[Asterisk-Users] multiple instances of asterisk spawning

[Steven Critchfield]

On Tue, 2004-04-27 at 13:14, Jody Rudolph wrote:
> I just subscribed to this list today because the company I work for is
> thinking of using Asterisk and I wanted to hear some opinions of actual
> Asterisk users. I will be promptly removing myself from this flame war list.
> I'd hate to think I might be responsible for someone's "activities to
> relieve that annoyance" I might create because I wasn't born on this list.

You really should get around more if you think this is a flame war list.
There are only minor "toastings" as Brian puts it occasionally. 

New users fall into 3 categories
Category 1, is the perpetual newbie. This category is willing to forever
portray themselves as a newbie to hopefully get help from others at the
least cost. Eventually they move on, but luckily after initial launch
they don't seem to stick around, or they just upgrade to a decent user. 
Category 2, The new business user. This category is identified by the
urgency their questions must be answered to make someone happy usually a
client. This group tends to either learn quickly, hire a person who
already knows the product, or leaves for a different project before the
clients skin him alive.
Category 3, is the user who may make a few mistakes in etiquette, but
learns. 

We don't demand high standards here. We don't want to pull teeth to get
information. We want to have our time considered just as valuable as
yours. We want you to understand that we ourselves are not computers,
duplication of effort isn't nearly free. The archives are there to
reduce the effort to support you. Google does a wonderful job of
indexing the information. Your task is to learn how to feed google
decent search criteria, and then be willing to chase the rabbit down
whatever hole it produces. The extra hour of searching will probably
enrich you greatly if you are willing to absorb all the extra data not
necessarily directly on your path.

Then also realize that it is highly likely that any and all the
volunteers that spend time here are also part of many other communities,
and fighting the same battles there as well. 

And for those who continually whine about how bad asterisk documentation
is, you should try something not quite so new as asterisk. At least
there are nearly 5 years of mailing list archives here to go back on. My
current project is being hampered by lack of documentation the likes
that in comparision makes the amount of asterisk documentation look like
the DEC VAX/VMS manuals. Yesterday I did a single word search for a
function name in a very popular piece of software and google returned 2
results. Those 2 results point to a domain that just expired last week. 
-- 
Steven Critchfield  <critch at basesys.com>