No more "Tux"

[mowestusa]

Simply contributing to sites like linuxquestions.org or to the documentation projects out there is probably the best way to help out people who want to learn these types of things.

I believe you made a really good point here. I do believe that there are some noobs who would be more than happy to learn about Linux and would appreciate a noob friendly resource. However, I still feel like a noob lots of times, and when I try to find information on my won, it is often frustrating in the following ways.

1. Google can overwhelm. Sometimes google saves the day, other times you just don't know what to put into the search box to find the answers. I have spent too much time chasing links that did not apply to my situation or did not apply to my distro. Configuration questions questions fall into this catagory. Sometimes the ideas that are posted are old and outdated because there is a new configuration tool that does it automatically or with a couple of clicks instead of 30 minutes of editing a text file. Dann is no dummy, but he couldn't figure out how to configure gnome to launch certain programs when the files were opened until a recent post to this list. If Dann had difficulties with such a simple thing then how would a newbie find the help that they need.

2. Forums can be a curse or the best solution. I love the Linux forums out there, this one being one of my personal favorites. However, how does a newbie know in which forum to ask a question. Also searching forums can be frustrating like doing a google search. I have searched Ubuntu forums and found plenty of ideas and answers that are way outdated because they apply to the first couple of releases of Ubuntu and things have changed radically in recent releases. Also with Ubuntu it does seem like if you are a not running the latest release and the gnome desktop then the answers may not apply. For example search on how to get Samba shares running, and you will find 20 different ways but you have to know which release it applies to, and whether you are running gnome so you can use the simple configuration tool. I will say forums are great. For example this forum has answered a number of my newbie questions well, and pointed me in the right direction. I love linuxquestions, but they are getting so big that your question can quickly scroll past in a forum with no responses, or with few people even looking at your question, leaving your post unanswered.

3. Wiki's might be the answer, but here, how does a newbie know which one to go to. Unfortunately, there seem to be so many wikis and so many to choose from that we have a lot of the same artilces in all of them, and other topics remain uncovered. Wikipedia has become a standard, so you can go to one place for that type of information. We don't have a standard Linuxpedia where we can have a one stop solution for all things Linux, and maybe we shouldn't, but sometimes less choices is better for the newbie users.

For the reasons above, I do feel you make a good point. Perhaps we should simply contribute to the projects you mentioned. They seem to be the best standard we have going right now (although I still feel finding information on LDP is sometimes hard or the information is outdated).

Advantages of a monthly webzine: 1. Explores areas that perhaps never considered trying before because you thought it was too hard or never found the easy tutorial on line. 2. Gives new user something to look forward to, and at the same time giving the user a whole month to try it out, practice, and read the resources connected to the article. 3. Can produce a publication for a certain level of user (wiki articles and forum answers can range drastically between easy to netadmin level)

Considering everything, I believe that I've been encouraged to pour some attention into the LQ wiki and to start advancing my own Linux knowledge. Great discussion.

[Vogateer]

Mowestusa, that's a very good description of some problem areas. You've described feelings to which I—if not everyone else here—can easily relate. I've had the overwhelming Google results, the frustration of sifting through LDP, and feeling like I walked into the middle of a discussion on a forum, wishing I could rewind back to the beginning and pick up the knowledge I need, then come back and take something meaningful out of the discussion.

I just thought of Linux Questions since I listen to Jeremy's podcast regularly, think he's a level-headed guy, and believe he has developed an impressive and active community and Internet resource beyond the original forums. I haven't delved in to their wiki, but that's probably the best way to go about things. The only problem with wikis is that it takes a lot of work to try to make the writing consistent. You may write a well-defined documentation guideline, but you then have a tough job of both trying to get people to follow it, and if they don't follow it, editing their work so that it's consistent with the general style of the rest of the wiki. This takes a lot of work, and probably a dedicated team of people willing to devote some time towards achieving that consistent format and possibly labeling the level of difficulty.

I suppose there are different ways of learning, but I find that I prefer a flow along these lines:

• A history of the program, and more importantly, the problem the program was intended to solve. A very quick top-down look at the program.
  A few use cases to give me a feel for how the program is used.
  A few very simple examples, hopefully one that lets you get your hands dirty quickly.
  More complicated examples with explanations along the way as to why settings, flags, and options were chosen. Working from a bottom-up perspective until you get comfortable.
  Then you can start providing descriptions and lists of options, philosophies and pretty much get into the advanced topics from there.

Probably missed a few points there, and that's pretty general, but the initial top-down perspective and use case examples are very important for me. For some reason I started trying to learn LDAP lately, and it's been horribly frustrating trying to learn from just reading about it without using it. That's my fault for trying to do so, but cements my belief in learning by doing.