From owner-freebsd-questions Thu Mar 11 8:46:48 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from dub-img-7.compuserve.com (dub-img-7.compuserve.com [149.174.206.137]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id F1EFE15221 for ; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 08:46:45 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from Malcolm_Boff@compuserve.com) Received: (from root@localhost) by dub-img-7.compuserve.com (8.8.6/8.8.6/2.18) id LAA26208 for freebsd-questions@freebsd.org; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 11:46:27 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 11:46:08 -0500 From: MALCOLM BOFF Subject: Use of questions To: freebsd-questions Message-ID: <199903111146_MC2-6DA1-5316@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Disposition: inline Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG I have been attached to freebsd-questions-digest for several = years with occassional outages and I have taken a broad brush analysis of what questions (hence problems) are most frequently asked. My conclusions are the 2 most major topics are 1) = installation related and 2) ppp related. I think that this should surely tell us that either the documentation or the mechanics related to installation are perhaps not what they should be for installation and that probably due to the way in which ISP's vary in there implementation is the most likely cause in the case of 'ppp'. In the case of installation problems it would seem to me that there is a split namely a) first time installations b) upgrades. a) here problems may be largely due to inexperience of UNIX and is perhaps understandable, however, b) should in theory not happen at all. The mere fact that users find that what worked on one release doesn't work on the next is extremely worrying if we wish industry to take FreeBSD seriously. The 'ppp' problems are also of concern since the only real authority on this (Brian@awfulhak.com ??) cannot be expected to be a guru on every ISP's implementation. (I have to say that having tried 3 ISP's in the UK I have not successfully managed to get connected via ppp so I have stayed with compuserve - it sickens me to say that MS$ can apparently do what I have failed to do in FreeBSD). Shouldn't there perhaps be a task force outside of freebsd-questions to build up some knowledge of what is going on with ISP's ? (freebsd-ppp ???). I have some other points to make but I will follow 'Greg's rule' and stick to a single question. Malcolm G. Boff To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message