[Distutils] [Python Language Summit] Distutils / Packaging survey

[Ben Finney]

Tarek Ziadé <ziade.tarek at gmail.com> writes:

> On Sat, Jan 31, 2009 at 12:32 AM, Ben Finney <ben+python at benfinney.id.au> wrote:
> > Given the inertia on both sides of this terminological schism, and
> > the fact that these concepts are not exactly things that an
> > outsider would even expect to have to learn new terms for, I don't
> > think it matters how prominent such a "Python packaging
> > terminology" web page is. No newcomer is going to be looking for
> > it, and IMO rightly so.
> 
> For the newcomers:
> 
> Well, between reading some thread where there is +100 mails and
> reading 4 lines of a definition for each word in a FAQ or
> Taxonomy...

I'm not sure what your point is with that paragraph; I presume you're
saying that a short online definition is quicker to read than a long
discussion thread.

If so, I've already addressed that: The online definition document
won't *be* read by the representative newcomer until it's already
caused them confusion, most likely in a long discussion thread. That's
because it won't even occur to most of them that Python would be
perverse enough to use these terms in a contradictory meaning to the
majority of the software world.

And, in my opinion, they're right to have that expectation. To think
otherwise is to blame the victim. From that, it follows that we can't
expect the newcomer to have any awareness that this terminological
issue even *exists* until it bites them.

-- 
 \     “I went to a fancy French restaurant called ‘Déjà Vu’. The head |
  `\                  waiter said, ‘Don't I know you?’” —Steven Wright |
_o__)                                                                  |
Ben Finney