Re: Patch for 1.3.151

[David Petrou]

> I disagree. When I encounter a new program, I start looking at FAQs,
> introductions, readmes, screenshots, etc. The manual is the last thing
> I'd be looking for.

lily isn't a typical program.  it's closer to a language.  when you
want to learn C, you don't look at FAQs, screenshots, etc.  you do a
combination of two things: you read k&r and look at other people's
code.  and you have to do both.  without a good book like k&r, your
command of C syntax / constructions will always be sketchy.  and
without looking at examples, you won't learn common idioms.

to me, there are two seperable things that a new user to lily needs to
know: its syntax, and how to tweak things.  the syntax part must be
required reading.  you're not going to get all the subtleties by
looking at example lily code.  i don't think you should hide the fact
that using lily well will require study.  (but the results are so
great, that people will put in the effort.)  as far as finding
documentation on tweaking things, all you need there is a good index.

i haven't looked at lily docs recently, so maybe you're already doing
this.  i just concerned about what status lily's manual should have.

> More to the point, many of the questions on the mailing list indicate
> that the manual isn't even read *after* downloading and running lily.

maybe people try the documentation and give up?

david