Ugh I also find that really offputting. Worse still is it’s the same guy behind SourceHut. Now I need to think about whether I want to continue to use that since if I need help the last thing I want to hear is RTFM. I always do but that doesn’t mean I don’t miss things and need a pointer :(
To be frank, drew answered me RTFM once regarding one of my sway questions. I found the answer valid, because I couldn't find the manual before. As sad as it is, many projects do not ship a man page, which makes it very difficult to find documentation.
Sway has quality man pages, and I very rarely have to find someone else in a chat room or fire up the web browser to find answers. I can understand the devs' frustration: they spent a lot of time writing those up, so have people use them.
Give someone an answer, you'll help him for the day. Show him the man, you'll help him for life :)
I get it, but when I reach out for help, its because I wasn't able to figure it out myself and I likely put a significant (relatively speaking) amount of time into it. If its in the manual, it means I overlooked it and could really do with a pointer. If I'm just told RTFM, that leaves a very sour taste.
I understand that devs have to deal with a lot of "dumb" questions, but that doesn't mean they have to be rude. As someone else said, silence would actually be better in this case, but a better response would be something like "hey, that's in the manual, in the blah section" because its not rude, it affirms that it is, indeed, in the manual and gives me a pointer where. Even without the last bit, it would be better. Part of good support is to acknowledge that the person has a problem, even if you can't help. If you don't want to provide support for an open source project (as in the case of the linked issues) then don't respond or at least set up a replacement to turn RTFM into something a bit more human.
> I found the answer valid, because I couldn't find the manual before.
How did RTFM help you find the manual if you didn't find it before, aside from affirming that there is, indeed, a manual?
idk, those examples seem justified. The second one was someone ressurecting an old issue with a request for config information that was _in the issue_.
RTFM is sometimes a valid response, and if you're having an issue finding the documentation then that's a bug.
RTFM is never a valid response. At the very least you point the user to the specific section of the manual.
It's this philosophy that made the ubuntu support forums the most agreeable (and pretty much most popular), at least for a while. You can RTFM people, but then you show that you hate your users, and they will leave.
Not only the people asking, but also others reading it. Like this example shows very well. This bad comment not only made d0ugal search for a different project, but also made sure I won't use it, and worsened my opinion of the author considerably.
In my experience, "RTFM" is often a manifestation of the frustration that the person asking for help hasn't even begun to do the most basic thing to try and help themselves.
It's extremely wearing having to deal with people with a problem who have apparently put precisely zero effort into figuring the problem out on their own.
"RTFM" isn't always a useful response, but I have sympathy with people who express it and its friends ("Have you read the manual?", "What have you tried to do to solve this problem before asking for help?").
RTFM is not going to make for happy users, but volunteers for free projects have the luxury of being able to ignore disgruntled users. If they don't want to maximise their user count then they have the luxury of being able to do whatever they like up to and including not having a bug tracker and literally hurling abuse at people who ask them questions.
We aren't entitled to professional and comprehensive support just because the project happens to look well run.
"Ask"? Of all the open source work I've done, I never ask anyone to use it. I put it out there with the hope that others will find it useful. I never go around pushing people to use it.
No one is entitled to anything, including free support. Many open source developers provide free support, but don't have the patience to deal with users who won't even do the bare minimum to help themselves.
I think there is a very clear distinction between asking for help like: 'I have searched for a solution to my X problem in this or that way, but I couldn't find anything.' and 'I don't know how to do X.'
If you feel like neither of them deserves a RTFM, I think you have a very entitled view of being a user, and personally I will never want you as a one for the software I write.
RTFM is a perfectly justified answer to people that consider that a developer's time in replying to their problem is less valuable than their own in searching for a solution. Exceptionally more so when the answer is an "apropos" or "man" page away.
The least thing a user can do is to spend a fraction of the developers' invested time into finding solutions on their own.
Is it the category of response, or is it just the simple "RTFM" that turns you off? That is, if the answer was, "The answer to your question is in the manual; please read it", would you consider that ok?
Arguably the latter answer is the exact same thing in content as "RTFM", but it's easily more polite and doesn't have the same negative baggage.
If you're ok with the more wordy answer, then you're really just objecting to the negative tone and lack of politeness, not the amount of information given by the answer.
> This bad comment not only made d0ugal search for a different project, but also made sure I won't use it, and worsened my opinion of the author considerably.
Just a final note: many open source developers consider that a feature, so I doubt you'd sway most of them with this argument. As in, they're doing this in their spare time, and don't want that spare time to be squandered by people who don't even give them the courtesy of reading the provided documentation. (This is why, if you have read the docs and are still at a loss, you should say so: "How can I do X? I read through the man page and searched the wiki, but I wasn't able to figure it out". Framing your request this way shows that you aren't just a lazy leech who is wasting the developer's time.)
