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Tom,
So far I have not seen any inclination that Tomasz is looking for help with this. There are issues for TJ to consider when an important component is no longer under his direct control. Since TJ said on more than one occasion that he wants to do the whole product himself, he will do the whole product himself. I also want him to do the documentation for two reasons. First it really is his responsibility as the developer even if he has 1 or 100 employees. Second, doing the documentation is an important step to really understanding your own work and finding edge conditions from the careful thinking when explaining the function for others. As an example, while writing up the documentation for my Flexible Parameters for others to read, I realized a number of things I wanted to change --some of them just because it would be easier to change the code than to explain it the way I wrote it. However, to what level he documents is his stated choice.
So, if there is a project, it needs to fill a need for users independent of, not instead of, the official documents.
I think the spirit of sharing between users is that we each have benefitted from help from other users and in a spirit of fairness and repaying that debt and expectation of further cooperation, we give back something to the community. 10% will take and never give. 10% will give much more than get. 80% will give and get about the same. It is easiest to share when there is a common agreed upon playing field. This list is one field, the AFL formula library is another, and the UKB is one more. It is easy to agree on these venues because they are directly supported by AmiBroker.
I think that proposing another venue for many to collaborate would be taking a big risk. It would really need to become like a business with partners and conditions spelled out carefully if money is to change hands. It is much easier for an individual to do this than a group. I think there is a much higher risk of disappointed people than delighted ones.
Now that I have got the negatives out, I don't want to leave the impression that I think no need exists, or that there is no way to fill it. There are needs and there are ways to fill them. Of course a better playing field would help, but the key to success IMHO is to use the same approach as eating an elephant -- one bite at a time. People feel good about making a contribution that takes them a few hours, but has immediate results that can be shared. A contribution that takes months becomes a job, and as you say needs to be justified somehow with a larger compensation --and expectations of (emotional) reward grow with the investment.
Take a look at what happens when expectations are not lined up with reality. Someone is hurting right now due to this revelation and it is showing in another post.
As far as monetary compensation goes, I expect to reap that directly from my efforts in trading. Seeking compensation from writing documents is a different business and would be an emotional conflict of interest that could interfere with my prime goal. Emotions are a key factor in trading success -- conserve them!
I am taking one collective bite of the Elephant to start -- a Glossary. If that goes well, then I will bite again.
Best regards, Dennis Dennis, I agree that having the information for free would be better, but I have found that there is no such thing as a free lunch. By having a pay site, the people who are working to keep the site current would get compensated for their work. Probably not what they deserve, but at least some compensation. All the help on this forum would still be available on this forum in whatever form that is being used, but it would also be available on the user site in a user friendly form. I have about 10 web sites. I now how hard it is to keep a site up to date. With a product like AmiBroker, the task is almost overwhelming. I also think that it would give Tomasz more time to concentrate on improving AmiBroker because someone else would be keeping the manuals and help areas current. Tom ----- Original Message ----- Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2008 3:16 PM Subject: Re: [amibroker] Re: Help Manual
Tom,
I am answering you here to get this into the right thread.
It sounds interesting, but I believe that the UKB could support the ebook idea or even broken up into smaller sections. Once the initial heavy lifting is over, I would guess that it would not be hard to find volunteers to update it with just the new stuff. I would hate to see a paid subscription site model for this --it just seems like it is admitting failure of the community which is so good about sharing freely. I would not object to contributing to the initial work that would be free to all. Of course that is what the UKB is supposed to be for.
However, I would be happier if there was some way that we could have an AmiBroker UWiki to compliment the AmiBroker UKB for this kind of work since it fits that model so much better. Open to the community, but only up to date license holders would have edit access (as a way to control access to those with a vested interest in its integrity --or perhaps only trusted authors access like the UKB. Another option would be to have a site like you mention but only up to date license holders would have any access as a way to support AmiBroker and perhaps gain support from Tomasz since there would be a direct benefit.
Lots of possibilities. It warrants more consideration. The thing is to fill a need of one segment of the community as easily as possible.
Best regards, Dennis Dennis, What I envision is a site for AmiBroker users. It would contain an Amibroker manual in an ebook form, an AFL manual in an ebook form, a glossary in an ebook form, links to all the AmiBroker info. maybe a revision of the AmiBroker AFL terms with a more easily understood definition with more samples, a list of AFL programmers who will do programming, a forum for questions and answers, and anything else that would help users get the most from AmiBroker. This would be a membership site with an annual fee. Of course, Tomasz would have to approve and I would suggest he raise the price of AmiBroker and include a year's membership in the site. The new AmiBroker user would up to date easy to use manuals and information and Tomasz would not have to devote as much time to support and up dating manuals. This is just a quick idea of the possibilities. Tom ----- Original Message ----- Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2008 1:23 PM Subject: Re: [amibroker] AmiBroker AFL Glossary project
Tom,
I don't think I quite have the full understanding of your vision. I believe Tomasz would need to support the idea (at least not object to it) because of the amount of proprietary material that would have to be referenced. I think it should be discussed in its own thread. I could support it personally if it fills a need and does not fracture the community.
To have a manual that is complete and current would take a lot of time and effort not only to write the manual, but to also keep it current. I would suggest that if someone wants to take the trouble to write and update the manual, they could have a pay site with the manual on it. They could charge a nominal annual membership fee. Then the members could have access to the manual all year and the writer or writers would have a least received some compensation for their effort. I realize that this would not be a big money making effort, but it would be helpful to the members and provide some compensation to the writer. It could even be presentated as an ebook which could be downloaded. The members would be able to get an up dated ebook as changes, corrections, and additions are added. I think that if the annual membership was reasonable, enough people would subsribe to make it feasilbe. I would be glad to provide help with a web site and producing the ebook. Just my humble suggestion, Tom I
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