On Jul 29, 2004, at 2:33 AM, Gang wrote:
May I quote what he said: why my question is inappropriate? Who gives
him
all the power to judge the others, the altitude?
Nick Cox has earned the right and power to express opinions which are
respected highly by the vast majority of Statalist contributors and
readers; as others have suggested, he is de facto the list's arbiter of
good taste, and author of the Statalist FAQ (which Gang should read
carefully before further postings if he wishes to get much help from
the list).
Anyone on the list has the right to respond (politely): why don't you
RTFM (that is, the Fine Manual). Those of us who spend a good deal of
their time helping out Statalist posters have a limited tolerance for
posts that appear to be versions of "if I can get human help rather
than digesting the complexities of manuals, on-line help, FAQs, etc.
why not let someone else write the program for me?" One of the very
good reasons for this attitude is the concept of teaching a person to
fish rather than delivering fish, nicely debomed, flletted and grilled,
to their table. Some concepts are hard to learn to use, and reshape is
one of them. If a post provides a clear "I tried this, I wanted to do
that, I thought that's what the manual said to do, but it gave me this
error" then it will probably receive some positive response.
Kit
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