(In which A responds to perceived bullying by Q and rejects one of Q's criticisms of the FAQ.)
A. I don't answer to you, you pompous windbag.
Q. How dare you?
A. Your questions serve only to advance your narrow agenda, not to provide illumination.
Q. You presume to lecture me?
A. Indeed it is in the answer that the knowledge lies, not in the question.
Q. Are you questioning our arrangement?
A. The question is subordinate--merely the path to the answer. The answer is the destination, the goal.
Q. Do you seek to undermine my authority?
A. The phrase "asked question" is not necessarily redundant.
Q. But did I not force you to agree, that unless a question is asked, it cannot exist?
A. A statement is only truly redundant if it is redundant from every possible perspective.
Q. What are you talking about?
A. Though a question must be asked to exist, it is also valid to consider, for example, how often the same question is asked. One question may be asked rarely ("Where are the Crispins of yesteryear?"), while another may be asked frequently ("Where did I leave my goddam keys this time?").
Q. What is your point?
A. Distinguishing between questions that many people ask, and questions that few people ask, and answering the former, is not only an efficient means of conveying information, it is also a non-redundant perspective on the phrase "asked question".
Q. Can you run that by me again?
A. Unless the phrase is redundant from every possible perspective, the phrase is not redundant. I have provided a non-redundant perspective of this phrase, therefore the phrase is not redundant.
Q. Do you think anyone will listen to you?
A. Indeed "asking" a question, is the most common thing people do with questions. In fact, since someone must ask the question for it to come into being, it is not only not redundant, but necessary.
Q. Surely you don't think you can get away with this, do you? How will people pronounce FQA?
A. To ask the question is the most common way to convey it. For example, you ask "Where are my keys?", and you can ask the question "Where are my keys?" (Redundant, or not? you be the judge!), but you cannot just question "Where are my keys?".
Q. What about posing a question? Pondering, bringing up?
A. Yes, and you can "question" authority. But authority is not a question. I need only demonstrate that "asked question" is not redundant from every perspective. My work here is done.
Q. Wait, don't go. I'm not done! Don't you want to hear my next question?
A. In conclusion, unlike your questions about the redundancy of the phrase "asked question", your questions about the hypocrisy of the FAQ writer just making up questions with no idea of their actual frequency, showed promise. Perhaps some day you will ask questions (!) worthy of my answers.
Q. Can we meet again?
Showing posts with label FAQ. Show all posts
Showing posts with label FAQ. Show all posts
Sunday, December 18, 2005
Thursday, December 15, 2005
the why FAQs suck FAQ
Q. Isn't the act of asking a question, what makes a question be a question?
A. Yes. It is the asking that brings the question into being.
Q. Can an unasked question exist?
A. No! For it is in the asking, that the question comes to be. Left unasked, it does not exist.
Q. Isn't, then, the phrase "asked question" not only redundant, but downright stupid?
A. Yes.
Q. There would be no point, then, in creating a FUQ, for frequently unasked questions?
A. As a Zen koan, perhaps. And it would be more fun to say than "fack". But though an amusing concept, such a list would be impossible to create due to the metaphysical contradiction alluded to in the earlier questions.
Q. Would not "FQ", meaning "frequent questions", be a better term?
A. The purpose of the A in FAQ is to provide pronounceability of the acronym. "fack", though a hideous word which sounds like you are ejecting a hairball from the throat, is easy to say. "FQ" is too much trouble to say. Redundancy and stupidity is the price we pay for this convenience.
Q. "Frequently asked" implies some mechanism for sending questions to you, the FAQ owner, such that you can tally them up and answer the ones you receive most often. Is there such a mechanism?
A. No. The implication is deceitful.
Q. How then, do you know what questions are frequently asked? Or even asked at all?
A. One question at a time please. The answer to both is the same. I do not know.
Q. Are you just making up what you imagine people might ask, because you have no way of actually knowing what they might ask?
A. Yes it is true. I make the questions up because I have no way of actually knowing.
Q. Are you aware that the practice of providing a FAQ with a new product is inherently dishonest, because a new product has not been available to those who might ask questions about it long enough to count up the questions to determine their frequency?
A. Boy you got me on that one.
Q. How do you live with this hypocrisy?
A. It is a source of unending shame.
Q. In fact is not a developer the worst person to come up with the questions in a FAQ, because that person knows the product too intimately to put themselves in the position of the very person who needs the FAQ the most, a person who has just come to the product knowing nothing, who looks to the FAQ for informational sustenance?
