From: sandmann AT clio DOT rice DOT edu (Charles Sandmann)
Message-Id: <9605061337.AA11458@clio.rice.edu>
Subject: Re: [rms AT gnu DOT ai DOT mit DOT edu: Re: [david AT thermoteknix DOT co DOT uk: RE: gcc/as/ld, COFF and embedding]]
To: dj AT delorie DOT com (DJ Delorie)
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 08:37:40 -0600 (CDT)
Cc: djgpp-workers AT delorie DOT com
In-Reply-To: <199605060120.VAA08949@delorie.com> from "DJ Delorie" at May 5, 96 09:20:36 pm
Content-Type: text
Content-Length: 1837      

> Background: someone installed djgpp, had problems, sent e-mail to rms.
> RMS thinks that the bug reporting mechanism isn't obvious enough.
> 
> Comments?  Yes, I know a big chunk of the conversation is missing.
> I'm just interested in RMS's comment about the README files.

I just watched over the shoulder of a non-savy user which I told to go look
around and see what is needed to install.  Comments:

1) 00README describes the V1 and V2 directories, but doesn't say anything
   about why there are multiple directories.  Which to get?  The user started
   looking in the V1 directories (they are listed first, etc).

2) FAQ at the top level contains some critical information, but isn't 
   mentioned at all in the 00README.  When I pointed it out, the newbie
   didn't even know what FAQ was.  He suggested the text from FAQ be put 
   inside 00README at the top level (why get two files?)

3) The first impression of the user (after skimming and ignoring the 
   micro-FAQ) was to go to v2 and download those zips.  I asked about getting
   and reading "readme.1st" and he assumed it would be similar/identical
   to the 00README.  At that point, once again, the comment was why he 
   needed a THIRD file to download to know what to do, how about just 
   putting this in 00README ?

4) After reading readme.1st, the files to install is in the middle of a
   paragraph in the middle of the document.  The user felt a minimum install
   list should be the first thing in the document, and also felt it was a
   bad idea to spread the files required over multiple directories.  He
   likes to mget, instead of hand typing lots of names.  Oh, he would also
   have liked to have an install.bat to unzip the things, and suggested 
   it could check to see if any were missing.

That's my 10 minute install research for the week :-)