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Re: Poll: personal convenience vs. global improvement of docs



On Wed, May 24, 2006 at 09:28:02PM +0200, Rado S wrote:
> Moin moin fellows,
> 
> we need your vote to learn whether _you_ (personally, individually)
> are willing to accept
>       a major (single) change of your personal muttrc
> in favour of improved docs support for newbies by introducing
>       a muttrc variables naming scheme.

This change should be introduced.

The variable names in Mutt's configuration language should be cleaned
up and organized into logical components.  Please note, we are not
talking about renaming COMMANDS (though a few of those probably also
should be renamed), nor are we talking about changing syntax.  We are
only talking about reorganizing the names of configuration VARIABLES,
most of which you will only ever set once.

  - Doing so makes the interface cleaner and more consistent.  This
    should be obvious.

  - Organizing the variable names into logical groups makes them
    easier to remember.  This is a fact which is well understood by
    psychologists, and is easy enough to prove to yourself:

      Generate a random 28-digit number, and try to remember all the
      digits.  For all but the most exceptional among us, this task is
      extremely difficult.

      Now, break that number into 7 4-digit numbers.  Try to memorize
      those...  You'll find it's much, much easier.  Organizing the
      variables into logical groups works in much the same way.

   - This change makes it much easier to reorganize the documentation
     into sections which mirror the organization of the variable
     names.  Or think of it the other way:  The documentation
     desperately needs to be reorganized into sections based on
     various mail-related tasks.  Organizing the variable names
     according to those sections makes the documentation flow better,
     and again makes it easier for the user to remember the names.

Opposition to such a change has thusfar fallen into 3 categories:

1.  It can't be done.

    That's clearly false.  Renaming variables is a 1 to 1 operation;
    for each old variable name there will be exactly one new variable
    name, which may or may not actually change.

    A conversion tool can be written to convert all old variable names
    to their new names, and can serve the secondary purpose of easily
    identifying the new name of any old variable.  The tool should be
    able to correctly identify and convert any instances of old
    variable names in any text file (and therefore any standard
    .muttrc including any files which it includes which are not
    programs or scripts).  It should also be able to do the same for
    any scripts where the variable name is not programatically
    generated.

    The tool can't be perfect; there is a small risk of false
    positives, but the naming scheme of mutt's variables and the
    syntax of muttrc files should and do minimize that risk.  It also
    can not correctly fix variable names which THE NAMES THEMSELVES
    are generated by macros or programatically.  Such cases should be
    extremely minimal, and should not warrant serious consideration.

    Thus, logically speaking, this is not a basis for opposition.


2.  It's too much effort.

    For the typical end user, there will be no effort.  Mutt should be
    able to detect old configs, and automatically convert them using
    the afformentioned conversion tool.

    For the developers, there will be some effort, but (unless I
    misunderstand) Rado S. is volunteering to do that work.  For
    everyone but Rado then, there is virtually no effort involved.

    Even if there were some non-trivial effort required on the part of
    users to convert their existing configs, this is a one-time
    operation, and user laziness should not be allowed to hinder the
    improvement of Mutt, so the developers should discount such
    opposition when making their considerations.  However, in the
    overwhelming majority of cases, no such effort will be required.

    Thus this also is not a basis for opposition.

3.  There is no benefit, or too little benefit.

    I have already outlined the benefits.  To those who care about
    those issues, there is benefit.  Most users will not notice the
    benefit, but they will nonetheless benefit from having a cleaner,
    more consistent interface.

    To those who do not care about these issues, there may be little
    or no benefit.  However, since there will be no effort (or very
    little effort, in the worst-case scenario) required to convert,
    there is also essentially no downside for those users.

    Thus this also is not a basis for opposition.

In conclusion, this change will make Mutt better, and will benefit its
users even if they don't perceive such a benefit.  There is no
downside, and no logical basis for opposition.  Therefore the change
should be made.

-- 
Derek D. Martin    http://www.pizzashack.org/   GPG Key ID: 0xDFBEAD02
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