From owner-freebsd-newbies Mon Jul 27 05:46:59 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id FAA10085 for freebsd-newbies-outgoing; Mon, 27 Jul 1998 05:46:59 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from phoenix.welearn.com.au (suebla.lnk.telstra.net [139.130.44.81]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id FAA10076 for ; Mon, 27 Jul 1998 05:46:51 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from sue@phoenix.welearn.com.au) Received: (from sue@localhost) by phoenix.welearn.com.au (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA21441; Mon, 27 Jul 1998 22:46:13 +1000 (EST) Message-ID: <19980727224609.46579@welearn.com.au> Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1998 22:46:09 +1000 From: Sue Blake To: junkmale@xtra.co.nz Cc: freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Many assumptions are made References: <199807271119.XAA03911@cyclops.xtra.co.nz> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 0.88e In-Reply-To: <199807271119.XAA03911@cyclops.xtra.co.nz>; from Dan Langille on Mon, Jul 27, 1998 at 11:20:18PM +1200 Sender: owner-freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org On Mon, Jul 27, 1998 at 11:20:18PM +1200, Dan Langille wrote: > Have you ever noticed how easy it is to forget what it's like to not know > anything? I keep being reminded what it is like to be a novice. Wow! You mean, you've already had the chance to forget for a while? :-) > And that's a good think. As we gain knowledge, we tend to forget that > we once did not comprehend what we now consider to be basics. And > much of those "basics" are by no means intuitive. > > For example, I just downloaded nslint and tried to install it. Every > previous port installed first time. Just enter "make install". No > problems. But for the life of me, I can't figure out what the > installation procedure it. There are no instructions with the port (none > that I can find; please see my thread in the questions list). Yes I did see that, and I'll offer a suggestion. It might be a bit hard for people to answer that question just in terms of "how to install?" Maybe if you gave them an account of what you had done and what came up on the screen that you didn't expect, someone in -questions would find it easier to zero in on the problem for you. I usually go for packages instead of ports. I'm not sure what all the pros and cons are, but I figure that if there's going to be any hassles compiling or any smart decisions to be made when doing so, let someone else work that out and I'll just have the provided binary, thanks :-) It'd be nice to use ports all the time and exercise some of the control that method allows, but I'm just at the stage of using Midnight Commander to whizzy through and figure out tiny bits of what's going on in the ports and packages. People who are more comfortable with unix seem to use ports all the time, so there must be a strong reason to do so that I can't appreciate right now. > I'm finding it difficult to tell the difference between my lack of UNIX > knowledge and the lack of full information being provided to the user. > > I'm sure the rest of this list must be encountering similar experiences. Constantly. I misattribute it to one or the other, depending on mood. -- Regards, -*Sue*- To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message