Jan Zerebecki, I'd be happy to help, but how? I could develop some guidelines and rules for admins to follow, but then what? How would they be enforced? I have no authority to put such things in place. Its not the writing rules that's hard, its the enforcing them. Here: i'll write them now: Either participate politely or don't participate at all Break up flamewars, don't start them.
James Keane, "oh well" is a valid answer to my question that would have solved my problem? I think you're getting mixed up between caretto and I. "He is not our employee we can not reprimand him for his actions and neither can you." There needs to be some kind of structure, though. Presumably, unless he's the project leader, there's someone who can take away his admin privileges. There should be guidelines for how admins behave, and admins who don't behave according to said guidelines should have their admin privileges suspended or removed.
Abel Chiaro, he said "I don't f*** care where you download the file to caretto, not me.
Tom Wickline, I am Pie-rate, not carretto. I still don't agree with how he handled carretto. Maybe the community should try appointing admins based on people skills, not coding skills?
The problem here is I asked a question in a help channel, not to him specifically, but he answered it just to state that he doesn't care. He then banned me for voicing concern over whether he should be doing such things.
Juan, I think I sent my previous message to you instead of the list. Sorry for sending it to you twice. Ok, no one really got the message here. I guess it really wasn't clear, and that's my fault. I am Pie-rate. The comment about windows was probably offtopic, but its not nearly as ridiculous as vitamin cussing out both caretto and I, and banning me for voicing concern over the fact that an admin is doing such things. vitamin: carretto, I do not f*** care where you download the file. vitamin: Pie-rate, STFU if you have nothing to say Ok, the swearing is really not that bad. I don't really care if someone swears at me. What really gets me angry is that vitamin *banned* me for voicing a perfectly valid point, when vitamin answered a question with "oh well," without trying to help, and before anyone else tried to help. As I said, this would be rude if he was some random guy, but he's an admin. As I said before, this is like inviting someone to an installfest, and then spitting in their face and saying "STFU RTFM GO AWAY AND GOOGLE." All it does is makes people distance themselves from OSS as far as possible.
"This is an invitation to flame if ever I saw one, and if civility flies out the window, it begins here." No, civility flies out the window HERE: (09:44:34 PM) vitamin: Pie-rate, oh well and HERE: vitamin: carretto, I do not f*** care where you download
Civility is important to a degree in the freenode channels, but swearing like a sailor while banning people who complain about it is just ridiculous. As an admin, you should be helping politely or not helping at all, and breaking up flamewars, not starting them.
As for the fix to my problem, that's completely beside the point now.
I hope that clears some things up.
On 8/16/07, Juan Lang < juan.lang@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Jonathan, I'm changing forums here, as I don't agree that wine-devel is the appropriate place for it. I'm cc'ing vitamin, since he's being discussed.
I'm also breaking a rule against top-posting, since I want to state my position up front: I agree that civility is important. I also agree that vitamin sometimes lacks tact. So let's look at the post a little bit:
On 8/15/07, Jonathan Challinger mr.challinger@gmail.com wrote:
Below is a log of #winehq, from 9:44 to 10:09 on Wednesday August 15th: (09:43:50 PM) Pie-rate: my brother's girlfriend's WoW install is crashing (locking up, stops responding) randomly. she will install windows tomorrow if it doesn't get fixed. i don't like windows and i don't want to deal with it.
I'm sorry, but this bit about Windows is completely off-topic.
the message it crashes with is: (09:43:50 PM) Pie-rate: err:ntdll:RtlpWaitForCriticalSection section 0x509da8c "?" wait timed out in thread 0047, blocked by 003e, retrying (60 sec)
Okay, that's a real problem. Now we're getting somewhere, though it's hard to diagnose.
(09:43:50 PM) Pie-rate: this is with an install copied over from my computer, which i KNOW works flawlessly, and wine 0.9.41
Now we have a problem. Installing apps into Wine is the only supported configuration. Copying over installations isn't supported, and this is well documented (see the FAQ in the wiki: http://wiki.winehq.org/FAQ#head-3647fcb12328bf8f43d7cfce4d0dcbcee12c0541 )
I know this is no consolation, but we often see requests from people who don't follow the instructions, and that tries our patience. It's been said over and over again, but since not everyone is getting message, I'll say it again:
- Don't copy programs from a Windows install.
