Koozali.org: home of the SME Server
Legacy Forums => Suggestions => Topic started by: wyron on April 23, 2004, 09:55:51 AM
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Before gbairds mounting rage does him an injury, wouldn't it be appropriate to construct a new forum reserved for newbie questions?
Perhaps we could persuade him (and 'guests' of the same brand) to simply ignore such a forum.
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Firstly, since this is my fisrt post i would like to say what an awesome job the people behind SMEServer have done! I couldn't get Samba to work with full distros like rh/mdk. But with SME it worked straight after setup...
TO comment on this thread. I like this idea.. since currently there are:
General discussion
&
Experienced User Forum
as a newbie myself... i have some ridiculously simple questions that are too simple for even the general thread(at least judging from the first 12 pages of threads)
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The General discussion forum IS the place for beginners & newbies questions.
I don't think more forums are needed, there are already too many places to read to keep in touch with everything that's going on.
What seems to irk many users (and rightly so) is that MANY questions have already been answered before.
ALL users including beginners should do a search of the forums first, and remember to click on the "Show all results" link.
Report your findings (or lack of findings) in your query post and hopefully other users will respect you for having made an effort to search first (even if you could not find the answer due to wrong search criteria or whatever).
I would say to ignore people who are less than courteous.
All forum posters/users do so voluntarily so no-one really can complain, they don't have to answer anybodys query.
Regs
Ray
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ALL users including beginners should do a search of the forums first, and remember to click on the "Show all results" link
I think I remember a statement similar to this at the begining of the forums at the old e-smith (mitel) site.
Would it be possible to have this done?
Sometimes a gentel push in the right direction is a much better than swinging a big (verbal)club.
Would it be possible to provide a web links page to some of the better sources for the more generic questions. With so many experenced users, there has to be a wealth of information as to where to find this stuff. I am not promoting giving the the answers, just pointing them in the right general direction.
Bob
ps. could the "show all results" be made a little bigger, bolder, and possibly red, or some color to catch your attention a little quicker?
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Hi
I also think users have to search by themself first
When i learned linux my teacher tolld me before asking question RTFM
I think it's the best way to understand
After searching if you don't find answer you post in general or exprienced ...
Someone will help you
A proof concept :
If you give someone a fish he will eat one day
If you learn him how to fish he will eat forever
(sorry for my poor translation)
By the way i think it will be better to learn newbies how to search instead off just reply to their answer
Regards
Souley
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Hi
I also think users have to search by themself first
Souley
An' ain't that the truth.
The problem is, as has been stated in various other threads, that they don't know this, being, well . . newbies, as it were.
I have had several questions posted to me in my private mailbox from people not daring a question in the 'General discussion' for fear of a rude answer from someone like gbaird, taking an offensive approach. Hence my request for a newbie forum, which would hopefully be ignored by such people.
One rebuke, and they might never come back (and gbaird would say: Good riddance), one hint at the possibilities instead, and they might become valued contributors in the end.
Now I agree absolutely with your analogy about the gift and the education, but answering people by leading them to the search possibilities, and perhaps even supplying them with a few meaningful links is the best way there is, if you want a continued productive environment !
Patience and understanding are the keywords, now as always.
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1: The things is, i know for alot of the linux old hands the current General forum seems like a newbie thread. But alot of it really isn't. its more like an intermediate thread.
2: with regards to searching, speaking from experience, sometimes i dont even know what to search for. Vague descrictions in my head wont match somebody elses.... therefor, if i was to briefly explain it, although it might be a repeat of an earlier thread, someone could just say... "oh, you mean xyz", check out this thread.
3: what about pinned threads like alot of forums do? That way the common topics that arise could get pinned.
4: like wyron said, sometimes a question may be so basic that a user is afraid to ask. (general is actually quite intimidating to a newb).
5: the more open and welcoming the community is. the more this distro will grow. this is a very promising distro, lets make the community one that encourages absolute newbs to try their hand at a linux server (so far, it has been the easiest by a long way as far as setting up a linux server goes).
edit- 6: finally, if there was a Newb thread, myself and others like me would gladly field any really obvious questions. I've seen this alot in other forums, where recent converts help the inquisitive, leaving the gurus to field guru worthy questions:)
just my thoughts on the whole thing.
