I can see why someone might be tempted to respond like that, but in my experience some non-native speakers come across more blunt, terse or stilted so you really should give them a mulligan.
Thereâs a long form version of his questions that likely wouldnât have appeared as objectionable.
ABSOLUTELY agree
I always used to think Thomas T was being a jerk about how heâd respond to things
Then I met him and we talked (heâs a decent guy FWIW)
Turns out how HE uses english is different than how I use english
Where a native speaker might say âyou should do âŚâ he often would say âyou MUST do âŚâ
And while both are imperative they have vastly different meaning
When talking face to face though I could ask "do yea mean should " and sometimes he would say âoh yes of courseâ and so it was less demanding than it first sounded
So yeah I try to give non-native english speaker the benefit of the doubt (note I said TRY - Iâm not always successful and sometimes catch myself forgetting that difference) But I try
Thatâs a common mistake us Germans make. In German we mostly use âDu mustâŚâ where English speakers say âYou shouldâŚâ. And the German âDu mustâ is much less demanding than the English âYou mustâ. Itâs a really nice example of âfalse friendsâ.
He didnât provide answers by saying he could give answers but as he wasnât successful in his own tries probably he shouldnât, but it was on topic.
In fact, the OP question could be the preliminaries to a book.
And, this is my second flag.
The first one was because I shared a Microsoft Windows link to âHow to create an Iconâ, dated from August 2020 (or so), but in the text (I read it after sending the link) was talking about using Freehand by (name of the 20/30 years ago owner).
The OP says it âused a Vectorial software to create its icon as was writing somewhereâ and that document says⌠exactly that.
Back to off topic: I received (last year I think) an off topic answer that was exactly what I needed. My question was not incorrect. The answer was. And I thanked the answerâs author. I was really happy.
BTW: thank you Markus for telling me I was flagged. I could stay many days without knowing that as I will leave home tomorrow and I do not really know when I will come backâŚ
At last, in another Topic, in a screen shot the OP set a âCancel / Stopâ button (macOS) at the windowâs right: I do not answered.
I share this problem too; I guess most of us (non-native english speakers) just use english between how we learnt it and how we use our native language.
Add to this that weâre usually not corrected by other readers, we take wrong/bad habits over time.
Iâm sure Iâve derived from what I learnt in school, mixing what I read on the Internet everyday (which isnât always correctly written) and other languages syntax. In school, we get corrected; thatâs no longer the case.
I know many occurrences where what I wrote was incorrectly interpreted, but I can understand itâs not the readerâs fault.
Again incorrect. He did say that he failed in his own attempts, which (a) is a hard thing to admit, and (b) is useful information as it emphasises that the vast majority of users will NOT be successful developers able to make a living from XojoâŚ
But seriously, if you think only answers like âYes, I managed to build a successful business on Xojoâ are answers to the OPâs question, but not âI failed at it, itâs not as easy as it might be portrayed by someâ, then you are right.
Otherwise Emile was on topic.
I think he was on topic, and I can explain WHY I think he was on topic.
Over to all those who disagree - explain your argument for him NOT being on topic?
(and no, Emileâs sometimes hard to follow way of expressing himself does not count)
Thatâs YOUR reading on it. If you have read several of Emileâs comments then youâd know that his grasp of English is sometimes ⌠tentative (and sometimes it sounds as if he is on a bad trip and you wonder what he is on). Mine can be deliberately mocking, even acerbic - Emileâs canât, at least not deliberately.
And btw, I guess you mean âthe postâ, not âthe topicâ âŚ
And topic is non-sensical in contest. You could write âthe aimâ or âthe thread was aboutâ or âthe topic/question was if the poster can become a professional developer with Xojoâ (which Emile contributed pertinent information to).
But âThe topic was answering the OPâs questionsâ makes no sense in English since âtopicâ is synonymous with âquestionâ or âthe subject under discussionâ, which means you basically wrote âThe question was answering the OPâs questionsâ.
I donât know why youâre reposting Emileâs comment I read it on TOF And now, Iâve read it again. Still appears unhelpful. Imagine if everyone felt the urge to respond, what is in effect, âI donât knowâ to peoples questions on the forum. Scrolling through 500+ variations hoping for an answer. Itâs a waste of everyoneâs time, including Emileâs. He had nothing to offer, no need to broadcast that fact.