Does Ubuntu Care About It's Documentation?

[Robert Stoffers]

Matthew East wrote:
> On Tue, 2006-03-14 at 18:55 +1000, Robert Stoffers wrote:
>> Matthew East wrote:
>>> Robert Stoffers <rstoffers <at> gmail.com> writes:
>>>
>>>> Ok, so I thought I'd start blogging about Ubuntu.. to kick it off:
>>>>
>>>> Does Ubuntu Care About It’s Documentation?
>>> The answer to this is quite obviously yes, for a number of reasons.
>>>
> 
>> Take a step back for a minute and 
>> look at the situation from the users stand point. Very rarely do the 
>> users that Ubuntu targets (newer users) read on board documentation, 
>> they have learnt from their Windows using days that the on-board 
>> documentation is quite useless (despite Ubuntu having good docs). The 
>> same users then type ubuntu.com into their web browser and still don't 
>> have any kind of direct link to the documentation, buried on the support 
>> page is not helping anyone.
> 
> You've already stated your opinion about the top level link as opposed
> to a second level link. The simple point I am making is that even if
> you're right (and I don't agree) there is a long logical jump from that
> opinion to the idea that Ubuntu doesn't care about documentation. It's
> an impossible jump.
>  

Matt,

The documentation needs to be two things:

1. Easily accessible within the project (it is via Yelp).
2. Easily found on the web site.

Currently point number 2 above is not true, burying the link down in the 
support page is certainly giving the impression to most average users 
that Ubuntu doesn't care about its documentation (or at least doesn't 
regard it up to scratch). I am well aware of all the behind the scenes 
action that does happen in regard to documentation, to then bury this 
down to three clicks on the web site is an absolute shame and waste.

The wiki has a direct link on the web site as the administrators 
obviously regard some kind of documentation important. Originally only 
the wiki did exist, now that there is a proper project producing good 
quality documentation this link needs to be replaced with a link that 
covers both.

 > No, but when you write an article with that sort of title, and say on
 > your website that you are part of the doc team, the onus is on you to
 > say that this isn't the view of the people who actually work on the
 > docs, in my opinion.

I'm not going to get bogged down in this argument with you, it's 
irrelevant to the topic at hand. Anyone with some common sense can 
clearly see this is my opinion and meant as constructive criticism, 
nothing more.


Robert Stoffers