I've blogged about it. I've ranted about it on various social media. But it seems the message is obviously not getting through to some, so I might as well rant at the source: This mailing list.
I am getting tired of receiving MapGuide-related questions through my personal email address that have not being asked first on this mailing list. I read this mailing list almost every day, if you ask a question on it I or some other knowledgeable user can possibly answer the question for you. Directing the question to me (and me alone) is selfish. a) You are denying other users who might have a similar problem the same answer. b) You are hindering what we want this mailing list to become: A reliable, searchable knowledge base of mapguide questions and answers. Also, it's plain illogical. You'll have an audience of many by asking MapGuide questions on the mailing list, whereas asking me directly there's an audience of one (myself) and that depends on whether I'm actually in the mood to answer your question since you've flagrantly disregarded the above reasons that I've already stated for posting to the mailing list first. The only times I'll acknowledge and likely reply to mapguide-related emails directed to my personal email address is when: a) If I've asked you to email me in response to something in a discussion thread. b) You're already a known or established MapGuide user/developer or associated with one. c) It concerns something that is confidential in nature and can't be discussed openly on a mailing list. d) You want to engage me or Zac for MapGuide consulting/development/business. e) We have a pre-existing partner, business or client relationship, and for some reason you don't know or have my business email address. f) It's concerning some issue/topic/discussion on mapguide-internals. g) It's a question about Maestro, FDO Toolbox or mg-desktop. Projects where *I am* the sole developer of so I am at least somewhat obliged to listen what your queries are and am more lenient about in this regard. MapGuide is not one of these projects. It has many developers and users, with an appropriate forum for questions/answers/support (this mailing list and Trac). I expect such questions and queries to go through the correct channels (the mailing list) accordingly. I won't name and shame the guilty parties that have triggered this ranting, I'll just ask you to strongly consider next time (and every time after that) to ask your MapGuide-related questions on the mailing list first, where people besides myself can also help you instead of just me! Sadly this *is* a mailing list and not a web-based forum, because I'd sticky this post as mandatory reading material for all new users! /end rant - Jackie -- View this message in context: http://osgeo-org.1560.x6.nabble.com/PSA-Direct-MapGuide-questions-to-this-mailing-list-first-and-not-my-personal-email-address-tp5052596.html Sent from the MapGuide Users mailing list archive at Nabble.com. _______________________________________________ mapguide-users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/mapguide-users
