Date: Mon, 02 Mar 1998 04:54:35 -0800 From: Studded <Studded@san.rr.com> To: Sue Blake <sue@welearn.com.au> Cc: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: newbies mailing list (and other ways to improve user help) Message-ID: <34FAAC0B.9933BA70@san.rr.com> References: <19980301181929.41719@welearn.com.au> <Pine.BSF.3.96.980301210912.26963A-100000@andrsn.stanford.edu> <19980302172511.58160@welearn.com.au>
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Sue Blake wrote: > > On Sun, Mar 01, 1998 at 09:59:13PM -0800, Annelise Anderson wrote: > > [cc list trimmed] > > > > A newbies mailing list might be a good idea--the question that > > arises is who's going to staff it? It seems Sue has sort of been > > drafted....I think it will be a fairly demanding project. > > Perhaps, perhaps not. It depends on how much use and how much support it > gets, and a lot of things we won't know until we try. I don't see that as > sufficient reason for not trying. Not yet anyway :-) I think you're underestimating the importance of having a fairly concrete plan of action with definable goals. You are going to have to overcome a great deal of resistance to get this off the ground, and if it fails due to poor planning the failure will be held up for years to come as a reason not to try again. > > Here are a few points I would make: > > You made a lot of thoughtful comments about how some newbies access support, > but I'm not quite sure how to relate it to the idea of the proposed mailing > list. Maybe I've missed the main thrust, a common fault. As tempting as it is to respond to this directly, I'll let it pass. :) However, without my speaking for annelise you have missed a major point. A more important question than "do we need a newbie mailing list?" is "why do we *think* we need a newbie mailing list, and could the conditions that lead to this feeling be better addressed in other ways?" > Are you saying that you think the mailing list is a good or bad idea? Why are you assuming that she was speaking directly to your issue? I don't intend to sound hostile, however I think you've focussed your goals too narrowly. You want a newbie mailing list, and since you have this hammer in your hand, every problem looks like a nail. Personally I see a number of problems related to this idea. Not the least of which is that one of the basic tenets of providing user help is having a single point of entry. Splitting the entry level help between -newbies and -questions will only lead to confusion and frustration. "But freebsd-newbies will not be a help list." Ok, then what will it be? The main thing I've heard from Sue is that it should be a place where newbies are "comfortable," and "valued." These are extremely difficult goals to accomplish with a mailing list. At the same time, what we have now is far from perfect. Although I rarely see people actively mistreated on any freebsd list, I have seen answers that are less than helpful (if not flat out wrong). Also, the documentation on the www and ftp sites is rather overwhelming and lacks a coherent vision. For example, let's take one of the most common questions on -questions. Q: I want to install freebsd but I went to the ftp site and I can't figure out what to download. At first glance this looks like pure laziness on the part of the newbie. However a quick once over on the ftp site shows that there isn't a clear entry point. The README file in the root directory spends most of its time talking about mirror sites. There are several documents in the sundry directories that talk about how, when, where and why, but they don't talk about what. This problem could be solved by adding a paragraph to the README file like this: What To Download: ----------------- Most of you will want to download the 2.2.5-Stable distribution. It contains the most up to date.... blah. For those interested in a little adventure, you might want to give the 3.0-Current distribution a try.... blah. If you need updated bits for an older 2.1.x installation you will find them in the 2.1.7.1-Release directory.... blah. The www site does a lot better in this regard, and it's improved a lot in the 2 years that I've been around. The fact that people can't seem to find the help they need there is proof of the fact that most people actually *are* lazy. :) The people on efnet #freebsd are sometimes perceived as unhelpful because they tell people to go read the documentation. (D'oh!) This leads to another important point to keep in mind. Unix *is* in fact a difficult thing to learn. One of the things that makes it that way is that unix knowledge is very interdependent. You need to know X to learn Y, but you can't learn X till you learn Q, and Q won't give up its favors till you've teased H into submission... etc. This gets very frustrating for new people. In fact, it frustrates the jeebers out of me sometimes. :) Therefore, the person who is going to be successful with unix has to be highly self motivated. The flip side to this is that you gain a tremendous feeling of accomplishment from the achievements you do succeed in. Whether the one balances out the other is purely a matter of personal judgment. :) Giving people a forum to express their joy in accomplishment would probably be a good thing. Whether we need a new list for that or not is still open to debate. I think a better goal would be to make a consistent effort to improve the facilities that we have available already. Annelise made an excellent point in her previous post. As good as they are, our user help facilities need some work. I would like to make the following proposals. 1. A recognition on the part of the core team that there are improvements to be made. One of the most frequent responses I've received to my suggestions in this regard was that what we have works. Well, *sometimes* there are historical reasons for "The Way Things Are" that I don't understand and am happy to learn. More often (in my opinion) institutional lethargy works against change, with "They'll catch on if they try hard enough" attitude as a justification. There is a balance needed of course, as I made the case for above. However, if freebsd is going to grow and flourish, the needs of new (and sadly microsoft-indoctrinated) users are going to have to be addressed. 2. We need people to analyze and provide solutions for the areas where we currently lack. There has been some progress in this regard, there needs to be more. Someone needs to analyze what's coming into -questions and make suggestions for things to add to the FAQ and/or Handbook. A lot more of this has been happening recently, and that's a good thing. 3. Education for the folks in -questions. We have a lot of skilled helpers on the -questions mailing list. Sometimes this works to a disadvantage because those who might be able to provide simple answers to simple questions are sometimes scared away from doing so. We need to increase the cultural acceptance of both low level questions and good low level answers. More education about what constitutes a good answer, and how to ask good questions is also in order. (Kudos to Greg for his herculean efforts in this regard. :) I don't see any reason this can't happen on -questions, and it would have a lot of benefits. Finally, I don't want my comments to be taken as overly negative or critical. Things are improving, but we also have a ways to go. I am not categorically opposed to the idea of a newbie mailing list, but I don't think the need has been proven yet, nor the parameters and goals adequately defined. I hope this is of use, Doug -- *** Chief Operations Officer, DALnet IRC network *** *** Proud operator, designer and maintainer of the world's largest *** Internet Relay Chat server. 5,328 clients and still growing. *** Try spider.dal.net on ports 6662-4 (Powered by FreeBSD) To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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