Re: Documentation for total beginners
I take it you missed the flap last week or so about newbie documentation :)
I'll give you a perspective of a (self-proclaimed) Windows stud
transitioning to Linux. It is very, very hard. Even as I type this
(in mutt) I'm putting in my own hard returns because I have no clue
how to set my margins to 72 chars, and I don't want to get flamed.
It took me weeks to understand what exim & fetchmail are, how they
work together, how to configure them, etc. I looked and looked for
documentation, went to local bookstores, etc., and got completely
frustrated. The man pages made my eyes glaze over.
I've spent the past year and a half developing Java applications
on Solaris, so I'm familiar with Unix from a user perspective.
I get around in it just fine--no problems.
I've even switched my beloved Windows editor, Codewright, to vi
emulation. *nix from a user's perspective and *nix from an
administrative perspective are completely different, however,
as I have resoundingly discovered.
Admittedly, I'm a busy kind of guy, and I spend 30 minutes here,
an hour there, to get this Linux system up and running. Keep that in
mind. And I'm not crying or demanding that people write me
better documentation. I'm just trying to paint a possible picture
of what you might be signing up for by getting friends to run Linux.
They will call you ALL THE TIME ;-)
--Looking forward to that Debian/GNU Linux Bible that people
have been mentioning
On Wed, Apr 18, 2001 at 08:26:36PM -0400, - wrote:
> I have a few prospects that I'm trying to talk into doing Linux, Debian
> in particular. The problem is they have very little experience except
> using MS Windows for internet and games. I've written some very basic
> instructions for them just so they can at least log on and navigate
> through the directories. Much of my own experience comes from trial and
> error.
>
> I haven't seen any documentation that is suitable for anyone with their
> limited experience, nothing on internet, not in bookstores, and not in
> boxed sets. Everything seems to be geared towards people who,
> colloquially speaking, at least know how to multiply large numbers,
> whereas my proteges and I are just learning how to add single numbers.
>
> Does anyone know of any documentation that doesn't require extensive
> experience to comprehend?
> I don't consider myself to be an expert so I could benefit from that
> kind of documentation too.
>
> Should I tell my friends to forget Linux for now and come back after
> they have experience with other operating systems because otherwise, you
> can't get there from here?
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