Date: Sat, 28 Aug 1999 13:29:08 -0700 From: Doug <Doug@gorean.org> To: Young <young@richardson.apana.org.au> Cc: Jeff Baker <Jeff.Baker@ACADHOTLINE.net.au>, freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: adopt a newbie program - Thanks Message-ID: <37C84694.82C20A4B@gorean.org> References: <01d601bef0fe$08ad7f20$857e03cb@jdy>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
Young wrote: > I agree in principle, but not in practice .... the experts regard so much > stuff that causes > newbies untold grief as too trivial to even mention. I'm not suggesting it > any way that its intentional, but there are countless things that an > experienced unix user takes for granted assuming EVERONE knows basic stuff > as well as they (the experts) do. What you say is absolutely true. Experienced users who worked hard to obtain a basic facility with unix have an expectation that someone who wants to learn the system will put a little effort into learning it themselves. The problem is that there isn't any one place to start. Every bit of knowledge assumes some other bits of knowledge, and there really aren't any alternatives to just slogging through it till it starts making sense. > A common issue here is the MAN's & HOWTO's .... which may well be a valuable > reference > tool if one knows a bit, but to a newbie looking for a simple command its > totally frustrating having to wade through a list of 345, 347,237 switches > (of which maybe 2 apply in 99% of instances) and maybe 443 lines to find the > ONE you need. How is the man page supposed to know what switch you want to use? Unix rewards those who get in there and dig, it does not reward people who want to be spoon fed. Also, the neat thing about FreeBSD is that if you don't like the documentation, you are ENCOURAGED to submit changes. Personally I've worked pretty hard to improve what I can, and although I think I'm better at faking it than some of the "higher level" programmers I don't have a new user perspective anymore. The short version is, if you don't like what you see, work to change it. But please don't expect the entire Unix world to change just because you happened to step into it. Doug To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?37C84694.82C20A4B>