On 29/07/12 12:53, Sean Miller wrote:
Problem is, Alan, that if the person who has come to the meet simply wants a solution to their problem (within the distribution they have "chosen" [or found on a disc]) this just makes the problem worse. In other words, instead of people trying to resolve their problem random members of the LUG say "I have basically the same hardware as yours, and it works so let's re-install your laptop, and go with mine as it will work" and then half the things that *WERE* working stop doing so, but the original issue is resolved. That's no way to enthuse people about Linux is it? They end up with an idea something like the "you can't please all of the people..." meme but related to Linux, and they get the idea that if you have wonderful wireless you have to have a rubbish UI, or if you get a good UI then you can't use your scanner etc. etc. etc. All very bad - what we need to do is find ways to resolve issues people have with Ubuntu before other members of the group try to poach them to their preferred distro on the basis it will resolve their issue (but, potentially, create others). And that is the challenge of a LUG. Because the "Debian evangelists" and similar are always lurking to poach people from their chosen route, and I get tired of it (to be honest). As a Ubuntu user I'd be quite happy to help a user of any other distribution to solve their problems and suggesting a change of distro would *always* be "the last resort". Sean
For some time now I've been slowly gathering a database of issues I've encountered on Windows, Mac and Ubuntu. I'm always happy to try to resolve any issue on any platform and in fact it irritates me if I have to give up and reinstall. The goal should always be to be able to fix the problem in 5 minutes using prior knowledge. It will probably take me years to mature this database of mine but it should be expanded to include all distros eventually, and hopefully a lot of tricks I simply don't know now. I should expect the members of any LUG can probably run rings round me on the command line, certainly the Reading members can. Unfortunately I've never been able to get them to slow down enough for me to take notes!
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