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Date:      Tue, 15 May 2001 07:22:14 +1000
From:      "Doug Young" <dougy@gargoyle.apana.org.au>
To:        "Rahul Siddharthan" <rsidd@physics.iisc.ernet.in>
Cc:        "Sue Blake" <sue@welearn.com.au>, <freebsd-docs@FreeBSD.ORG>, "Kathy Quinlan" <katinka@magestower.com>
Subject:   Re: (was) I'm leaving, now something like "anti official docs rant" :)
Message-ID:  <00af01c0dcbb$f2fa2a10$0300a8c0@oracle>
References:  <002b01c0db54$e0febaa0$5599ca3f@disappointment> <20010513171444.E26123@welearn.com.au> <00f401c0db7e$ff3ca2a0$fe00a8c0@kat.lan> <20010513122623.I97034@lpt.ens.fr> <20010514084709.A68348@welearn.com.au> <024b01c0dc05$b1314fc0$0300a8c0@oracle> < <20010514135309.B48638@lpt.ens.fr>

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> I just subscribed too, for the first time.  I will try and
> contribute, at least to whatever I'm comfortable with...
>
Well I guess its like we say in OZ ..... "avagoyamug" ..... which for
the
benefit of those not from the land of the pacific peso means something
like
"nothing ventured, nothing gained"

> It seems to me that back issues of Daemonnews FreeBSDzine, etc have
> lots of useful articles which are rather hard to locate for
beginners.
> So one thing I have in mind is make an index for them (with links to
> the original articles), classified by subject, and perhaps with
short
> summaries.  Think it's a good idea?
>
As I see it, the folk yelling "all the info you need is already
available" are
partly correct, however its spread out over an area many times that of
the
Sahara so to all intents & purposes it might as well be on mars
(specially
considering that much of the info is in that language anyway !!). My
idea is
to collect just the snippets immediately relevant to a given objective
& distill
those into a single "task based" document

To use my "Pedantic FreeBSD" as an example ... I needed a document
that
walked someone unfamiliar with unix through installation /
configuration as a
gateway / router / mailserver. Obviously this needed a fair amount of
ppp
setup info since thats always been a female canine to setup. Now to
follow the
"official" track would require a newbie to devote several weeks at
least
familiarizing themselves with a million subjects, most of which are
virtually
irrelevant to the task at hand & thus adding to their already "panic
stages"
disorientation. Remember the primary object here is to get a FreeBSD
box
running the ppp connection to the ISP & sharing that with a LAN ....
its NOT
to turn a beginner into an "all knowing, all seeing expert" in two
weeks.
Remember the old story .... "its pretty difficult to remember your
primary
objective was to drain the swamp when you are up to your a**e in
alligators!!"

> For some things like XFree, the linux howtos are definitely a useful
> resource too.

Yeah I guess .... I'm not exactly a fan of anything linux (for a start
I absolutely
refuse to indulge in that facing California / chanting 'Our Linus' bit
& I don't
believe that Comrade Gates is the Antichrist), however the XFree thing
did
apparently originate there so maybe thats a good place to "pirate"
some stuff :)



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