UbuntuOhio What can new users do for Ubuntu?

[Scott Merrill]

ael wrote:
> Hello,

Hiya!  I'm replying only to the ubuntu-ohio team, rather than to all the
LoCos included on your original email.

> Many of these new users, like myself, do not know
> anything about coding or development but are interested in making a good
> thing better. As a team representative, what can newbies do to
> contribute to Ubuntu and the Linux community? What does the community
> need that could be provided by those who cannot provide the more
> mathematical or technical acts that so many do already?

Lots!

1) General advocacy.  Encourage your friends and neighbors to give Free
Software a try.  Even if it's just installing OpenOffice and Gaim (now
Pidgin) onto a Windows computer, you're increasing the adoption of Free
Software, and breaking the proprietary hegemony.

2) Write about your experiences.  If you run into a problem with a Free
Software product, write about it on your blog / journal / website.
Explain the situation, explain how you approached the problem, and what
solution or work-around -- if any -- you used.  Sometimes just helping
people know that others hit bumps in their use of Free Software is
sufficient to let them know that it's not some deficiency within
themselves!  Knowing that others run into problems too can be very
re-assuring to a new user.

3) If you do run into problems, file bug reports!  Use
http://launchpad.net to find the product with which you had a problem,
and file a bug report.  Monitor the progress of the bug.  It can
sometimes take a _long_ time for bugs to get resolved.  If you stick
with the bug, though, and provide updates and status reports, you
greatly increase the chances that it will be fixed.  Regular users are
_extremely_ helpful at identifying and reporting bugs:  the experts
often know how to work to avoid many bugs to begin with, and certainly
know how to work around many bugs that they encounter.  A bug
experienced by a regular user can be a real show-stopper, and needs to
be resolved.

As an example of how long bugs can take, I filed this bug in 204:
   http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=477
It's still not fixed, but the discussion about the root problem, and the
possible solutions, is all transparent.  Any concerned user can weigh in
on the issue, and work toward a resolution.  This is completely
different from proprietary software, where your bug reports go into a
black hole.

4) Write documentation.  Simple, easy-to-follow how-to recipes _really_
help out new users.  If you use some piece of software to accomplish
some task, document your process, and publish it.  Someone, somewhere,
will find it useful.

Remember: Google remembers basically _everything_.  By putting your
experiences online, someone somewhere will search for the exact same
thing.  If you can help them out, you've made the world a better place
-- even if you never know that you helped them.

5) Create pretty graphics or icons, if you have artistic ability.

6) Help improve a project's formal documentation.  If you find
instructions confusing or lacking, send your suggestions for improvement
to the project team.  I have a friend who has been a member of the
Apache Software Foundation for more than a decade.  He's a respected
member of the team, and the author of several books.  He's contributed
exactly one line of code to the Apache httpd project (and it was almost
immediately reverted).  He has, however, contributed mountains of
documentation and suggestions for ways to continue to improve the
documentation.

7) Join a local user group.  If you're in Columbus, join the Central
Ohio Linux User Group:  http://www.colug.net/   Attend presentations,
and consider presenting something yourself.  Take a friend with you to
the meetings to get them more interested in Free Software.

-- 
GPG 9CFA4B35 | skippy at skippy.net | http://skippy.net/