Re: water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink.
When you do come back, you have to realize a few things.
First of all, installing and using any linux distro, especially debian,
is nothing like installing and using windows. It doesn't matter how
much of an expert you are in windows. It won't carry over into debian.
This is a major source of frustration for newbies like you, because they
expect windows but don't get it.
Second, you cannot learn to use linux the same way you learned to use
windows. In windows, if you point and click enough, you will eventually
learn how to do virtually everything that is possible in windows. This
is actually one redeeming quality of windows-- it is easy to learn. No
books are required. The trade-off is that you are quite limited in what
you can learn. A linux distro, on the other hand, is much harder to
learn but is vastly more configurable. This is by design. We like it
this way. You aren't going to learn to use debian by merely
experimenting and pointing and clicking. Research and lots of reading
will be required, even to do stuff that's trivially easy for you to do
on windows.
Third, the documentation you seek is out there. The documentation is
less organized for debian because debian is not a commercial entity like
Redhat. There is little motivation to make debian easier to learn for
newbies because no one is making any money from a new adopter of debian.
Maybe you'd have a better experience if you bought a shrink-wrapped
version of Redhat or Mandrake or whatever. You'd get a nice install
manual and some hand-holding. Remember, you get what you pay for. Also
consider buying an O'Reilly book. Their "Running Linux" (is that the
right title?) book is a huge help for newbies. I still look up stuff in
it all the time and I've been fiddling with linux for 5 years now.
You need to understand that it is not easy to setup and administer a
linux box if you're new to it, which is apparently what you wanted to
do. If you want it to be easy, there are other OS's that will make it
easier. However, we believe you will get the best experience out of
debian, which is why we advocate it. It won't happen overnight, and it
will be frustrating at times, but it's not impossible.
Finally, complaining that debian is not like windows (which is exactly
what you did, even if you don't realize that) isn't going to get you
anywhere. The reason we all use debian is because it's *not* like
windows.
How come no one explains this stuff to newbies before they try a linux
distro?
-Nelson
----- Original Message -----
From: "Kevin Stokes" <linux@pieskysoft.com>
To: <debian-user@lists.debian.org>
Sent: Thursday, April 12, 2001 11:08 PM
Subject: Re: water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink.
> >Nice. So, what - you're a martyr now? Give us a break. <
>
> No, I'm not a martyr. I was just trying to be funny. I shouldn't
have
> put that part in, since it didn't add to the analogy.
>
> I'm sorry I started the whole thing. I'm going to unsubscribe from
the list
> and leave my Linux box idle for a week or so, and maybe come back to
it
> later.
>
> For those who were annoyed by me, I apologize.
>
> -Kevin
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-request@lists.debian.org
> with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact
listmaster@lists.debian.org
>
>
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