try. Most of us here have done everything but hack the source (and many have done that, too!). We have acquired our knowledge the old-fashioned way - we have earned it. It's my fish, damnit. Go get your own! I'll show you how, but the one I've got is still my fish. As for community ... PM is the only website I go to on a daily basis other than my news source of choice. I have friends here closer than some IRL. Heck, I even have a Go game going right now. :-) (It's on my scratchpad if anyone cares to look.) I understand I've kinda devolved into a rant somewhat unrelated to the OP, but I think it's related. Somehow. shrugs ------ We are the carpenters and bricklayers of the Information Age. Then there are Damian modules.... sigh* ... that's not about being less-lazy -- that's about being on some really good drugs -- you know, there is no spoon.* - flyingmoose	[reply]
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Re: How do you see PM by corenth (Monk) on Apr 03, 2004 at 01:52 UTC
aah! when i was reading the question i thought i was looking at someone very new to perl. as it turns out, his method of communication is just a bit more burdened with overhead. now, i think it's telling that the replies to that and most other posts i've seen have been fairly polite, if on occasion critical. I'm willing to bet that this has something to do with the size of the active perlmonks community. In my experience, a fairly small community, even one that definitely isn't traditional (online 'communities' are not traditional!), are naturally more polite and careful. That's not to say that we wouldn't be honest about criticisms, but that we'd be more patient with the other guy. Having this place where I recognize many of the names in the CB really makes a difference with how I'll interact and respond to other people here. Being sociable is important in a setting like this... even those of us who are gruff may tend to be a little more careful around people we expect to see again someday. Now, a question about perlmonks: Which do you feel is better, small community or large knowledge base? $state->{tired} = "true";	[reply]
Re: Re: How do you see PM by hardburn (Abbot) on Apr 05, 2004 at 14:05 UTC
Which do you feel is better, small community or large knowledge base? When online, I prefer a small community. Larger knowledge bases, in my experiance, tend to also increase the noise. See also: Slashdot and Kuro5hin, both of which were fine communities before they got really big. ---- `: () { :\|:& };:` Note: All code is untested, unless otherwise stated	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Re: Re: How do you see PM by corenth (Monk) on Apr 06, 2004 at 14:06 UTC
I agree with that :) when a community is too small, there's a real lack of diversity of ideas and veiws. when it's to large, there's a lack of social intimacy. i wonder what the critical mass for each is? any sociologist type guys out there? i wonder if a cellular automata's been made for simulating this kind of thing? grin interesting idea for a fun hack ^_^ $state->{tired} = "true";	[reply]
Re: How do you see PM by Abigail-II (Bishop) on Apr 03, 2004 at 10:00 UTC
Yes the poster is blind. Sometimes it is easy to forget that not everyone knows what the fine manual is The poster never said he doesn't know about the manual, and I would be surprised if he couldn't read the Perl manual, which is available in plain text and no-frills HTML. I've several close friends who are blind, and they would be able to read the manual. But indeed, sites using frames, and especially forms, can be hard to navigate. Abigail	[reply]
Re: How do you see PM by castaway (Parson) on Apr 03, 2004 at 08:47 UTC
I'm not quite sure what you're getting at. If I had answered the question, I would have probably done the obvious, as would anyone else. 1. Wonder where on earth the problem is, 2. Assume that the poster is newish to perl, and assume they hasnt installed the module, or had just copied it somewhere not in the library path. That the poster is blind seems irrelevant to me at that point. What would be more useful would be to know how knowledgable they are about perl, so would you suggest we all add a 'newbie, beginner, intermediate, knows all' to our signatures? Since we're not (all) psychic we have to assume some sort of common denominator, and quite frankly I cant see how blindness indicates an inability to consume the information in the manual. The problem is more finding where the manual is, which we've all had, at one point or another. (Completely irrelevant: Im somewhat disabled, my sister is also, and she has friends disabled, in wheelchairs without use of various limbs, yet they all chat on ICQ, and you wouldnt notice the difference) Last point that just occured to me.. I hope you're not equating physcial disability with mental disability here.. C.	[reply]
Re: How do you see PM by bilfurd (Hermit) on Apr 03, 2004 at 09:15 UTC
When someone new asks a fairly common question, we point them towards other nodes and/or the search functions. We often remind people asking questions to post their code. We are asking them to help us help them and helping them get the most out of the site. In this instance a question was asked and answered. rscott212 provided more detail that helped you help him. You provided additional information that (a) will help him get more out of the site, (b) has very rarely, if ever, been requested in a question node, and (c) would have been very difficult to research. We help each other. It's what we do. I have yet to see another community that does it so well. I actually thought a lot about this one driving home from work. When dealing with others, we learn to adjust our responses as necessary. We learn each other's "quirks" and change our behavior as necessary. This process takes longer in an on-line forum because we do not have all of the cues that allow us to identify which quirks to compensate for. The best we can do, whether asking or answering, is help.	[reply]
Re: How do you see PM by theorbtwo (Prior) on Apr 03, 2004 at 08:41 UTC
I fail to see what one has to do with the other. Disabled people tend to fail into two categories: those who will ask for lots of help (and use their disability to get it), and those who will not ask for lots of help, who want learn for themselves (disability or no). Now, read the paragraph above, skipping the bits in parenthesies. Is it any less true? If they said "hey, my screen-reader has problems on this site, can you do X", there would be replies telling them how to do X, or a patch implmementing it fairly quickly. OTOH, if they ask stupid questions, I'm going to respond to them the same way as if anybody else asked a similarly stupid question. Somebody's eye's being broken is no excuse for acting like their brain is broken... on either end. Warning: Unless otherwise stated, code is untested. Do not use without understanding. Code is posted in the hopes it is useful, but without warranty. All copyrights are relinquished into the public domain unless otherwise stated. I am not an angel. I am capable of error, and err on a fairly regular basis. If I made a mistake, please let me know (such as by replying to this node).	[reply]
Re: How do you see PM by Vennis (Pilgrim) on Apr 06, 2004 at 15:51 UTC
Without dropping too much out of topic i hope, i find it amazing blind people choose to program Perl. I respect it very much since i can't imagine how hard it must be to decrypt a challenging regular expression. Ofcourse, then again i guess i can't imagine how they experience a lot of things. Q: Why did the Perlmonk cross the road? A: He wanted to escape the match.	[reply]