Gandalf,
That was such an absolutely fantastic post that it deserves to be repeated with a full quote.
Quote:
On the subject of Documentation...
As I often said (and was finally proven out with the manual for the 3rd version of Dominions) waiting for the programmer to document is not the best idea. By the time a programmer (or mapper, or modder, scripter, etc) gets their love-child to work they tend to be beyond writing for a brand-new user. They dont think like a newbie and dont come up with newbie questions. And any answers tend to not be newbie answers. They are too deep into the subject. And we dont really WANT them to back out of that deep spot since they are hopefully thinking on the next version. (a very general stereotype of course and not true of every programmer)
The BEST documentation IMHO is when a new user, with abit of writing skill, takes good notes while they are learning the program. Write down the questions that came up and the answers you got. Translate the programmers short answers into new-user full english. Maybe even add charts and screenshots. Etc, etc, etc. Not only is it great for the community but its a nice way to thank a developer by offering them "just a quick little thing I did that you can use for documentation". Most of them will appreciate it.
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I know that I would appreciate someone taking something like that upon themselves.
Not that I am begging or anything.
(
Please, oh please won't somebody save me!!!)
...uh...I mean, well, yeah.
