Date: Thu, 23 Dec 1999 11:59:39 -0800 (PST) From: David Wolfskill <dhw@whistle.com> To: tymbrwlf@bellsouth.net Cc: newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Experiences Message-ID: <199912231959.LAA65489@pau-amma.whistle.com> In-Reply-To: <002401bf4bc0$e0facc80$2e00040a@lhawk>
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>Reply-To: "Larry Hawk" <tymbrwlf@bellsouth.net> [Cc:d to -newbies despite this. dhw] >From: "Larry Hawk" <tymbrwlf@bellsouth.net> >Date: Tue, 21 Dec 1999 08:37:15 -0600 > My biggest frustration is with the IRC channels and some of the >newsgroups.... Please note that to some extent, the mechanisms you use for the communication will self-select the pool of possible responders. Not everyone has the time & inclination (as well as other requisite resources) to use IRC or USENET. >.... But what they seem to forget >is that everybody is a newbie at sometime.... Well, there are some of us who still feel like "newbies" to FreeBSD (despite many years of UNIX administration experience).... >Don't let anyone tell you otherwise; UNIX is very complex. That's going to be dependent, among other things, on the perspective and background of the observer. It certainly has complex aspects; no working OS doesn't. Whether or not you (as a user or administrator of the system) have that exposed to you is a rather different matter: I suggest that a relatively small number of folks who are capable of using (say) a microwave oven would also be able to write the code for the CPU that controls that appliance (and get it right, of course). > I thought the whole idea of the FreeBSD community was to promote >FreeBSD, Hmmmm.... Dunno; I don't recall seeing that expressed in that way previously. My impression was merely that the "FreeBSD community" was a rather eclectic group of individuals with various talents and perspectives, united by a desire to use and/or contribute to this working, free OS. "Promotion", per se, can be of significant value, but I'd be hard-pressed to consider that a goal in and of itself. >but when new folks get stuck and can't get help, then they're very >likely to just say "Screw this! Windows does what I want. I don't need this >kind of frustration!". Well, there again, this is observer-perception-sensitive. I, for example, have reacted precisely that way the few times I've tried to use a Microsoft product for something. >.... Unfortunately, not every potential FreeBSD user is a 23 year old >college computer major, who hacks code for their research paper. Although I was a CS major, my 23rd birthday was in 1974. :-} (This, for the record, was somewhat prior to the existence of "FreeBSD", per se.) >Most of us are competent PC users who want to >explore other alternatives besides MS. Ummmm.... Well, that may well describe you. It does not describe me -- though I hardly mind being somewhat anomalous. >I am a NT Admin and I consider myself >pretty darn knowledgeable about PCs, but my background is 100% MS, so *NIX >is very alien to me, so I can't really draw on past experience to help me >very much. But I'm learning and I'm quite proud of my progress. Well, congratulations! (Seriously!) As for me, PC hardware (& firmware & history) is one of my weakest spots. From my perspective, UNIX itself is pretty straightforward; it's the interactions with the hardware that engender confusion & grief. (Then again, back when I was an MVS systems programmer, I once wrote a program that did no I/O at all; to use it, one needed to run it under a debugger. But then, I *really* dislike I/O.) > Now in all fairness, there were many people who offered to help me. And >if it weren't for them I might have given up and throw the FreeBSD CDs in >the trash, but they didn't discourage or belittle me. They tried to help and >that's were the whole "community" parts comes in. Amen. > Sorry for rambling. I just had to vent a little.... Well, seems to me that if you needed to do that, this was probably an optimal forum for it. :-) Peace, david -- David Wolfskill dhw@whistle.com UNIX System Administrator voice: (650) 577-7158 pager: (888) 347-0197 FAX: (650) 372-5915 To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message
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