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1: The things is, i know for alot of the linux old hands the current General forum seems like a newbie thread. But alot of it really isn't. its more like an intermediate thread.
2: with regards to searching, speaking from experience, sometimes i dont even know what to search for. Vague descrictions in my head wont match somebody elses.... therefor, if i was to briefly explain it, although it might be a repeat of an earlier thread, someone could just say... "oh, you mean xyz", check out this thread.
3: what about pinned threads like alot of forums do? That way the common topics that arise could get pinned.
4: like wyron said, sometimes a question may be so basic that a user is afraid to ask. (general is actually quite intimidating to a newb).
5: the more open and welcoming the community is. the more this distro will grow. this is a very promising distro, lets make the community one that encourages absolute newbs to try their hand at a linux server (so far, it has been the easiest by a long way as far as setting up a linux server goes).
edit- 6: finally, if there was a Newb thread, myself and others like me would gladly field any really obvious questions. I've seen this alot in other forums, where recent converts help the inquisitive, leaving the gurus to field guru worthy questions:)
just my thoughts on the whole thing.
I totally agree with you. The first time I visited the forum I didn't really know where to begin...
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For my part i would not divide the forum any further. The more subforums the more confusion and we have to jump around in another one.
- New to SME
- Intermediate/General
- Experienced
does not look too bad, but I estimate 75% of the newbie questions (including my own) are answered with
man <command>
RTFM
use search
look into server-manager
Some people need it kind of "personal adviced", some with more autonomous minds would probably look into a sticky thread. Others lacking self-confidence would do nothing. I slightly doubt that a newb section will encourage them to do otherwise. But i am far away of being sure.
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Maybe FAQ or Knowledge Base with links to most repetitive issues discussed on the forum will help?
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The General discussion forum IS the place for beginners & newbies questions.
Ray
I disagree, the General Forum is intermediate at best.
You seem to think that the community is only for gurus like yourself. As was stated. you do not have to visit the forum. So stop being selfish. The forums are far from easy to use and find information in.
I don't think more forums are needed, there are already too many places to read to keep in touch with everything that's going on.
Ray
I disagree, a newbe forum is an absolute necessity for those who are not very experienced at being self taught or confident in this their ability.
What seems to irk many users (and rightly so) is that MANY questions have already been answered before.
Ray
And this would not be a problem for newbees if the forum algorithm was a bit more precise in bringing up relevent data.
Maybe we need a how to search the forums forum as well. Then you people who seems to find things very easy can teach the rest of us how you go about doing it. :lol:
ALL users including beginners should do a search of the forums first, and remember to click on the "Show all results" link.
Ray
I would agree with you on this however, since the E-smith forums were moved to the contribs site, and the data tranfered into the new format, it has been very difficult finding relevent information. Before, you could limit your searches by forum and somewhat by date. I found a lot of relevent information under the old system. If I attemplted to find that data that I needed before, I would not be able to find it. I know because I have had this experience. Now, when I find something that helps me, I save a copy to the hd so that if I forget, I will yet have access to it.
Report your findings (or lack of findings) in your query post and hopefully other users will respect you for having made an effort to search first (even if you could not find the answer due to wrong search criteria or whatever).
Ray
Your not being realistic. I have come across posts where people have done just that, and read a reply that ridiculed them becuse they didn't find what they needed.
I would say to ignore people who are less than courteous.
All forum posters/users do so voluntarily so no-one really can complain, they don't have to answer anybodys query.
Regs
Ray
It would be better if we could ban them from the forum for a couple days or so. This would discourage this type of behavior.
The facts are the facts. The forums are not very easy to search. The Distro is not very well documented. Even the man pages and the files that came from Mitel had a lot to be desired. Basic Information that should have been in those help pages are not there. Last and finally an end to my long winded response is a question: Why would adding a Newbee formum make it so confusing for you? You would not need to search the newbee forum at all. But then you know as well as I do, you would be forced to search the newbee forum because the forum search engine is not as easily restricted as it was when the forums were on the E-smith website. And so, you would have to take an extra step or two to eliminate the Newbee forum from your searches.
nuff said:
Scott
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Dear Scott
> I disagree, the General Forum is intermediate at best.
