[BioC] Note: No specified download type, defaulting to Source

[Robert Gentleman]

On Tue, Oct 14, 2003 at 11:18:13AM -0700, Richard Finney wrote:
> I think you hit the nail on the head there.
> 
> The message says : 
> "No specified download type, defaulting to
>  Source".  Which is fine for the guy who
> wrote the code or a jaded users who have seen it
> all before.   First time users would completely
> grok a simpler message much like what you just said :
> "you didn't specify a download
> type (source, win32, etc), so we are defaulting to the
> type that we think  you need (in this case,
> 'Source')".
> 
> A lot of bioconductor/affy problems could be cleared
> up
> and lot of confusion could be minimized with just a
> little more clear, friendly text in the messages.
> 
  Thanks Rich,
   and (at least here) it is taken as such. Please do note though,
   that the writing of error messages is somewhat straight forward and
   you (and others) certainly can write them, submit patches and
   contribute to the project. There is no reason to leave that to the
   original author this is all open source and the end product depends
   on the community as well as the developer.

   Let me also say that from a developers perspective, we have very
   limited time, we are not writing commericial software and we pretty
   much all have our own research agendas.
    We try to combine that with making our
   software user friendly etc, but if user friendly counts for a lot,
   there is a company in Seattle that provides you with that, for a
   modest fee.

   Robert

> This is meant as useful criticism.  I think some
> of the developers are missing the forest for the
> trees here.  The error messages are too short
> and need to be dumbed down.  Suggesting remedial
> action
> would be good too.  An occoasional "wait a minute
> while we contact [URL]" would help too.
> 
> just some thoughts.
> 
> -rich
> 
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| Robert Gentleman                 phone : (617) 632-5250                   |
| Associate Professor              fax:   (617)  632-2444                   |
| Department of Biostatistics      office: M1B20                            |
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