[Scribus] Manual

[Christoph Schäfer]

Am Samstag, 20. Oktober 2007 19:00:14 schrieb william f.maddock:
> On Oct 20, 2007, at 10:47 AM, Gregory Pittman wrote:
> > William F. Maddock wrote:
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >>
> >>> From: Gregory Pittman <gpittman at iglou.com>
> >>> Sent: Oct 20, 2007 8:50 AM
> >>> To: scribus at nashi.altmuehlnet.de
> >>> Subject: Re: [Scribus] Manual
> >>>
> >>> jeff Weir wrote:
> >>>> Does anyone know of a PDF format manual for scribus that I could
> >>>> print
> >>>> out and carry with me?
> >>>
> >>> This is perhaps a paradox with Scribus, in that a project designed to
> >>> make PDFs does not have a manual in its own or in PDF format.
> >>
> >> Unfortunately, that is really not a satisfactory answer.
> >
> > This comes across as a rude and selfish reply.
>
> Actually not. What it is is pointed, and it is not selfish because I
> posted on behalf of someone other than myself. It is an attempt to get
> others to see the point of view of those who prefer printed manuals
> instead of treating their requests as though they don't really matter,
> which is how your reply to Jim came off to me, and how almost all of
> the previous replies by others on this matter have also come off. You
> accuse me of being rude when almost all of the replies regarding
> requests sent to this list for a printable manual have been approaching
> rude and have definitely been condescending. Two people have replied
> with links to printable resources. Everyone else has only spouted
> excuses as to why there aren't any. Those replies are not helpful. If a
> project as large and complicated as OpenOffice.org can have a printable
> manual (which it does:
> http://billsey-christian.net/tmp/ShotsOfOOoManual.JPG ; apparently done
> largely by one person), certainly scribus can also.

Actually it's not about finding excuses. The point is: people are working hard 
(and without being paid, I might add) to provide you the software and the 
documentation. For free. Their time is limited, and offering documentation on 
a Website or a Wiki is much easier than producing a PDF. However, the 
documentation is available under licenses that allow you to produce a PDF and 
even distribute it. That's what open source is about: if you're missing 
something, you are free to create it yourself. Open source is about 
participation, not just getting something for free (as in beer). You're 
actually complaining that others who work for free don't give you even more 
for free. And, yes, that's impolite and ungrateful.

If you want a printed manual, you can buy one (at least in my country). You 
can convert the available documentation into a printer friendly or write one 
yourself from scratch.

Finally, let me note that you can't compare Scribus to OO.o. OO.o is a huge 
project with many important companies involved and a much larger user base. 
Comparing both projects is simply unfair. And as I said above, if you don't 
like it as it is, you're free to contribute and to fix the issue. Actually 
that's what I'm doing. I'm writing a manual, and once it's finished, it will 
be available as PDF and as HTML for inclusion in the help browser. But you 
don't write a manual overnight.

Regards

Christoph