From owner-freebsd-questions Sun Mar 14 9:30:28 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from pop01.globecomm.net (pop01.globecomm.net [206.253.129.185]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 2AD4715208 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 09:30:12 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from zen@buddhist.com) Received: from WhizKid (r38.bfm.org [208.18.213.134]) by pop01.globecomm.net (8.9.0/8.8.0) with SMTP id MAA29628; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 12:29:36 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <3.0.6.32.19990314112250.008e0170@mail.bfm.org> X-Sender: stanislav@mail.bfm.org X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Light Version 3.0.6 (32) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 11:22:50 -0600 To: Nocturne , freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG From: "G. Adam Stanislav" Subject: Re: Horror story In-Reply-To: <36EB6E7D.8058ADE8@uswest.net> References: <3.0.6.32.19990312184205.008eabe0@mail.bfm.org> <3.0.6.32.19990313082158.008eaa20@mail.bfm.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG At 00:08 14-03-1999 -0800, Nocturne wrote: >Personally I think people who just scoff at those who haven't quite >got it yet don't deserve FreeBSD. Even someone asked a question that >is answered on the front page of the FreeBSD website I would *kindly* >tell them where they can find the answer. Personally, I agree. Nevertheless, when I was first starting, I posted a question there, and got a load of really nasty mail. One of them sent me private email (i.e. directly to me, bypassing questions), where he quoted my signature and said something like "so, you have designed some nice sites, but you need to get some computing experience." I replied asking him if 30+ years of computing experience was enough for him (yep, I've been at this since 1965). He never replied back. Just because one is new to Unix does not mean one knows nothing about computers. One of the ways I learned a lot about computers was by answering questions that people could easily find answers to. Years ago I was very active in Dr. Debug which was a Fidonet echo (same concept as Internet mailing list). It often happened that someone would ask "Is it possible to do such and such thing?" One might easily get annoyed and simply reply: "Why don't you try it, dummy." Instead, I would simply try it myself and reply: "Yes, I just tried it, and it works." That way I accomplished three things instead of one: 1. I would learn something new; 2. I would get them their answer; 3. I would tell them in a non-offensive way that all they had to do was try it. Of course, the reason they asked rather than try most likely was they were novice users and were afraid thier computer would blow up if they simply typed something at DOS prompt. I have a good friend who got a new AT (when it was the cream of the crop). His sister was using it for word processing, when suddenly "Fatal Error" appeared on the screen. She almost died thinking she killed her brother's computer! When I heard about it, I just laughed, but to her it was a very serious situation (which, of course, she learned from). Your way of kindly sending them to where they can find the answer is good, too. Chances are they did not look there because they were unaware of the existence of the resource, or possibly did not know how to use it. It is also possible they cannot use it: Some people have access to email but not to the web (although, I suppose, chances are people who try their way with FreeBSD do have web access). I have a good friend who works for the State of Wisconsin. He has email access at work, and is very comfortable using it. But he would not know how to load a web browser, let alone how to tell it to get him to a web page. >You have much better chances of getting it answered in -questions. If >you're not subscribed to -questions, you can put a note at the top (or >bottom) of your message saying that you aren't subscribed and thusly >need e-mailed replies. In most instances, your e-mail address is kept >in the To or CC headers and you get e-mailed replies automatically. Ah, I did get my answer from Robert Nordier who saw my post here. The problem was that I was only able to get 3.1-R using the 3.0-R bootinstall floppy and needed to boot from boot/loader instead of kernel, and then create a new kernel. >In any case, it breaks the charter to ask tech-support questions in >-newbies. Yes. But I started typing the message to share a horror story, not to ask a question. Only when I was done typing it, did I think it would not hurt to add "Any suggestions?" It did not. :-) I am the type of guy who tries everything possible to solve a problem without asking questions. Although, admittedly, without Robert's help I would probably not have solved this one. For the sake of others who may have the same problem, here are the steps I had to take: press F2 type "1:wd(1,a)boot/loader" type "boot kernel.GENERIC" log on as root type "disklabel -B wd1" type "cd /" type "cp kernel.GENERIC kernel" type "reboot" press F5 press F2 Now it works and I am very, very happy! Adam ===> Whiz Kid Technomagic <=== http://www.whizkidtech.net/ The resource center for webmasters and web users Winner of the Starting Point Hot Site award Winner of the Lighthouse Award Home of the Web Magic Award To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message