From: Christian Neukirchen Date: 2006-03-08T03:01:58+09:00 Subject: Re: No documentation for modules on RubyForge? ara.t.howard@noaa.gov writes: > i release my code because i hope people will find it useful. often i'll > release something as soon as it's reusable and discover noboby finds it > interesting! other times i release something and quite a few people find it > helpful. they send bug reports, patches, and even docs to contribute. the > reality is that i __cannot__ spend the time to maintain encylopedic docs for > each project i release. i've found that a simple README and some samples will > suffice for 80% of the ruby developers out there. if a project is really > useful my hope is that those developers can answer questions for the other > 20%, or, even better contribute to doccumenting the project. i don't even > bother with rdoc any more. know why? because if developers can't read your > code and figure out what's happening - they shouldn't be using it. especially > with a language as concise as ruby. the same doesn't hold for how it's > expected to be used - so i make a concession by writing a README and some good > samples. but, again, that's simply the most i have time for - it's very time > consuming to release code - with or without documentation. [...] > i, for one, have absolutely no need to make ruby live up to any hype. why > should anyone? ruby helps me get my job done more quickly and more enjoyably. > i contribute back to the community because the community has helped me many > times. i'm certainly not selling my software and neither is matz - there > really isn't that much to be gained by making it live up to anything other > than what it is. Two words: Thank you! -- Christian Neukirchen http://chneukirchen.org