Dear Debian Installer Team,
Congratulations on the recent release of Debian Lenny.
I would also like to tip my hat to the people who worked on the installation
guide[1] and its translations into 16 languages. They did a fantastic job.
The comprehensive nature of that 141-page guide is invaluable to anyone who
has to perform a complex and/or uncommon task (such as using TFTP to boot a
computer over a network from another machine).
The trouble with comprehensiveness is that it frightens a new user who is
simply trying to set up a home desktop. For them, Debian's official
installation guide is not a good introduction to Debian and it is completely
at odds with the spirit of projects like Robert Millan's
Goodbye-Microsoft.com[2], where the goal is to provide the simplest possible
transition from MS Windows to Debian GNU/Linux.
For people who are new to GNU/Linux and are simply trying to install Debian
on a home desktop, I wrote an "Illustrated Guide to Installing Debian
GNU/Linux."[3]
The guide is 10 pages long and is filled with screenshots (to make the user
feel comfortable). To add a touch of comprehensiveness, I also included 12
pages of appendices to help them select partition sizes, introduce them to
package management, etc.
When I wrote the guide, I had the users of Goodbye-Microsoft.com in mind, so
I submitted it to Robert Millan, who asked me to send it to you.
I never intended to create an official Debian document, but -- if you think
that it is of good quality -- I would be happy to help you turn it into one
("source code"[4] and all 73 screenshots[5]).
Let me know what you think of the documents and please let me know what I
can do to help make Debian more friendly to new users.
Thanks,
- Eric Doviak
[1] http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/installmanual
[2] http://goodbye-microsoft.com/
[3] http://www.doviak.net/debian/debian_install_guide.pdf
[4] http://www.doviak.net/debian/debian_install_guide.tar.gz
[5] http://www.doviak.net/debian/debian_install_shots.tar.gz
