After an evaluation, GNOME has moved from Bugzilla to GitLab. Learn more about GitLab.
No new issues can be reported in GNOME Bugzilla anymore.
To report an issue in a GNOME project, go to GNOME GitLab.
Do not go to GNOME Gitlab for: Bluefish, Doxygen, GnuCash, GStreamer, java-gnome, LDTP, NetworkManager, Tomboy.
Bug 98394 - The GIMP needs a new FAQ
The GIMP needs a new FAQ
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Product: gimp-web
Classification: Infrastructure
Component: www.gimp.org
unspecified
Other All
: Normal enhancement
: ---
Assigned To: Carol
The GIMP web bugs mail alias
: 561104 (view as bug list)
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
 
Reported: 2002-11-13 14:43 UTC by Dave Neary
Modified: 2015-11-24 00:09 UTC
See Also:
GNOME target: ---
GNOME version: ---



Description Dave Neary 2002-11-13 14:43:17 UTC
The old FAQ hasn't been updated since 1999. Even then it was getting a bit
crufty. There has been no FAQ for 1.2 at all. 

Carol, edsapir and I were talking about what is needed to get a FAQ on
#gimp.  I think that some kind of chapter-based scheme (similar to the
comp.lang.c FAQ at http://www.eskimo.com/~scs/C-faq/top.html) is good, and
edsapair suggested wiki (http://c2.com/cgi/wiki) as an approach.

The most important thing, though, is to have FAQs and answers grouped in
one place. Chapter divisions, maintainership, etc will sort themselves out
once the FAQ is in place, IMHO. But to get a FAQ in place, we need some
ideas on things like submission criteria, we need a forum for proposed
answers, and we need someone (or a group of someones) to assimilate all
that information into one document.

Cheers,
Dave.
Comment 1 Raphaël Quinet 2002-11-14 13:10:48 UTC
I agree that the GIMP would need a new FAQ.  The current ones (User
and Developer FAQs) are outdated and do not give the correct
information in many cases.  However, there are a few important points
that I would like to stress:
- The first virtue of a FAQ is to be short and concise.  If it is too
  long, then the users will have a hard time finding an answer to
  their questions (or in other words, finding the questions in the FAQ
  that are as close as possible to their own questions).
- The FAQ should not repeat the tips of the day.
- The FAQ should not be a substitute for the online help.  If some
  questions come up because the help pages are not addressing a
  problem correctly, then it is better to spend some time improving
  the help pages instead of working around it and adding this to the
  FAQ.
- The FAQ should answer real questions from the users.  The questions
  that are never asked by the users do not need to be in the FAQ (we
  can make exceptions for "what is the GIMP?" and "where can I get
  the GIMP?").

I think that it would be better to host the FAQ on www.gimp.org if
possible.
Comment 2 Nathan Summers 2002-11-16 21:09:59 UTC
I created a much modified version of the current user faq, including 
updated answers, removal of obsolete questions, and several new 
FAQ's. Unfortunately, at the bottom of the documentation, I noticed 
that the license on the GIMP User FAQ doesn't allow modification. :(  

If we can't get a hold of Miles O'Neil, we'll have to do a clean room 
reimplementation of the FAQ.  This time, let's use the GNU FDL as the 
license for the FAQ.

My experience with using wikis and FAQ-O-Matics is that the quality 
of answers varies dramatically, and that there are always many more 
questions than answers. Of course, we could have a designated FAQ 
maintainer to look over the answers and make sure they are complete 
and high quality, but if that is the case, it would be about as much 
work as a conventially maintained FAQ.
Comment 3 Raphaël Quinet 2002-11-17 12:11:14 UTC
Yes, we should try to contact Miles and get his permission.

I am not too fond of the Wiki idea.  I'd rather have a document that
is under CVS control (like all other pages on www.gimp.org) and one
maintainer who takes care of this (and other web editors who could
fix some problems while the maintainer is away).
Comment 4 Tino Schwarze 2003-07-24 10:09:33 UTC
Wikis are often CVS or RCS-backed. (For example, TWiki is).
Comment 5 Dave Neary 2003-11-25 13:09:00 UTC
This was discussed at camp, but got lost in the ether afterwards.

We need a maintainer for a FAQ, and no-one has volunteered yet.

Changing milestone to Future.

Dave. 
Comment 6 Henrik Brix Andersen 2003-11-25 13:22:38 UTC
I would like to maintain a GIMP FAQ as also stated at camp - but
seeing that a site people spent a lot of time is still waiting to
replace www.gimp.org is not exactly encouraging.
Comment 7 Raphaël Quinet 2003-11-25 14:24:54 UTC
I can also help for the FAQ.  Some time ago, I collected some of the
questions that were posted frequently in comp.graphics.apps.gimp.  I
hope that I can still find that list somewhere.  ;-)

Regarding the web site, I agree that it is not very encouraging.
As far as I know, everybody on the team has decided to stop working on
the site until it is moved, so we are all waiting for this to happen
before making further improvements.  I have just opened a separate bug
report about this (bug #127895) because this is also preventing us
from getting new people on board (like the mailing lists).
Comment 8 Sven Neumann 2003-11-25 17:37:06 UTC
A FAQ would indeed be nice but it doesn't block the 2.0 release, so
there's no point in having the report on the 2.0 release milestone.
Comment 9 Dave Neary 2004-01-04 11:47:21 UTC
Changing all www.gimp.org bugs from gimp product to the gimp-web product,
including old closed/fixed bugs, and reassigning.
Comment 10 Henrik Brix Andersen 2004-03-08 22:23:43 UTC
FYI: A new developers FAQ is taking shape at
http://developer.gimp.org/faq.html
Comment 11 Michael Schumacher 2005-08-03 17:53:11 UTC
There has been some effort to establish a FAQ in the wiki, but it seems to be
abandoned - but since it is a wiki, anyone could contribute...

http://wiki.gimp.org/gimp/UserFaq
Comment 12 Michael Schumacher 2009-06-24 11:11:06 UTC
*** Bug 561104 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 13 Michael Schumacher 2015-11-24 00:09:39 UTC
http://www.gimp.org/docs/userfaq.html has been rewritten - I'm solving this as fixed, issues with the current content should be filed as new bugs.