Re: Thoughts on RTFM

[Alan Shutko <ats@acm.org>]

cmasters <cmasters@despamnbnet.nb.ca> writes:

> Do you see. No-one can possible be expected to ~read for comprehension~ a
> manual that has ~not~ been written with a ~complete~ newbie in
> mind. 

Remember that most of the people who tell others to RTFM are people
who _have_ bootstrapped themselves from no knowledge with the same, or
less, documentation as you have before you.  I'm one of them.

It's likely that their situation is not identical to yours.  Some
people learn better in this way than others.  When I began learning
Linux, I simply read all the available documentation and pieced things
together where I could.  In fact, I'd read all the available howtos
before I even installed Linux, because I hadn't yet gotten my machine.
(I did the same thing with C, for a similar reason.)

I do well at this sort of thing: taking large quantities of material
and putting things together.  It's hard for me to explain things in a
clear and linear fashion, because understanding came for me in an
instant of connecting seven different things, and I have trouble
expressing myself in other ways.

I don't want to sit here and say "I am better than you" but more "I am
different from you, and your experiences are important."  You are much
better situated to identify and correct problems with documentation so
that others who learn things as you do can benefit.  It's hard to do
so, but very worthwhile.

Here are some suggestions on making your path (hopefully) easier, and
pointing out problems you discover:

* Try to read in a less directed fashion.  Read documentation for
  which you have no immediate purpose.  Don't focus on trying to
  understand everything, or even much of anything.  The mere act of
  familiarizing yourself with the material will help you later on when
  you _do_ have a goal.  You may remember something that now makes
  sense to you, or at least remember that something can be done.

* When researching for an active goal, write down or remember somehow
  exactly what problems you find.  If you have a problem finding
  something in a manual, that's a bug in the manual.  Report it, and
  explain specifically what's wrong.  It probably looks completely
  clear to the person who wrote it, because they have context that you
  don't.  Your experience as someone without that context makes your
  input important.

* When asking questions, ask for specific pointers in the manuals, and
  explain where you've looked for other answers.  It may be that a
  person telling you to RTFM _thinks_ that the answer is somewhere in
  the manual, but is recalling incorrectly.  (It's happened to me more
  times than I can count.)  Clear communication will help identify
  these problems.

I hope this message is at least a little helpful.

-- 
Alan Shutko <ats@acm.org> - In a variety of flavors!
What happens when you cut back the jungle?  It recedes.