debug wiki needs love

Hi All,

I thought this would be a good project for one (or more) of you
fantastic documentation oriented people. Our debug page is not nearly as
useful as it could be because it's written: (1) missing vital info; (2)
in a way that is targeted towards developers instead of towards users -
debugging often times isn't that hard and an "every day user" can do it
but the instructions aren't the clearest.

If someone is interested in starting, I suggest starting with dealing
with valgrind instructions, Norbert has been kind enough to say he'd
explain the process to anyone from documentation that is willing to
clean up the instructions. He can be found on the developer chat
(shm_get) or by email nthiebaud@gmail.com. Please don't waste his time
if you're not going to take a serious stab at trying to clean the wiki

One thing I've noticed is that there are several pages dealing with logs
- they should be consolidated to the best location (in my opinion QA not development) and linked appropriately:

https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/QA/BugReport/Debug_Information#GNU.2FLinux:How_to_get_a_Valgrind_log
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Development/How_to_debug#Valgrinding
.28memcheck.29_cppunit_tests
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Development/How_to_debug#Valgrinding_.28memcheck.29_LibreOffice_itself

etc....

I'm happy to talk about the scope of the clean up - feel free to ping me.

Thanks in advance.

Best,
Joel

Dear Mr. Madero:

Some days back I got tour message entitled "degug wiki needs love".

This problem is far more pervasive than just the wiki you mention, and I heartily agree that there is much need for User respect, which is the real underlying gremlin.

I have been told, originating from an anonymous source, close to silicon valley, that the root is economic.

Those, hidden in the background who largely finance the cost of technological development, do not want to have those they have to finance to do any more debugging and teaching than the minimum they are forced to do to maintain the market.

Albeit in silence, those who have to work in that arena hate this, but have no choice, they need their paychecks.

Close to the same would suggest its presence in the open source world.

Any large organization has big financial needs, non-profit groups are no exception.

Added to that, those who are working as volunteers in large organizations, do not want to work in an understaffed and overloaded environment.

Being volunteers, they can easily resign, or if they fear this type of situation, may never even volunteer.

But, if they are forced to do the same work for their own needs alone, it makes a lot of tacit pressure for them to join the developers or leave even the user group.

I see this as yet another case where "The explicitness is of the essence."

Now let every person have their say on the subject.

Best Regards,

Bruce Martin

Hi Bruce,

I'm undertaking this venture after the Thanksgiving holidays. I've already
talked to the requisite folks and have an ODF account, etc.

For the record, I worked for Amazon.com, and I know AWS is one of the most
transparent organizations with regards to their documentation, including
debugging instructions and API documentation for third-party developers.
Technical writers had their hand in that as much as the developers did.

And you don't get much more commercial than Amazon.com.

So I have very little idea of what you're talking about. My pals at
Google.com also have technical writers on staff for this sort of thing.

But then again, I'm not an anonymous source close to Silicon Valley, so
what do I know...

ReHi Ava & Joel:

Being in Canada, I had to think a sec re the remark about thanksgiving. Thanksgiving in Canada happens about a month earlier than in the U.S., this being historically climate related.

I am glad to see people taking an interest in the issue, as it is much bigger than just the debug wiki. I see this problem written into technical manuals all the time.

Generally I have an answer to it, when I have the time to dig into the details. The answer is a self-made .ODT template.

Since it is shareable, I am going to check it out for any possible unshareable content and attach it here.