On Fri, 30 Sep 2005, OpenMacNews wrote:
> much info is already tabulated in convenient form ... why not this? posing
> possible answers to my own/this question:
>
> (1) it's too complicated / too hard / impossible / ...
... the information for many variables is too big to fit into a table.
> this all simply begs the question, for WHOM are docs (to be) written?
The reference manual is a reference manual. There are some (a few)
people who actually read reference manuals from cover to cover to learn
about some piece of software. However, for the majority, a reference
manual is where you go to look up something in detail, having learned
about its existence from somewhere else. Therefore, the information in a
reference manual should be ordered and indeed indexed so that it is easy
to find rather than in an order for sequential reading.
Originally there was only a reference manual. I wrote Exim and its
manual for experienced email sysadmins, who would know about Unix and
email, and be deliberately choosing to switch from Sendmail to Exim.
Then Debian upset the applecart :-) by giving Exim to first-time, new
users. One consequence of that was that I tried to write something more
introductory, namely, the book.
> at the end of the day, a slightly-more-than-newbie-and-far-from-expert user
> couldn't find the 'obvious/apparent' enaswer that was 'in there'.
I do take note of comments and try to improve the docs that I maintain.
However, I don't have time to write load of intros, howtos, etc. And
indeed, I am the wrong person to do that. I know too much. :-)
> > Philip, can you please index the individual variable
> > definitions in Chapter 11.9 in the 5.60 docs?
>
> this too, would help! =)
One reason for supplying doc/spec.txt with Exim is to enable you to
search it with your favourite text editor. Then when I don't index
things the way you would like, you can still find them. Even if you then
go away and read the details in a printed version.
--
Philip Hazel University of Cambridge Computing Service,
ph10@??? Cambridge, England. Phone: +44 1223 334714.
Get the Exim 4 book: http://www.uit.co.uk/exim-book
