[99958] in RedHat Linux List
RE: "Winmodems" (Support in Linux) (fwd)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Aaron Clow)
Tue Nov 17 18:23:46 1998
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1998 18:22:25 -0500 (EST)
From: Aaron Clow <aaronc@blood.cmj.com>
To: redhat-list@redhat.com
Resent-From: redhat-list@redhat.com
Reply-To: redhat-list@redhat.com
On Tue, 17 Nov 1998, Bruce Richardson wrote:
> Aaron wrote:
> << The book moved on while I sat with a black screen in front of me. I was
> left to my own to figure out what happened. >>
>
> You do know you're going to get a hundred messages saying "That happened to
> me and _I_ figured it out!" (it happened to me and... I won't say it).
> This happens with every system as it develops: people who hacked and
> persevered through the early phases resent that anyone should have an
> easier time of it than they do.
Well, to open myself up even more to attack than I have already with this
thread, I can understand this... It's kind of an initiation. How many of
us who had been on the net for a couple of years got annoyed that BINGO,
people could just subscribe to AOL or Prodigy and suddenly they were all
over the net SAYING EVERYTHING IN CAPS and reprinting the entire content
of e-mail messages when replying even when it was easy to follow the
thread without doing so?
There is a certain satisfaction gained by power-users in being able to
troubleshoot their way through a problem. I myself got through the blank
screen and got AfterStep working...struggled through my first installation
of WindowMaker with no one's help. Yes, it's pride. However, it would've
been nice to have a reference manual somewhere that explained things like
so:
"E-mail Clients: You can use fetchmail to retrieve POP3 mail from all
your POP accounts & dump messages into your mailbox and read them
with Pine (or whatever)...Here's an example configuration file with an
explanation of what you're doing in each step."
Something like that. Also, when I got started, it would've sped me along a
LOT faster if I had easy answers to questions like:
Client/Server OS -- how it differs from Windows' "desktop" server
What are the different directories (/usr/bin, /home, /etc) and what are
they generally used for?
How do I install applications and where are the executables stored?
Stuff like that...
Of COURSE we all figured this stuff out... I still consider myself a
Linux newbie, and occasionally I f*%k something up so bad that I have to
reinstall the whole OS because I don't know enough to get myself out of
trouble. But I'm learning. And each time I have to reinstall my system, I
have a much better idea of what apps I want at my fingertips (nedit, pine,
docking cpumeter, FileRunner, etc.) and I can do a cleaner install by NOT
installing every needless FTP application or file manager...some stuff I
still prefer to do from the command prompt.
HOWEVER... I still think it would be great to have a Linux reference for
Win98 users. I DO NOT think it would "dumb down" the user base. Those of
us who love Linux, I would imagine, are into it for the performance, the
scalability, the reliability -- all things that are not NECESSARILY as
important to the casual user. Therefore, Linux (at least for now)
automatically excludes the casual desktop user.
Would it not be an honorable notion to give the Win98 power users -- those
users who realize the shortcomings of their OS but are unsure of where to
proceed to opensource operating systmes -- a reference manual to make
their trek a little easier?
The argument can always be made that "well, I didn't need any reference
manual -- I slogged through it."
Whatever. I just thought it would be helpful.
I still don't know how to defrag my Linux drives...
Aaron
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