Date: Sat, 9 Oct 1999 09:03:07 -0400 (EDT) From: Michael Lucas <mwlucas@blackhelicopters.org> To: laotzu@juniper.net (Chris Parry) Cc: blk@skynet.be, stable@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Roasting Newbies Message-ID: <199910091303.JAA33525@blackhelicopters.org> In-Reply-To: <19991008130803.R41817@juniper.net> from Chris Parry at "Oct 8, 1999 1: 8: 3 pm"
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
I'm taking this message as an opportunity to respond to the scads of private mail I have received. I never thought a web page would produce more mail than I could answer. ;) I don't think it's that we're actively hostile to newbies. We're just sick of answering the same questions over and over again. To be honest, I don't want developers wasting their time answering questions about the OS. I want them coding. I'm going to use one particular developer as an example. No offense is intended here, I'm not trying to single anyone out. (Okay, to be honest, this developer writes some pretty good flames that stick in my memory. ;) We have a guy who writes NIC drivers. He writes good NIC drivers. He knows his shit. He's happy to help anyone who presents him with a solid, useful trouble report. The number of solid, useful trouble reports that this individual receives is, at a guess, roughly a tenth of the total number he receives. The remainder of the reports are useless. The person reporting the problem doesn't know any better, though. And there's a lot more of these than there are of us. If a developer takes the time to explain to said user how to submit a trouble report, that's all well and good. But I'd rather intercept these before they reach a developer, and point said newbie at a web page that says "This is how you submit a NIC driver report." Make the page very detailed. Show said newbie that they, too, can actually gather the necessary information to file a useful and sensible PR. By the time said developer checks his mail, I want him to see not only the trouble report, but the reply that says, "Check out http://..../nic-trouble-report.html" This would reduce the developer's blood pressure, and make the newbie more likely to stick with FreeBSD. Actually, I think I'm going to go dig through the mail archives. Surely we have a good email or two on how to submit a NIC report that could be turned into a decent web page. ==ml > I think all of these are very good ideas. Set out plenty of pointers to > self-help and it makes dealing with people that want to learn much easier. > I love to say 'man it' or goto freebsd.org and follow the links to > 'newbie' or something similar. It also makes sense to keep a few of the > lists closed, then the newbie flames are just averted right away. > > While many people in the FreeBSD community may have an anti-newbie > attitude I find it slightly annoying. It was like this when linux was > very young in '93, many folks flamed newbies that asked dumb questions, > while they rarely replied to any questions that were actually technical at > all nor consistently pointed them to self-help, that has changed and I > think linux is far better to start people off with, but we should still be > reasonable about treating folks curiosities with some respect. > > My $.02, > > -chris > > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?199910091303.JAA33525>