Date: Thu, 12 Apr 2001 10:40:00 -0400 From: Leonard Zettel <zettel@acm.org> To: "freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG" <freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Documentation opportunities (Was: resolv.conf overwrite Message-ID: <3AD5BE40.2E1E9AA7@acm.org>
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Once more, thanks to all who responded. I once again feel
I am off the dime (you aren't stymied until you've run out
of things to try :-)).
(If the rest of this belongs somewhere else, my apologies).
At the same time I can't resist observing (advocates of RTFM
please note) that by now my documentation expenditures are
as follows:
The Complete Free BSD (which is why I *bought* the CD-ROM) $40 (approx)
Unix Power Tools $63.55
Using Samba Special Edition $42.39
The Unix System Admin Handbook (coming) $74.00
Online Handbook 0.00
------
Total so far $219.94
This for a system for home use.
The System Admin Handbook hasn't arrived yet.
dhclient is not in the index of the other books listed above and I
don't recall a reference to it in any of the documentation I have
perused.
I first tangled with a computer in 1961. Tangling with computers
(mostly as a producer of applications) was my primary job
responsibility from about 1963-1995. As a market,
I am probably typical of a hopelessly small segment (and a darn
curmudgeon to boot "Sonny, I remember when...").
In my opinion, the "naive hacker" approach of "type the following lines
and it'll be ok" or "after semi-random attempts here, here, and
here, this is what worked", while it has its place, is overwhelming
everything.
Damnit, I am not going to be happy until I feel *I understand what
is going on* with my wonderful machines and the systems they run.
That to me is the real (and wonderful) promise of the open source
movement and its relatives. At the moment I see FreeBSD as my last,
best hope of doing that. Right now I would be happy knowing
exactly what scripts, files etc. my system is accessing when it
boots up and how to read them. What logs are produced and how to
read them. Yes, I can read C code. I feel I can learn to read
scripts (hopefully with the help of some of the stuff I have bought).
As of now, I am trying to get basic services running under FreeBSD
4.2, trying as much as possible to follow the principle of least upset.
In configuring I had to make more choices whose consequences I only
vaguely understood than I would have liked, and I undoubtedly got
some of them wrong. Since being up and running I have fooled with
/etc/rc.conf /usr/local/etc/smb.conf and /etc/resolv.conf and
that's about all (that I can remember anyway).
I have tried to install Star Office and samba 2.0.7 using the ports
mechanism and they are both running (sort of, at least). I need samba
because my laser printer is attached to the (dual boot)FreeBSD machine
and my wife at times wants to print stuff on it from her Win98
machine (getting her on FreeBSD will come much later, if at all).
Getting print share running is the next specific to do on my list.
So: what else should this documentation nut be looking at?
And, to all of you out there, if it hasn't been written yet,
you will be doing the community and the movement a great service
if you change that.
<rant off>
-LenZ-
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