Re: Ballot for leader2008

[Josip Rodin <joy@entuzijast.net>]

On Sat, Apr 12, 2008 at 10:46:46PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
> On Sun, 13 Apr 2008 03:44:12 +0200, Josip Rodin <joy@entuzijast.net> said: 
> 
> > But I see how it would help if the CFV was more verbose about that,
> > and less verbose about other things. It goes on and on about the
> > technicalities of the vote, and says to read the platforms twice
> > (because the readers are idiots who need to have things repeated to
> > them ;),
> 
>         The more I see of the mistakes that are still made, the less
>  preposterous the last sentence becomes.

I know...

> > but it fails to simply say "the ballot is the chunk of formatted text
> > located five paragraphs down, nothing else".
> 
>         The draft ballot was posted to this list earlier; all
>  this simple additions were not caught and proposed by anyone.

Yes... and for the last 5-10 years too, it's been like this all the time,
I'm not exculpating myself for failing to comment before :)

>         Huh. Looking at the ballot:
> ,----
> | ...
> | Do not erase anything between the lines below and do not change the
> | choice names.

Yes, you see, that's the point - the text just starts talking about not
erasing something. Which lines below? - is not an illogical question.
It's just automatically answered for anyone who actually spends the
next 35 seconds reading the rest of the text...

I propose that you make the beginning look like this:

 HOW TO VOTE

 First, read the full text of [...variable data...]

 The ballot is a small text form that is included below.
 It is cast by sending a filled out and signed form to a dedicated
 e-mail address, also included below.

 The form is marked with two lines containing the characters '-=-=-=-=-=-'.
 Do not erase anything between those lines, and do not change
 the choice names.

[...]

Also, it would probably help to make the sentence with the address stand out
by adding a paragraph break after it:

 Mail the ballot to: [...variable...]@vote.debian.org.

 Don't worry about spacing [...]

Another paragraph break before the last sentence might be good, too,
because there it stops talking about formatting, and instead talks
about how to get a fresh ballot.

-- 
     2. That which causes joy or happiness.