mailing-list for TeXmacs Users

[Stephane Popinet <address@hidden>]

> Correct. And I have tried. On one occasion, a very miffed secretary asked me a 
> simple question  - "Can't you simply export to LaTeX or Word ?". I had posed 
> that question on this mailing list prior to that experience myself, and had 
> been told in no uncertain terms (putting it mildly) that I was being 
> unappreciative of the effort put into developing texmacs. 

Hi,

Although I tend to agree that the issues you mention are all important, 
I also think you may be mistaken in your conception of how free software 
works. This may be an explanation of why texmacs developers think you 
are "being unappreciative of the effort put into developing texmacs".

Free software is not a "product". As a user, you cannot "request" that 
some feature be included. You are welcome to "suggest" that some feature 
would be nice/useful/absolutely necessary. This is different.

If the developers do not agree with you, tell you that they have other 
priorities etc... you have another option: doing it yourself. For a 
developer a piece of working code (even if it's not perfect) is worth a 
thousand words. As Linus Torvalds once said: "Talk is cheap, show me the 
code".

cheers,

Stephane