A. I am forced to admit that you are correct.
Q. Is a FAQ just a lazy way of writing your documentation, because it's too much trouble to organize the information logically, by topic?
A. Yes, it is true.
Q. Is the real reason you have a FAQ, in spite of in your heart knowing it is deceitful and lazy, that you think people expect you to have one, because everybody else does?
A. Yes my friend. You have revealed the truth.
Q. Are you aware of the fallacy known as ad populum or "appeal to popularity", which states that because most lemmings approve of a claim (in this case, that a FAQ is necessary or good), that the claim is therefore true?
A. Yes. At one time most lemmings thought the world was flat. But that did not make it so.
Q. Do you resolve then to get out of the FAQ-writing business, and pledge yourself to righting this wrong by being honest with your readers?
A. I so resolve. Henceforth I pledge to write either proper topic-based documents, or provide the less pronounceable but more truthful QIGPMABIFHNFIITW--Questions I Guess People Might Ask But In Fact Have No Fucking Idea If They Will.
Q. When encountering a new object, what do you suppose is the most frequent first question about the object?
A. What is it?
Q. What is GlassFish?
A. I don't know. The question is insufficiently frequent to be addressed by a FAQ.
A. Yes. It is the asking that brings the question into being.
Q. Can an unasked question exist?
A. No! For it is in the asking, that the question comes to be. Left unasked, it does not exist.
Q. Isn't, then, the phrase "asked question" not only redundant, but downright stupid?
A. Yes.
Q. There would be no point, then, in creating a FUQ, for frequently unasked questions?
A. As a Zen koan, perhaps. And it would be more fun to say than "fack". But though an amusing concept, such a list would be impossible to create due to the metaphysical contradiction alluded to in the earlier questions.
Q. Would not "FQ", meaning "frequent questions", be a better term?
A. The purpose of the A in FAQ is to provide pronounceability of the acronym. "fack", though a hideous word which sounds like you are ejecting a hairball from the throat, is easy to say. "FQ" is too much trouble to say. Redundancy and stupidity is the price we pay for this convenience.
Q. "Frequently asked" implies some mechanism for sending questions to you, the FAQ owner, such that you can tally them up and answer the ones you receive most often. Is there such a mechanism?
A. No. The implication is deceitful.
Q. How then, do you know what questions are frequently asked? Or even asked at all?
A. One question at a time please. The answer to both is the same. I do not know.
Q. Are you just making up what you imagine people might ask, because you have no way of actually knowing what they might ask?
A. Yes it is true. I make the questions up because I have no way of actually knowing.
Q. Are you aware that the practice of providing a FAQ with a new product is inherently dishonest, because a new product has not been available to those who might ask questions about it long enough to count up the questions to determine their frequency?
A. Boy you got me on that one.
Q. How do you live with this hypocrisy?
A. It is a source of unending shame.
Q. In fact is not a developer the worst person to come up with the questions in a FAQ, because that person knows the product too intimately to put themselves in the position of the very person who needs the FAQ the most, a person who has just come to the product knowing nothing, who looks to the FAQ for informational sustenance?
A. I am forced to admit that you are correct.
Q. Is a FAQ just a lazy way of writing your documentation, because it's too much trouble to organize the information logically, by topic?
A. Yes, it is true.
Q. Is the real reason you have a FAQ, in spite of in your heart knowing it is deceitful and lazy, that you think people expect you to have one, because everybody else does?
A. Yes my friend. You have revealed the truth.
Q. Are you aware of the fallacy known as ad populum or "appeal to popularity", which states that because most lemmings approve of a claim (in this case, that a FAQ is necessary or good), that the claim is therefore true?
A. Yes. At one time most lemmings thought the world was flat. But that did not make it so.
Q. Do you resolve then to get out of the FAQ-writing business, and pledge yourself to righting this wrong by being honest with your readers?
A. I so resolve. Henceforth I pledge to write either proper topic-based documents, or provide the less pronounceable but more truthful QIGPMABIFHNFIITW--Questions I Guess People Might Ask But In Fact Have No Fucking Idea If They Will.
Q. When encountering a new object, what do you suppose is the most frequent first question about the object?
A. What is it?
Q. What is GlassFish?
A. I don't know. The question is insufficiently frequent to be addressed by a FAQ.
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