3 ms·

To compare and contrast, when I was trying to get wifi up and working on my UltraSparc laptop, I read the OpenBSD man page for ipconfig. While very long, it go

To compare and contrast, when I was trying to get wifi up and working on my UltraSparc laptop, I read the OpenBSD man page for ipconfig. While very long, it got me up and running in short order. No Google required. On the Linux side, there was a Linux utility mentioned on HN and it was broadly praised. So one "pamac install" later, I was reading its man page. I had to resort to Google because I couldn't even tell what the program was supposed to do from its own manual.

jbverschoor 4y ago
Well this is my experience with almost all software.. except with Ruby on Rails. In the good 'ole days, I'd work completely offline, using only the documentation provided by Microsoft in Visual Studio. It was complete, correct, and had samples. No distractions, not googling, and no HN out of the blue!
- HeckFeck 4y ago
  Hah, and now the Windows help just opens a bing search results page in your browser. It is like they've fully capitulated. I find opening the browser to a search engine is very condescending; if I wanted to do that I very well could. Always look for adequate docs before adopting any library into a project. It is a lesson you need taught only once.
  - hulitu 4y ago
    Windows help was always bad. You could not find anything in it. And now they made the logical step: they made it worse. I think it follows the UI guidelines.
    - smhenderson 4y ago
      But the gpp wasn't talking about Windows help. He said documentation and Visual Studio; I presume he's talking about the MSDN CDROM that came with a VS installation. You could optionally access the docs from the CD or install it to your hard drive for speedier access. And it was quite good. You could learn just about everything you needed to work from it, offline and from one source. There are many things I did not like about Microsoft back then but their developer ecosystem was not one of them. Tools were expensive and closed but quite complete and well put together. Until I learned about open source and free software I considered MSDN to be the pinnacle of how software development should be. These days it just feels like MS can't decide between free or prosperity and so can't seem to get either one right.
- pdntspa 4y ago
  Samples, sure, but they were written in weird Microsoft style and made very little sense to a young me Also, another H/T for Rails docs, they are very good... but far from comprehensive

jbverschoor 4y ago

Well this is my experience with almost all software.. except with Ruby on Rails. In the good 'ole days, I'd work completely offline, using only the documentation provided by Microsoft in Visual Studio. It was complete, correct, and had samples. No distractions, not googling, and no HN out of the blue!

HeckFeck 4y ago
Hah, and now the Windows help just opens a bing search results page in your browser. It is like they've fully capitulated. I find opening the browser to a search engine is very condescending; if I wanted to do that I very well could. Always look for adequate docs before adopting any library into a project. It is a lesson you need taught only once.
- hulitu 4y ago
  Windows help was always bad. You could not find anything in it. And now they made the logical step: they made it worse. I think it follows the UI guidelines.
  - smhenderson 4y ago
    But the gpp wasn't talking about Windows help. He said documentation and Visual Studio; I presume he's talking about the MSDN CDROM that came with a VS installation. You could optionally access the docs from the CD or install it to your hard drive for speedier access. And it was quite good. You could learn just about everything you needed to work from it, offline and from one source. There are many things I did not like about Microsoft back then but their developer ecosystem was not one of them. Tools were expensive and closed but quite complete and well put together. Until I learned about open source and free software I considered MSDN to be the pinnacle of how software development should be. These days it just feels like MS can't decide between free or prosperity and so can't seem to get either one right.
pdntspa 4y ago
Samples, sure, but they were written in weird Microsoft style and made very little sense to a young me Also, another H/T for Rails docs, they are very good... but far from comprehensive