Having more users is only great if they aren't a support burden. A company can afford to hire scores of first-line support and afford to pay for support-desk platforms that automatically help triage and suggest answers to common questions. Most single-person and small-team open source projects can't do that. And users should not feel entitled to free support for software they haven't paid for. Sure, it would be great if people could always be courteous and friendly despite stress and overwork, but everyone has their limits.
It's both. Using the insulting term RTFM makes it worse. But just pointing to the manual is also not the right way to do it, at least you have to specify which manual and where. That's the rules we set and they are really the right rules, below this minimal amount of effort you are not giving support. You are just wasting time and offending people.
> Just a final note: many open source developers consider that a feature, so I doubt you'd sway most of them with this argument
See the reaction in this comment thread. Developers rarely do only one project. One might not care whether or not someone uses the free Window Manager, but if the negative impression carries on to other and commercial projects there was harm.
> That's the rules we set and they are really the right rules
"We" who? That's just your opinion, not some universal rule.
> Developers rarely do only one project. One might not care whether or not someone uses the free Window Manager, but if the negative impression carries on to other and commercial projects there was harm.
Perhaps, but I think we should let developers make the decision for themselves as to how to support (or not support) their own software that they work on for free in their spare time. If providing bad support hurts them in other walks of life, that's still a choice they may decide to make.
I referenced above the Ubuntu Linux forum. That's where we (=the people running the forum) set those rules, based on general Ubuntu guidelines. So it's a little bit more than just my opinion. But it's my opinion that these rules are always right if you want a successful software project. You can also treat it as an observation if you prefer.
> Perhaps, but I think we should let developers make the decision for themselves...
That's not a useful route to discuss, and frankly a bit annoying. No one is forcing devs to do anything. If you think discussing the consequences and why that behaviour is harmful is making it impossible for devs to make decisions for themselves - that will sound harsher than I mean it - you shouldn't engage in such a discussion.
RTFM is always a valid response when you are dealing with a lazy, spoiled society that would rather just call tech support and bother somebody who is sitting on the other side shifting through a stack of manuals in from of them that comes with the product...
What surprises me are people who have the patience to wait for somebody else to tell them why their app broke, when it's much quicker dealing with problem just by going straight to the source. (pun intended)
Generally, I agree. However, we're discussing a highly customizable WM. Not GNOME or KDE. You may assume the user is technically adept, and able to read a man page. Telling them to do exactly that is fair (but I agree it can be said friendlier). Silence might be better, but it might also be worse if the reader is awaiting help.
I often ask "stupid" questions, but I do so after having searched the documentation, google and tried everything I could think of trying. Sometimes it really is in the manual and in my frustration I overlooked it. My point is that assuming the person is just lazy is, well, an assumption and may not be true. At least a friendly "its in the manual" tells me I just overlooked it, but an unfriendly RTFM just makes me think why did I even bother wasting my time struggling. I don't have problems with stuff for the fun of it.
Two days ago, I tried to get a vim plugin working. After trying the instructions over and over for about an hour and a half, I finally gave up and opened a ticket with a question that probably looks pretty lazy and dumb to someone experienced with it. Did I get an RTFM? No, it turns out there actually WAS a bug (actually, a bug and an undocumented setting). I almost didn't post out of fear of being called lazy or whatever and just give up on it, but it turns out there actually was a problem. They fixed it and I'm now a happy user and the positive experience makes me more likely to report future bugs, tell others about the tool or even contribute if I can. An "RTFM" would have driven me away forever.
> I often ask "stupid" questions, but I do so after having searched the documentation, google and tried everything I could think of trying.
Then when you ask, demonstrate that you've done so.
"Hey, how do I do X? I read through the docs, googled, and tried everything I could think of but I'm still stuck" is likely to get you a decent answer.
If you're going to ask someone working for free to give you free support, the least you can do is demonstrate that you've done your homework. The unfortunate reality is that many users do not do this and just want someone else to hand-hold them through everything.
I agree that it'd be nicer if developers would remove "RTFM" from their lexicon, and, even if it provides no more information, go for something politer, like, "the answer is in the manual; please read it". But people get tired, people get frustrated, people have a bad day. And some people might do it deliberately to push away users who they think will be an unproductive time-suck for them. As someone benefiting from someone else's free labor, you are entitled to nothing. Suck it up and do your best to show that you're not a leech and that you'll do your part to support yourself, only asking for help when you've exhausted the usual avenues.
I get it that it comes across as negative, but it is partly a choice. You could assume the person is just very busy. You could assume RTFM just means Read The Fine Manual.