how to write a tutorial

[Brian van den Broek]

Terry Reedy said unto the world upon 2005-01-26 14:08:
> Xah the arrogant wrote, among other things,

<SNIP>

> However, there are several errors in the above that would mislead a Python 
> learner.  I advise any such to ignore Xah's writings.
> 
> Terry J. Reedy

Hi all,

here's a thought:

There isn't any doubt that these 'tutorials' are generally unwelcome 
and unhelpful. Numerous people have kindly taken the time to flag some 
of the problems. So much so that any competent google of the archives 
would quickly reveal the group consensus on their instructional merit.

I submit that continued corrections and advice of this sort are 
counter-productive. I understand the good intentions behind the 
corrections. (Indeed, my own level of Python-fu is such that it is 
possible that I might have been mislead the 'tutorials' without these 
corrections; I thus appreciate the correctors' efforts.) But, such 
corrections are troll-food and make it unlikely that the 'game' of 
posting such tutorials will soon loose its magical power to amuse the 
OP. They all but ensure that there will be more such 'tutorials' to 
correct.

Could we try to ignore them in the hopes that without the light of 
attention they will wither, meanwhile trusting the many extant reviews 
and google to do their work?

(In case it isn't obvious: none of this is intended as a criticism of 
Terry or any of the others who have been 'fighting the good fight'; I 
just think a change of strategy might be in order.)

Best to all

Brian vdB