>#the people who know the answers don't understand the
>#coordinates of question-space.
This is true for so many areas of life. Unless you are actually *IN*
question-space at some level, it is unlikely that your answer-space will be
accessible to those in question-space. I think in part THAT is why the FAQ
mode works so well. Perhaps it is because those who strive to pull
together a FAQ, are usually working almost as hard to find out what the
QUESTIONS are, as they are trying to explain the answers. Perhaps unlike
working on a conventional manual werein one tries to explain how something
works, the actual repeated search for, and formation of, relevent and
insightful questions keeps the answerer at least somewhat more closely
linked to question-space.
/philosphy mode off
Sincerely
Stewart
>scs@eskimo.com (Steve Summit):
># The "traditional" approach, if it can be successfully
># accomplished in a given instance, has a distinct
># advantage: the questions it covers have some real chance
># of matching the questions which a reader is trying to
># answer, even if the reader has tried and failed to find
># an answer using more traditional references. In fact,
># the process of identifying questions to be answered in an
># FAQ list by noticing which questions are asked in an open
># forum automatically discovers those questions which the
># traditional references, for whatever reason, do *not*
># answer.
>
>Al Gilman <asgilman@access.digex.net>
>#...or don't make sufficiently prominent. Lots of our FAQs in
>#Lynx land are answered in the documents, if you can ever figure
>#out how to find it... There is a generic problem in software
>#that the people who know the answers don't understand the
>#coordinates of question-space.
>#
>#Well put, Steve. The traditional FAQ is based on listening to
>#the customer. That is one of the foundations that made
>#news.anwers and RTFM such a great invention. What it gathers is
>#not just any answers. It collects the answers to the questions
>#people need answered.
>
>and I'd like to point out something which at times only certain
>Usenet groups or participants presume about the value of a 'FAQ'
>in the traditional *or* precis-oriented documents: that they are
>important means of reducing the NOISE-LEVEL in a contained forum
>like a Usenet group by minimizing redundancy.
>
>it is this element of the 'FAQ' which I think is most often
>overlooked in a mad rush for 'providing answers'. just as Steve
>has said that "real-life questions do not always lend themselves
>to orderly categorization", so too is it true that real-life
>*answers* do not always lend themselves to presentation within
>the space of an information file, be that in response to
>frequently asked questions or as part of an Internet reference.
>
>nagasiva (tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss)
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Stewart N. Abramson, Ph.D Phone 412-648-9751
Assistant Professor FAX 412-648-1945
Department of Pharmacology E-mail sna@prophet.pharm.pitt.edu
University of Pittsburgh WWW-URL http://www.pitt.edu/~sna2/
E1348 Biomedical Science Tower
Pittsburgh, PA 15261
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