On Monday 06 November 2006 16:51, Roberto C. Sanchez wrote: > On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 10:10:34AM -0500, Kamaraju Kusumanchi wrote: > > On Monday 06 November 2006 10:02, Greg Folkert wrote: > > > Couple of lists I am on, the matter of factly answers are all > > > RTFM with exact locations and nothing else. > > > > If that is the case, the developers need to rewrite the manual in a > > way which is understood by others. The content is probably OK but > > may need reorganization. Getting RTFM questions does not always > > mean that the reader is/was lazy to search for answers... > > Many of the "first reply" messages by Tom Eastep on the > shorewall-users mailing list are a URL and little else. After having > seen this for while I see that it is a good approach. In fact, many > of the "second reply" messages from the users are something like "oh, > I didn't see that" or "I did not read closely enough."
I don't think much of those who swing RTFM around like a club. I don't think that's ever helpful. I started Linux with Slackware 0.99. It's not likely that I would have even got to the point of a bootable system, and almost certain that I never would have become a convert, if it hadn't been for the patient help of a very capable teacher. jjohn was system administrator at a local ISP. He introduced me to Linux in general and Slackware in particular. He held my hand when I needed it, and answered a lot of stupid newbie questions. Invariably, he would give me a short answer first. "Oh, you just need to do X." or "You might have a problem with Y. Here's what I would do." Then he would add, "If you want to know why, this HOWTO/webpage/manpage will tell you all about it." In most cases, his first suggestion, X or Y, fixed my immediate problem and got me past another hurdle. My confidence bolstered by a quick fix, I was all the more interested in reading the recommended documentaion to find out why and how it worked. In fairly short order, looking back on it now, I went from the original clueless newbie to a fairly confident Slack user. I owe a debt I can never repay to jjohn. I've been trying to pay it forward ever since. -- Bud Rogers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> KD5SZ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
