sane

[John L Vifian]

On Saturday 15 August 2009 12:49:56 pm Perry wrote:
> Please give the old man a break,
> let him time to digest all that, it isn't that easy when it's completely
> new, I even belive it is a lot to learn in a week, assuming he has no
> previous experience.

Steven has posting to this list since at least June of 2007, and I believe has 
been 'running' Kubuntu since at least that time.  He is not new to it, and 
some of this stuff has been explained to him repeatedly.  Since that time he 
has had continual computer problems many of them of his own making which this 
last almost certainly was.  He has previously had problems with his 
sources.list, as recently as this June. He has trouble learning and we aren't 
being effective teachers.  However he can learn; he has apparently gotten quite 
efficient at reinstalling Kubuntu.  :-(  It would be better if he was learning 
how to keep his machine running.

So the question is how to get Steven to learn. I've tried the RTFM approach 
and gotten nowhere.  He can't take notes.  I suspect he does learn from 
repetition of tasks which is why he has gotten good at reinstalling Kubuntu.  
He apparently can set up kmail to fetch/send mail when he runs from a live CD, 
although someone should teach him how to leave the mail on the server so he 
doesn't end up losing the email.  Earlier he had problems with configuring 
kmail so this is something that he has learned.

I suggested that he could use tutoring.  I'm pretty left-brained so I might 
not be the ideal person, but I like teaching, and if Steven is willing I would 
be wiling to spend the time to get him so that he basically understood what he 
was doing on the command line.  (off-list of course) 

John Vifian
-- 
Nothing new here, except my marrying, which to me is a matter of profound 
wonder. 
Abraham Lincoln