- Don't use winetools or ies4linux or anything else that installs a
bunch of Microsoft DLLs.
If you do, we can't (won't) help you, as the problem may or may not be with Wine.
(09:43:54 PM) carretto: vitamin: what? (09:44:10 PM) carretto: vitamin: _period? (09:44:15 PM) vitamin: <vitamin> carretto, you have to install the game on Wine
Vitamin makes this point again here. Since it has been well documented, I think he shows civility by not flaming about it.
(09:44:34 PM) vitamin: Pie-rate, oh well (09:44:43 PM) Pie-rate: vitamin: "oh well?" (09:44:46 PM) Pie-rate: vitamin: no magic fix? (09:44:55 PM) carretto: vitamin: wine <game install>? (09:45:11 PM) vitamin: carretto, something like that
Again, this seems civil to me. "Oh well" is not particularly clear, but Pie-rate (sorry, I can't tell who's who) clears it up just fine, I think.
(09:45:33 PM) otaku [n=otaku@c-24-15-187-230.hsd1.il.comcast.net ] entered the room. (09:46:53 PM) carretto: vitamin: wine: Call from 0x40136e to unimplemented function MFC42.DLL.6929, aborting (09:47:10 PM) vitamin: carretto, get the newer version of that dll (09:49:56 PM) carretto: vitamin: i donwload MFC42.dll on dll.files and past to wine system folder (09:50:04 PM) vitamin: carretto, get the newer version of that dll (09:50:14 PM) carretto: here i get the newer version? (09:50:21 PM) vitamin: from windows
Again, all perfectly civil, and correct. Since mfc42 is not part of Wine, an application calling into a missing function in it is a symptom of a problem with the installation, not with Wine.
(09:50:50 PM) carretto: vitamin: i download version v. 4.21.71 (09:51:32 PM) shingo2 [n=shingo@p5487EFF1.dip.t-dialin.net] entered the room. (09:52:27 PM) carretto: vitamin: where i get the new version? (09:54:48 PM) prgrmr [n=prgrmr@bzq-88-154-138-152.red.bezeqint.net] entered the room. (09:55:37 PM) _3 [n=lol@89-178-108-192.broadband.corbina.ru] entered the room. (09:57:20 PM) carretto: vitamin: can help me? (09:57:38 PM) vitamin: carretto, I already answered all your questions
Again, civil and true.
(09:57:50 PM) Pie-rate: vitamin: Read the topic. "End user/tech support channel for Wine." A derogatory-sounding "oh well" is nothing more than flamebait. Either say nothing, or help. That's what I try to do, and that's what's in the best interest of the project. I believe you are a channel admin, correct? Saying "oh well," without even trying to help is rude, but saying "oh well" without even trying to help, as a channel admin? That's like inviting people to an installfest, and then when they ask for help installing something saying "OH WELL" and spitting in their faces.
At this point, I think Pie-rate loses it. This is an invitation to flame if ever I saw one, and if civility flies out the window, it begins here.
Regarding whether Vitamin acts appropriately as a channel admin: there are two issues here. First, do channel admins have the responsibility to maintain civility? Second, do channel admins in #winehq have the responsibility to help people with wine?
In my opinion, the answer to the first is yes, channel admins do have that responsibility. If people are flaming, a channel admin can try to tone things down a bit before tempers flare. vitamin did an admirable job being patient, I think, if he lost his patience at the end. Frankly, I would have too.
The answer to the second question is a resounding no. In fact, I, a longtime Wine developer (and channel admin), am often less qualified to help people with their programs than other users are. I prefer to let the community help itself out, and when I do jump in irc - admittedly more and more seldom these days - I rarely have an answer before someone else does.
Basically, I think civility may have been lost a little bit in this exchange, but it didn't begin with vitamin. I also think your expectations for support are quite high!
Anyway, if you are Pie-rate, best of luck with your girlfriend's computer. Cheers, --Juan