What is wrong with Beginners posting to the General forum ? You say it is a Intermediate forum, but that is only because of the content (or perceived content) that is there. If more Beginners "just go ahead and post there", then it will have more beginners type content. There is NOTHING that says beginners questions are excluded from that forum.
>Why would adding a Newbee formum make it so
> confusing for you?
> You seem to think that the community is only for
> gurus like yourself. As was stated. you do not have
> to visit the forum. So stop being selfish.
To put forward an opinion is not being selfish & I certainly did not say that having a Newbie forum would be confusing to me.
If you read my posts you will find most of them are helpful to people I don't even know, far from a selfish attitude.
I do believe I halp people who are in fact "of a newbie origin", as deduced by their questions. Thanks for calling me a guru, perhaps an experieneced user may be a better phrase, but I was a beginner only a few years ago myself & I know the pitfalls that beginners stumble on.
I just was saying that there are already 4 forums and 3 mailing lists plus the contribs site generally to read, to keep abreast of what's going on with sme server.
> Then you people who seems to find things very easy > can teach the rest of us how you go about doing it.
Well nobody particularly taught me, although quite a few people assisted me, it was also by trial and error, you learn different approaches to searching when initial searches fail to find the answer needed.
I never said it was easy to find things, sometimes some considerable effort is needed, quite often beginners do not search thoroughly enough, and that is the message that was being conveyed, usually by example, ie someone says they can't find something, after a 5 minute search I find the result and post it for them, hopefully next time they search a little harder.
Probably the biggest thing to do is to spend time reading lots of search results. There are many times where I have spent a couple of hours going through lots of old posts, to find some pertinent information, that subsequently I have used to create a HOWTO and given back to the community to be able to easily find and use.
> Now, when I find something that helps me, I save a > copy to the hd so that if I forget, I will yet
> have access to it.
I do the same thing myself.
> Your not being realistic. I have come across posts > where people have done just that, and read a reply > that ridiculed them becuse they didn't find what
> they needed.
Well some people do that, I can't stop them, it's part of human nature to be impatient & discourteous. You will have to search hard for a post where I blasted someone, I can only remember one, and that was at the end of a 115 message thread where the poster was just not "doing it" even though they had been told many times.
As far as your gripes are concerned about the current site, what have you done to improve it. After all it is now in the hands of the community and that is you and me. The site documentaion etc will only improve if you or me or someone else makes it better. Contact Jeff Coleman to offer your services. You only have to do a litle bit, if everyone did a little bit then that adds up to a lot.
I have seen some other sites where the forums are arranged by subject matter, with headings for certain topics eg mail, backup, etc and this concept does seem to be more user friendly and an easier way to access information. Perhaps a restructuring of the forums entirely would be another way to go, see Darrell May site for an example.
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The above post was mine, the system timed out & my login name was lost.
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Dear Scott
What is wrong with Beginners posting to the General forum ? You say it is a Intermediate forum, but that is only because of the content (or perceived content) that is there. If more Beginners "just go ahead and post there", then it will have more beginners type content. There is NOTHING that says beginners questions are excluded from that forum.
There is nothing wrong with people posting newbee questions in the General Forum. I just think that it would be best in the long run to put those questions in a newbee forum where it will be expected that those questions will be asked time and time again.
By doing this, anyone who goes into the newbee forum and posts a slam as was mentioned in the original post of this thread, can be temporarily or permanently bared from the forum.
Another plus to this, is that when those who have had a little bit of experience go into the newbee forum and find a question they know the answer to, they can provide the answer to the question.
Remember the first time you answered a question for someone? Remember the confidence it gave you when you realized that all that fussing around with the system actually stuck and you remembered it?
It would be far easier for those fresh to the SME server to build confidence in realizing they actually know how to resolve a problem if there was a newbee forum.
To put forward an opinion is not being selfish & I certainly did not say that having a Newbie forum would be confusing to me.
It is of my opinion that if there is an easier way and better way to do something you do it. It would be far easier and better for newbees if there was a newbee forum.
It is also of my opinion, that when people keep something more complicated than it needs to be, they do so out of selfish ambition. Such as the individual who witholds training on a job because he is afraid that he may loose his position if he doesn't.
