Prescript:
1    I and, I'm sure, the vastly overwhelming majority of people here,
support James in his thankless (thanks James) task as a member of list admin
(thanks guys). Any input on the subject from me is not meant as criticism.

2.    This is not a democracy But we serfs can make our petitions known

_________________________________________

> The current posting ratio seems to be about 10 to 1 in favour of Olin.

I don't think "in favour of" would be quite the best term to use here :-).
While some have as good as said (now and latterly) that they think Olin's
being violently rude to people is a good thing, I think most are trying to
separate the rudeness from the possibility for redemption.


_________

> While Olin may not have been sufficiently diplomatic in his tirade, I
happen
> to agree with his assessment of the poster. It was a pretty stupid way to
> ask for help. By making his point as strongly as he did Olin may have
actually
> connected with the poster, and made others THINK about how they post.
>
> Olin's moodiness is well known on the list,

A point to note is that an Olin broadside has often been the first response
that a newcomer to the list has ever received. Several of these have been
people for whom English was very very clearly a second language, as was the
case in this instance. It's easy to drive such people away with such a first
response when they MAY prove to be valuable members of the community AND we
may prove to be a  valuable additions to their life.

I (only) suspect that the present poster is not a beginner, but is new to
PICs. His claim to be going to write high level tools MAY reflect
considerable other capabilities. His having built an 18Fxxx system  of some
sort (no matter how humble) and having been able top program it suggests
capability with hardware and familiarity with software. His "insuccesses"
and .IT address suggests an Italian with non-English grounding.

> and I think your unilateral
> deletion of his subscription was a bit hasty. A private reprimand would
have
> been more appropriate.

> May I suggest that you put it to a vote, since this list is supposedly for
> ALL of us. As you have pointed out, Olin's advice is generally excellent,
> but he is also human, and can make mistakes too (like responding to a post
> he could have more easily ignored).

2 (again).   This is not a democracy But we serfs can make our petitions
known

The chiefest problem I see with Olin is that he utterly insists on
criticising people who he could just ignore. He insists on spending time and
effort in abusing people for not wasting HIS time when he could leave them
to others to deal with. Jinx did a reasonable brisk but humorous job of
addressing the same points that Olin did. Others will certainly do similar
for any "stupid" questions.


> > No amount of excellent advice is worth being called an idiot.

> Except when the shoe fits?? Expecting help for a cryptic machine language
> listing?? How would YOU have responded if the poster had written you
> directly for help?

Not knowing the full circumstance we could be surprised: eg Just possibly
(just possibly) the poster is old and stuck in a techo time warp. He may
handle hex and machine code with aplomb but not at all enjoy wading into an
IDE. he may thrive in DOS but die in Windows. He may find the learning
curve  steep into new applications BUT utterly excel once he's got past the
entry level. I have a friend who meets most of this decryption (but doesn't
speak Italian). He writes in raw machine code or uses an assembler he has
written himself. He has written tomographic routines in assembler, turned a
Hillman Imp into a motorcycle, can fix anything mechanical electronic ever
built but wouldn't touch MPLAB with a barge pole until you had stuffed it
down his throat. Such people need cosseting until they reach the power
band, at which stage they are off and running and leave most others behind.
"No religion: may be one such. And may not be. But on his very first post we
can probably afford to give him the benefit of the doubt.




        RM

--
http://www.piclist.com hint: PICList Posts must start with ONE topic:
[PIC]:,[SX]:,[AVR]: ->uP ONLY! [EE]:,[OT]: ->Other [BUY]:,[AD]: ->Ads