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George Prowse wrote: |
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> Roy Bamford wrote: |
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>> On 2008.02.03 16:49, Matthew Summers wrote: |
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>>> Roy Bamford wrote: |
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>>>> Many new users come to gentoo as their first Linux. Many of them |
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>>>> are poorly informed about both Linux and Gentoo - I don't know how |
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>>>> to reach this group *before* they start asking for help in #gentoo |
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>>>> and on the forums. Thats the sort problem we have to solve. |
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>>>> |
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>>>> |
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>>> Roy, |
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>>> |
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>>> Towards a solution to this particular issue above, I suggest Gentoo |
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>>> provides a documentation project (possibly) entitled "Learning Linux |
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>>> with Gentoo". Within this we could easily address many issues faced |
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>>> by new Linux/Gentoo users. |
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<snip> |
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>>> |
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>>> As always, I offer my assistance/support in the aforementioned |
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>>> endeavor. |
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>>> |
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>> Matthew, |
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>> |
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>> I think this is a good idea. However, one of the issues is that a body |
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>> of new users is not even aware of the existance of the current |
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>> documentation. |
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>> |
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>> e.g. How to head off questions like "I've just started the minimal CD |
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>> to install Gentoo but all I get is a black screen with some text at the |
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>> bottom. Where do I click to install Gentoo?" |
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>> |
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>> I'm not 100% sure it wasn't a troll but as this represents a class of |
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>> problems seen on the forums, I'm sure that some are genuine. |
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>> |
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> |
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> Maybe a quick Q&A for newcomers is needed? A kind of precis of what |
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> there already is with links to the longer documents? |
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> |
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I have to say all this sounds like lowering the bar a little too far. While |
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I am all for introducing newbs to Gentoo (in fact I've just got a |
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67-year-old and his wife, who don't know computers at all, hooked on Gentoo |
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KDE;) that's not the same as them learning to install and administer a |
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Genoo Linux system. |
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|
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I'd favour a "Why Gentoo Is Not For You" page, done as politely and |
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respectfully as we can, pointing out that some basic *nix knowledge, |
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including at the CLI, is pretty much mandatory for someone to be able to |
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maintain a Gentoo box properly. (I'm not interested in the corner-cases |
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where someone did actually manage to learn Linux on Gentoo first; sometimes |
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exceptions prove rules.) This is not to be elitist: it's simply so that |
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distros like Mandriva or Ubuntu, which /are/ setup for computing newbs, can |
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fulfil that part of the learning curve. |
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|
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I don't think Gentoo could ever be at that stage until and unless it has the |
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equivalent of the Mandrake Control Centre. #gentoo-guis is working towards |
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that imo, so join there and help out if you want to make Gentoo "just |
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work". himerge is really lush, if a bit tricky to install; insns at: |
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http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Himerge |
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-- |
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