[theme-reviewers] Meaning of messages

[Otto]

On Sat, Jun 25, 2011 at 12:48 PM, Bruce Wampler <brucewampler at gmail.com> wrote:
> Sorry, Otto, I can't help myself here - I'm sure I'm going to piss you off,
> you you
> really need an attitude change when it comes to understanding how to write
> user interfaces, and to interact with users.

Brother, you can't piss me off.

And while you're entitled to your opinion, I disagree. I just took a
look at Weaver's options screen (to respond to the comment you left on
my blog), and though I did trash it just a bit in my response, frankly
I felt was being rather generous.

> WordPress lives because of the contributions of its user base, including
> both main line developers, and theme writers. I am a very long time software
> developer.

You and me both brother. Been writing code for 23 years now, 11 professionally.

> But to dismiss my claims that the interface to Theme Check is confusing is
> really insulting, and ignoring the input of someone who has learned a lot
> over the years about dealing with users.

Sorry if you felt I was being dismissive. I was only trying to point
out parts that I had thought you had missed. When it reports "errors",
well, that's a fail. If it doesn't report any errors, then that's a
pass. I mean, I'm not sure how much more obvious it could be. Do you
feel it would be better to display a big FAIL in 100px tall letters
inside a <blink> or something?

Feel free to give criticism in the form of suggestions. Constructive
criticism is happily accepted. So far, however, you have provided
nothing constructive. Honestly, it seems to me that you've only
belly-ached about getting a fail in the theme uploader. A fail, BTW,
that I explained as clearly as I possibly could, showed how you were
wrong about security, and even provided a tutorial to you on how to
fix the problem. A tutorial in which you commented on calling me
out-of-touch and other such similar things.

Basically, I've tried to be nothing but helpful and nice. And now
you're kind of being a dick. Do you want me to try to be a dick as
well? I'm much better at that.

> And don't tell me that tracking the changes at some obscure URL:
> http://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/log/theme-check
> is a obvious place to find all the new theme requirement changes. That's
> obvious. What would constitute obscure?

There's a link to that right from the Theme Check plugin's page that
is labelled "Development Log".

See it yourself: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/theme-check/

> And maybe the INTENT was to always have WARNING block themes, but
> when I submitted the last version, which only in March this year, WARNINGS
> did NOT cause a theme to be rejected. March is not that long ago.

The change to make all "failure" elements of the theme check mandatory
happened on March 21st. Here's the announcement I made to this mailing
list about it:

http://lists.wordpress.org/pipermail/theme-reviewers/2011-March/004560.html

> And if the Theme Check is the same for the plugin (which I use constantly,
> by the way) as the upload site, why does the upload site so clearly use the
> word FAIL, and that never appears in the plugin version.

Only the interface is different, the actual checks being performed are
identical.

> I imagine you are an experience programmer, but I'm afraid you've not
> learned
> a very fundamental lesson when dealing with people who use your software:

Perhaps. However, I might tell you that you have a real problem
accepting assistance when you get it given to you.

> There are no dumb questions, and when a user gives a sincere and serious
> comment about your software's user interface, you don't insult them and
> dismiss their comment with "IT WAS RED".

I don't believe I used CAPS.

> Sorry if I've pissed you off, Otto, but you need to take some of these
> questions a little more seriously, and stop dismissing them with your so-called
> superior knowledge.

If other people knowing things, and then trying telling them to you in
a logical and straightforward manner somehow offends you, then perhaps
you should tell people that in the future, so that next time, nobody
will bother trying to help.

Remember, there's no emotions in text. Try to keep that in mind when
next you interact with other human beings via email.


-Otto