Though this may not be the case with you, it just seems to me from reading the posts in this thread that some people are way to eager to keep things as they are becuase their skill level, and their comfort level adjusted to the status quo.
So from my perspective, this whole debate is needless. If there is a way to make things a little easier for those wha are absolute newbees, we should do it.
If you read my posts you will find most of them are helpful to people I don't even know, far from a selfish attitude.
I do believe I halp people who are in fact "of a newbie origin", as deduced by their questions. Thanks for calling me a guru, perhaps an experieneced user may be a better phrase, but I was a beginner only a few years ago myself & I know the pitfalls that beginners stumble on.
I just was saying that there are already 4 forums and 3 mailing lists plus the contribs site generally to read, to keep abreast of what's going on with sme server.
Sorry, I took this as meaning it was somewhat confusing.
Well nobody particularly taught me, although quite a few people assisted me, it was also by trial and error, you learn different approaches to searching when initial searches fail to find the answer needed.
I never said it was easy to find things, sometimes some considerable effort is needed, quite often beginners do not search thoroughly enough, and that is the message that was being conveyed, usually by example, ie someone says they can't find something, after a 5 minute search I find the result and post it for them, hopefully next time they search a little harder.
Nobody taught you is a good example of why we need a newbee forum. I as you can pick up a book or go to websites and learn how to do something. Our ability to do this is a gift, not a given. Most people need to be taught and so the delema.
Because they are so accustomed to being taught, they have very limited research skill, as well as the patience that is needed to go along with it. With this in mind, I think the reason beginners do not search longer is because the results from a search may be of no use. If a beginner is not knowledgable enough to be able to come up with a different word for the same problem, he is out of search options.
Probably the biggest thing to do is to spend time reading lots of search results. There are many times where I have spent a couple of hours going through lots of old posts, to find some pertinent information, that subsequently I have used to create a HOWTO and given back to the community to be able to easily find and use.
Time is money, people are impatient, and why wast time reading something that won't fix your problem right away?
Well some people do that, I can't stop them, it's part of human nature to be impatient & discourteous. You will have to search hard for a post where I blasted someone, I can only remember one, and that was at the end of a 115 message thread where the poster was just not "doing it" even though they had been told many times.
I've read some posts like that where the person keeps saying they don't get it. Honestly, if they are truely that inept, how do they turn on the computer. I think those particular people are moles who are trying to make the SME and linux look harder to use than it is.
As far as your gripes are concerned about the current site, what have you done to improve it. After all it is now in the hands of the community and that is you and me. The site documentaion etc will only improve if you or me or someone else makes it better. Contact Jeff Coleman to offer your services. You only have to do a litle bit, if everyone did a little bit then that adds up to a lot.
I'm not all that good at programming. I however, am considering putting up a newbee forum on my own server and hosting it. This may in the long run be better than if contribs puts one up. However, this will have to wait unitil my present situation is imporved.
I have seen some other sites where the forums are arranged by subject matter, with headings for certain topics eg mail, backup, etc and this concept does seem to be more user friendly and an easier way to access information. Perhaps a restructuring of the forums entirely would be another way to go, see Darrell May site for an example.
I agree as it breaks things down to not only be easier to find, but should be easier to search. The question is, will there be enough catagories to provide the convenience of such a setup?
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The previous post is mine, the server timed out. That's getting anoying. :hammer: :pint: :lol:
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Scott
> I however, am considering putting up a newbee
> forum on my own server and hosting it. This may in
> the long run be better than if contribs puts one up.
If you feel a newbie forum is needed, then why don't you ask Jeff Coleman or Hsing Foo Wang to create a new forum, and offer your services to be the Moderator of it. That way you can screen the posts, if people are abusive.
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Scott
If you feel a newbie forum is needed, then why don't you ask Jeff Coleman or Hsing Foo Wang to create a new forum, and offer your services to be the Moderator of it. That way you can screen the posts, if people are abusive.
Ray - what an excellent idea!
Perhaps I should break in here, since the suggestion was originally mine.
I'll mail Hsing Foo today (with this thread as a reference) and suggest exactly that.
This way, perhaps, I can at least (and at last) begin to feel that there was also something for me to do.