Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!zermatt.lcs.mit.EDU!RWS
From: RWS@zermatt.lcs.mit.EDU (Robert Scheifler)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Clarification
Message-ID: <880315083810.9.RWS@KILLINGTON.LCS.MIT.EDU>
Date: 15 Mar 88 13:38:00 GMT
References: <8803150251.AA17265@uther.cs.purdue.edu>
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 29

You haven't offended me, and I appreciate the comments.  Given your
situation, the best you can probably do is to take the time to document
the problems you find as well as you can and let us know about them (for
example, you had problems building, send us the relevant part of your
make log, explain what you did and what failed, etc).

I still believe the best place to ask questions is a public mailing list
like xpert/comp.windows.x.  In doing so, you reach hundreds of people
who can probably answer your question (and thousands more who can't but
might :-), and hopefully one of them will.  Querying just MIT has simple
limitations: when thousands of people send mail to just a few people, it
will take those few people a *long* time to respond in a reasonable way,
and it is almost guaranteed not to be timely.  You send in a bug which
you think is absolutely critical, but unknown to you a dozen other
people have sent in what they think are critical bugs, and meanwhile the
MIT staff is currently looking at R&D issues that they view at even
higher priority than your bug reports.  In the end, the reasonable (but
not timely) response is the next MIT release, but of course people want
answers and quick fixes sooner than that.  We'll do the best we can, but
there should be enough Xperts out there now to help spread the load.

Different people will view MIT releases in different ways, depending on
how much time, money, etc. they have.  One view is that they are
developer's releases; if you want "creature comforts", you should buy X
from a vendor who puts effort into high-quality end-user documentation,
Software Support, etc.  Others view the releases as inexpensive
alternatives to paying Big Bucks for software, and rely on their local
expertise and documentation to see them through.  The MIT releases are
basically provided "as is", with minimal support from MIT, and you have
to make up your own mind whether it serves your purposes.