Re: The problems in comp.lang.c

"Jeff P. Bailey" wrote:

Dear everyone

Ok. I feel invited to respond...

I've been lurking in this group for a few weeks now. Originally I had a
question to ask (about atomic/threadsafe operations in C), and I wanted
to get the feel of the newsgroup first. In fact I've got to know it well
enough that I realize there's no point in even asking my question, which
would be vilified as "off topic".

I don't think there'd be cause for vilification unless you
insisted on disregarding the newsgroup's long established
topicality norm - the C programming language as defined by one or
more of the published standards.

I would expect that someone familiar with those standards would
inform you that none of those language standards addresses
multi-threading or multi-tasking, and that your question could
only be meaningfully answered in the context of a particular
environment and a particular library which exist outside the
scope of all of the published C language standards.

I would also expect that you would have included enough
information about the intended environment(s) to allow
respondents to suggest newsgroups where you might get answers
from the people best qualified to provide useful answers for
those environments.

Vilification might rightly follow if you declared that you didn't
give a hoot about the established norms and intended to subject
the entire group to the rules that /you/ wanted - or if you
established a pattern of behavior essentially equivalent to that
declaration.

From what I have observed, this group has big problems. There are some
positive posters here (I'd especially like to thank jacob navia for his
very interesting and useful long posts on stacks and debuggers), but
there seem to be many many more people here who post only to be
negative.

Jacob certainly has the capability to contribute in a worthwhile
way to the newsgroup. He's also demonstrated both the capability
and willingness to disregard the group's topicality norm in order
to serve his own personal interests. While you may not find that
objectionable, it imposes an avoidable (and therefore
unreasonable) burden on those relatively few people who give
freely of their time, efforts, and expertise just to answer the
substantial volume of on-topic queries.

Stacks and debuggers are topics completely outside the scope of
the C language as specified in the standard(s). There's hardly
any doubt that these are topics of interest to C programmers -
but that does not those subjects topical here.

The main example seems to be Richard Heathfield - I don't know what the
history of it is, but he obviously has a deep personal hatred of jacob
navia, and this dominates his posting. Most of his insults are pretty
puerile, but this constant negativity really seems to bring down the
atmosphere.

I been reading Richard's articles here for years - long enough to
know something of the person. FWIW, I don't think he's foolish
enough to waste his time and energy hating anyone as harmless to
him as C programmers. He doesn't walk on water, but he has earned
the respect of the best C programmers around. If I needed to
assemble a "dream team" for a vitally important software project,
he'd be on my short list. FWIW, I once did compile such a list
and only two of more than two dozen people weren't CLC regulars.
No one here needs your (or my) approval - it's sufficent that
they're tops at what they do.

Then there are lots of other people with a bizarre view of what
is "on topic" and "off topic", where fundamental concepts of C are (for
their own completely arbitrary reasons) verboten in this group. This
stupidity will drive away ordinary C programmers who might want to share
their knowledge and experience!

Agreed - the number of people who pop into a newsgroup and think
that having a usenet connection entitles them to impose their
personal/arbitrary views on those already present is truly
amazing.

One of the most common errors of newcomers is in believing their
(perhaps long) experience in using C badly qualifies them to
instruct others in how to use the language well.

I wish people would see what a useful resource this group could be if it
weren't for a noisy minority of morons who spoil it for everyone else
with their negativity and aggression towards other views.

My experience has been that those who prefer name-calling to
quoting the standard(s) or posting standard-compliant code have
been the greatest obstacle to the group's ability to provide
honestly interested individuals with expert technical/learning
assistance.

Thanks, by the way, for taking the time to lurk and for giving me
the opportunity to welcome you and to help you better understand
the nature of the group. A less mature newcomer would probably
have been less willing to attempt understanding.

--
Morris Dovey
DeSoto Solar
DeSoto, Iowa USA
http://www.iedu.com/DeSoto/
.

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