Date: Thu, 23 Jun 2005 15:01:05 +0300 From: Giorgos Keramidas <keramida@ceid.upatras.gr> To: cali <calculus@softhome.net> Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Explaining FreeBSD features Message-ID: <20050623120105.GA17140@orion.daedalusnetworks.priv> In-Reply-To: <011001c577e9$f2412c90$0201a8c0@SPECULUSHX1THE> References: <LOBBIFDAGNMAMLGJJCKNAENBFBAA.tedm@toybox.placo.com> <42BA8F5D.5040504@pacific.net.sg> <011001c577e9$f2412c90$0201a8c0@SPECULUSHX1THE>
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On 2005-06-23 12:51, cali <calculus@softhome.net> wrote: > > If they were like ultra-newbie, they might not even know how to access > the manual, but this is improbable. > > The idea is, the newbie gets repeatedly told "RTFM", so that > eventually they get the idea that they must work it out for themselves > because they develop this inner fear of asking for help and being > ridiculed, ie they don't want to portray themselves as a > "lamer". Usually it works. > > Sometimes there are people who will spout "RTFM" willy-nilly. I have > witnessed on several occassions (not on this list) of people spouting > "RTFM" when the manual in question did not contain the answer to the > question asked at all, thereby backfiring on the "RTFM" spouter and > resulting in self-ridicule. In such cases I believe that the spouter > has some self-esteem problem and likes to newbie-bash, or just hazards > a guess that the answer must be in the manual and automatically spouts > "RTFM". > > So the question bearer should state whether they have read the manual > first. Then if it turns out that the answer is in the manual, they > shall be ridiculed, resulting in them hopefully being much more > careful next time when they read the manual. > > Sometimes people ask simple questions, the answer is in the manual, > but reading the manual to find the answer is akin to reading a book to > discover how many pages it has. In such cases one feels that the > information asked should be somewhere else, not buried in a big > manual. It may be more useful in such cases to just answer the > question so it ends up in the mailing archive and comes up when > someone searches for it. I'm not watching the entire thread, so what I write below may seem a bit out of context. On the other hand, this particular post shows some of the few points I don't like about a stream of "RTFM" responses. You seem to overvalue "ridicule", IMHO. My intuition and experience with asking questions so far seems to be that it's usually a much better idea to give two-fold answers: - Actually point the user to a working solution (assuming there is one, of course). - Include relevant pointers to further documentation.
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