Abbreviations in important archlinux news

lilsirecho · 2009-12-31 19:52:55

Recent changes in kernel26 introduced KMS.

This is referenced in the archlinux news item regarding needs to change to allow KMS.

KMS is not specifically defined in the archlinux news item and did not seem to be of importance to my upgrade.

It does, however, affect my system.

I request that the use of Jargon of this type be defined at first use in archlinux news items such that communication is complete regarding the item being discussed.

Knowing that KMS stands for Kernel Mode Setting is helpful but further extension would be more specific with " Kernel Display Mode Setting" (may affect your system).

KMS is a new item in archlinux and needs to be treated as a "noobie" to all users...Jargon doesn't cut it!

Kernel Mode Setting as it stands is off the mark since it doesn't mean "display" necessarily but could mean something about setting up the kernel other than displays.

To those in the know it seems obvious but it isn't to those new to the new kernel and the changes therin.

Define all new terms?

jt512 · 2010-01-01 01:32:39

I agree. Archlinux news messages are often too cryptic, and don't sufficiently explain issues to users.

Jay

ngoonee · 2010-01-01 01:43:51

Google? [arch-dev-public]? Its not like there's THAT many warnings in the news section that its a big trouble to go through all of them.

dyscoria · 2010-01-01 10:21:39

ngoonee wrote:

Google? [arch-dev-public]? Its not like there's THAT many warnings in the news section that its a big trouble to go through all of them.

And neither would it be a big trouble to expand abbreviations. Not a big deal for me, but it just seems to make sense to avoid as much confusion as possible, especially because abbreviations can potentially have multiple or ambiguous meanings.

Last edited by dyscoria (2010-01-01 10:22:02)

ngoonee · 2010-01-01 10:50:59

dyscoria wrote:

ngoonee wrote:
Google? [arch-dev-public]? Its not like there's THAT many warnings in the news section that its a big trouble to go through all of them.
And neither would it be a big trouble to expand abbreviations. Not a big deal for me, but it just seems to make sense to avoid as much confusion as possible, especially because abbreviations can potentially have multiple or ambiguous meanings.

Makes sense, I guess, though for me moving trivial workloads from the user (as it currently is) to a dev/TU who has better things to do isn't wise.

TBH, if you can make the time to check the front page before updating (and the fact that this thread exists proves the OP does), you can spend the additional 20 seconds to google it.

mikesd · 2010-01-01 10:55:32

I find it hard to believe an Arch user would not know what KMS is. It's been mentioned in the forums, and the mailing lists, quite a bit lately.

It was also mentioned in a previous news item http://www.archlinux.org/news/468/ where it *was* expanded.

dyscoria · 2010-01-01 12:30:47

ngoonee wrote:

dyscoria wrote:
ngoonee wrote:
Google? [arch-dev-public]? Its not like there's THAT many warnings in the news section that its a big trouble to go through all of them.
And neither would it be a big trouble to expand abbreviations. Not a big deal for me, but it just seems to make sense to avoid as much confusion as possible, especially because abbreviations can potentially have multiple or ambiguous meanings.
Makes sense, I guess, though for me moving trivial workloads from the user (as it currently is) to a dev/TU who has better things to do isn't wise.
TBH, if you can make the time to check the front page before updating (and the fact that this thread exists proves the OP does), you can spend the additional 20 seconds to google it.

I disagree that trivial workloads being moved to a dev is a bad thing. In this case, a job of negligible effort (expanding an abbreviation) for only a single person (the dev) can become an issue of (small) importance (ambiguous abbreviation/jargon) for potentially many users.

Clearly there are limits to how much time and effort devs have to/want to spend, but it would make sense to keep news items self contained, which I feel is already the aim. tpowa gave links to important stuff like upstream changes and bug reports which could easily be googled by the user, but the idea is to give the user the essential information about a specific issue they need in a concise news item. tpowa's news item in this case was actually rather good I feel, but explaining jargon would be a low effort, high gain way of improving the news items in general.

mikesd wrote:

I find it hard to believe an Arch user would not know what KMS is. It's been mentioned in the forums, and the mailing lists, quite a bit lately.
It was also mentioned in a previous news item http://www.archlinux.org/news/468/ where it *was* expanded.

Why make news items at all? Users can see from ML that a new kernel is about to be committed to [core]. They would also see what changes have been introduced and what problems there are.

Well, it's because not everyone reads the forums nor the ML, and neither of them should be essential to using Arch Linux. Reading news items, however, has always been recommended before upgrading.

Last edited by dyscoria (2010-01-01 12:36:57)

R00KIE · 2010-01-01 17:07:08

As for using and expanded version of the acronym on first use it seems reasonable as in Kernel Mode Setting (KMS), some users that don't visit the forums very regularly may not know what KMS stands for and may make it hard to search in google, the forums or the mailing lists.

As for providing an explanation of what KMS does I disagree. This is Arch, not any other distro aiming to be windows like, and Linux is certainly not windows. Users should have a minimum amount of knowledge about these things as they can get a regression at any time that will come back to bite them.

The acronym and respective expansion should be more than enough for a user to google about it, search the wiki, forums and mailing lists and find out what is what, if _after_ that the user still has doubts then I'm sure people will try to clarify it if the user asks in the forum.

Not that KMS, Kernel Mode Setting, the problems that can arise and possible solutions are hard to find in the forums these days anyway.

lilsirecho · 2010-01-01 18:31:08

Perhaps the situation can be best understood when one considers that many users have not been active enough to follow the trends.

As well, many users do not use the forums because their systems are busy with activities daily.

Other users may be upgrading from "way back" and do not have the warning signs.

Others are assured by usual upgrades that do not require special handling and forget to read the news.

Problems that seem unrelated to the KMS news item are showing up
in laptops.

The present upgrade requires the user to modify the boot sequence to allay the problem (except that the problem may not be apparently caused by KMS as is the present situation for many users).

A simple definition of KMS when first noted will clear the air and alert users to the cause of their display problem even after downloading before reading the news item. This definition need not be more than KMS (Kernel Mode Set) affects the display mode in your computer and can be overridden with nomodeset in kernel boot line. Other problems may occur caused by KMS.

To me, KMS could well be some KDE package, such as Kdenlive among many, many others. This is exactly the way KMS appeared to me when I encountered same in forum posts.

Those aware of the KMS features will differ from my post but there is a saying "familiarity breeds contempt". All new devices in upgrades need a *warning* such that weird responses not anticipated can be understood as caused by the new change(s). Everyone is a "noob" to new devices, especially in this stage of archlinux builds which are anything but KISS.

A noob installing latest archlinux today will have difficulties not apparent to the "elite" of archlinux as I envision the situation.

This is not a rant and I have made a positive criticism of present practice hopefully getting an improved "newspeak" in the future.

Arch Linux

#1 2009-12-31 19:52:55

Abbreviations in important archlinux news

#2 2010-01-01 01:32:39

Re: Abbreviations in important archlinux news

#3 2010-01-01 01:43:51

Re: Abbreviations in important archlinux news

#4 2010-01-01 10:21:39

Re: Abbreviations in important archlinux news

#5 2010-01-01 10:50:59

Re: Abbreviations in important archlinux news

#6 2010-01-01 10:55:32

Re: Abbreviations in important archlinux news

#7 2010-01-01 12:30:47

Re: Abbreviations in important archlinux news

#8 2010-01-01 17:07:08

Re: Abbreviations in important archlinux news

#9 2010-01-01 18:31:08

Re: Abbreviations in important archlinux news

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