Terminal tutorials

[Andrew Sayers]

I've been playing around with the idea of interactive tutorials that 
introduce newbies to the terminal.  I think this counts as a 
documentation project, so I'd like to see if the concept sparks any 
interest around here.  There's download info at the bottom of this post.


Premise:

I think it's common for Windows power users to install Ubuntu, google 
the couple of things that don't quite work right, and find an Ubuntu 
Forum post telling them to chown this and rmmod that.  Since they've 
never even heard of a text-based interface, those instructions are 
totally inaccessible to them.

Because these guys are brand new to Ubuntu, they've never heard of 
help.ubuntu.com.  And even if Google showed them a page that explained 
bash really well, power users in that "hunter-installer" mindset are 
never going to sit still long enough to read it.

Suggested solution:

I think we need a set of tutorials that:

  * quickly teaches basic terminal use from first principles
  * teaches things in really small chunks
  * lets the user feel in control (not passively being lectured)
  * works really hard to keep the user's attention
  * Lets howto-writers in the forum start their guides with
    "If you're new to the forums, try the tutorials before reading this"

I've written a small program that shows a possible implementation.  It's 
called terminal-tutorials in my PPA:

https://launchpad.net/~andrew-bugs-launchpad-net/+archive/ppa

Once you've installed it, the program is available as Applications > 
Accessories > Terminal tutorials.  It's basically just a 
proof-of-concept right now, but can be easily expanded if there's interest.

So, what do you guys think?  Is this a useful approach?  Do you have any 
ideas for more tutorials?  Would you have any interest on working on the 
project?

	- Andrew