Date: Tue, 23 Jun 1998 00:43:35 +0100 From: Nik Clayton <nik@nothing-going-on.demon.co.uk> To: Tim Gerchmez <fewtch@serv.net>, Nik Clayton <nik@nothing-going-on.demon.co.uk>, freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Latest discoveries... Message-ID: <19980623004335.12833@nothing-going-on.org> In-Reply-To: <3.0.5.32.19980621215905.007fb8a0@mx.serv.net>; from Tim Gerchmez on Sun, Jun 21, 1998 at 09:59:05PM -0700 References: <3.0.5.32.19980621125604.007f66c0@mx.serv.net> <3.0.5.32.19980621125604.007f66c0@mx.serv.net> <19980621234817.22444@nothing-going-on.org> <3.0.5.32.19980621215905.007fb8a0@mx.serv.net>
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Notwithstanding the fact that your question was inappropriate for this
forum;
On Sun, Jun 21, 1998 at 09:59:05PM -0700, Tim Gerchmez wrote:
> I'm afraid I didn't find the answer where you said it was, or at least
> couldn't figure out how to use it. I tried at least 30 or 40 different
> forms of syntax as described in the man page section you mention and always
> got error messages.
You don't state this in your message. You don't say where you've looked
for information. You don't say which bit of the documentation you found
confusing.
Your message came across as "I can't be bothered to look this up, I'll
waste a few of everyone's resources by asking a question in the wrong
place to the wrong audience."
> Why the hell is it so hard just to get a simple answer sometimes?
The people who answer questions are doing so because they want to. The
answers you get are worth exactly what you pay for.
> Either you get "Read the manual stupid, it's right there,"
>From csh(1):
A simple command is a sequence of words, the first of which specifies the
command to be executed.
Great. A simple command, something like 'ls', or 'cd'.
A simple command or a sequence of simple com-
mands separated by `|' characters forms a pipeline.
OK. One or more commands is called a 'pipeline'. A term worth remembering.
We can string them together with the '|' character.
The output of each
command in a pipeline is connected to the input of the next.
Possibly confusing. But you can ignore this for the time being.
Sequences
of pipelines may be separated by `;', and are then executed sequentially.
You can connect pipelines together (and from *3* sentences ago we know
what a pipeline is) by separating them with ';'. Problem solved.
> "Ask in another group, we don't do questions here" or something similar.
Perfectly valid. Try posting SCSI questions to the -multimedia mailing
list and see how long people stay polite.
People subscribe to mailing lists for specific reasons. Posting messages
that are inappropriate to that forum are a burden on *everyone* who reads
the list, and (IMHO) unless publically 'rebuked' serve to encourage others
to do the same thing (which is the main reason I've cc'd the list with
this message).
> If someone asks *ME* a question that I can answer, I usually answer it
> (and point out further resources at the same time for further learning).
So do I. Usually. I ignore it if it's been answered many times before,
particularly if a cursory search in the mailing list archives would
turn up the answer. I ignore it if I don't know the answer.
I didn't ignore yours -- mainly because I wanted to remind folks that
questions in this forum are not appropriate. But I still included what
I felt was enough information for you to find the answer yourself.
Lest you think that I don't answer questions usefully, please consider the
*long* response I wrote to you a few days ago in private mail about how
to setup a FreeBSD network using private IP addresses and setting up a
name demon -- I didn't send that response to the list, I sent it direct
to you (although I notice that you quoted it fully when replying back
to the list about it -- quoting private e-mail in public is frowned upon,
and it would be appreciated if you didn't).
> Yet all I ever get (here OR on freebsd-questions) is "it's in the
> manual, it's in the manual, it's in the manual, it's in the manual,
> it's in the manual." OBVIOUSLY... EVERYTHING ANYONE EVER NEEDS TO KNOW
> IS IN A MANUAL OR BOOK SOMEWHERE, but time plays a factor as well.
You are expected to read the manual. It's *far* more efficient on everyone's
time if the information is written down in one place, rather than
having to regurgitate it everyone time someone repeats a question.
The FAQ/Handbook are *not* write-only documents.
> I could keep trying different forms of syntax on those aliases (might
> take me a week) until I got it, or could go spend $45 on a book to find
> the answer to one question.
That's certainly a recommended approach.
> Why is it so hard to give someone a quick answer to a simple question,
> so they can get on with what they're doing?
Have you tried IRC? It's more suited to the kind of rapid-response that
you seem to be expecting.
To tie in two threads; I humbly suggest that this is the wrong attitude
if you intend to run -current. As the documentation says, -current is
effectively unsupported. If you run into problems with that *and are not
prepared to read the documentation* you will hit problems sooner rather
than later. The people who run -current *and* answer questions have a
limited amount of free time, and are more likely to help out on interesting
problems that other -current users are having, rather than problems
probably generated by your own experience.
N
--
Work: nik@iii.co.uk | FreeBSD + Perl + Apache
Rest: nik@nothing-going-on.demon.co.uk | Remind me again why we need
Play: nik@freebsd.org | Microsoft?
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