Date: Sat, 30 Jun 2001 08:15:50 -0500 From: Mike Pritchard <mpp@mppsystems.com> To: Nik Clayton <nik@FreeBSD.ORG> Cc: arch@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: [PATCH] Show login(1) how to execute programs at start up Message-ID: <20010630081550.B4689@mppsystems.com> In-Reply-To: <20010619195223.E68877@clan.nothing-going-on.org>; from nik@FreeBSD.ORG on Tue, Jun 19, 2001 at 07:52:23PM %2B0100 References: <20010619195223.E68877@clan.nothing-going-on.org>
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On Tue, Jun 19, 2001 at 07:52:23PM +0100, Nik Clayton wrote: > I want to make the new 'tips' fortunes the default for new users at > system startup. Where is the little "click this box to not see this again" box? None of the fortunes mention how to opt-out of seeing these messages. Many of the tips are very shell specific. What if the user isn't running tsch, but running sh instead? I think the tips need to be more generic, or for shell specific tips, tell the user how to determine what shell they are currently running. How non-UNIX are we going on these tips. Foe example, there is one tip about editors: "The default editor in FreeBSD is vi, which is efficient to use when you have learned it, but somewhat user-unfriendly. To use ee (an easier but less powerful editor) instead, set the environment variable EDITOR to /usr/bin/ee" Under FreeBSD, typing "edit" runs "ee", no matter what my EDITOR environment variable is set to.. When running DOS, trying to run "edit" it runs the DOS version of "edit", which is about the same level of editing as "ee" provides. Figure that a lot of people who used to / or still do run DOS will try just typing "edit [filename]". My boss is one of them. > During IRC discussion, a number of ways of doing this were knocked back > and forth. Several people voiced the opinion that this should be > selectable in some way when adding users, particularly when using either > sysinstall or adduser. > [...] > * Putting the functionality in to login.conf. > > Now you can have classes of users who will or will not receive > tips at startup. Sysinstall and adduser already know enough to > ask you about classes when adding users. Provides additional > functionality over and above what we already have. With this method, I now have to contact the system admin so I don't see these tips on startup. As someone who has done sysadmin work, I don't like this. While I've been typing this message, I've been reading through the freebsd-tips file. Some are more "user" oriented, and others are more "sysadmin" oriented. For a sysadmin example: "FreeBSD is started up by the program 'init'. The first thing init does when starting multiuser mode (ie, starting the computer up for normal use) is to run the shell script /etc/rc. By reading /etc/rc, you can learn a lot about how the system is put together, which again will make you more confident about what happens when you do something with it." I think the tips file needs to be split up somehow. Joe user doesn't really need to see the above tip. It will probably confuse him. multiuser mode? init? /etc/rc?" "I just wanted to check my e-mail!" A freebsd-tips-user and freebsd-tips-admin file would probably work. Having an option on sysinstall, to display tips everytime I use "root" (either "su" or just plain logging in as "root" would probably be a good point to display the sysadmin type tips). As I mentioned above, I think some of these tips need to be a bit more detailed. Example: "To read a compressed file without having to first uncompress it, use "zcat" or "zmore" to view it." What is a compressed file? How uneducated are we assuming our audience is? I would probably add something like the following to the above tip: "Compressed files usually have a file name that ends with ".gz", ".z". Files that that end with ".tgz" are usually compressed tar archives (see "man tar" for information about the tar command) and "man gunzip" for information on how to uncompress them." Another misleading tip is: "Need to leave your terminal for a few minutes and don't want to logout? Use "lock -p". When you return, use your password as the key to unlock the terminal." That only keeps people like my boss out. There are many other examples of poorly stated tips I could list, but I hope I got my point across -- before we start displaying these messages (by whatever means) to users/sysadmins/aliens we need to do a bit of editing. Now if you read this far, you might think I'm against this. Not at all. I just want to make sure that we are giving the right tips to the correct audience. And that we are giving them enough information that, if they follow our tips, it will lead them to the correct solution/information. And that we tell them how to opt-out of our advice. -Mike -- Mike Pritchard mpp@FreeBSD.org or mpp@mppsystems.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-arch" in the body of the message
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