Newbie and using Ubuntu

[Benjamin Edwards]

Been reading this thread and have a couple of (possibly useful comments).

A newbie mailing list may seem like a good idea but there is a danger that it is only going to be subscribed to by newbie.  Mailing list tend to be a two way street. You subscribe because you need help and if you spot something you can help with you do so.  There are some selfless individuals who subscribe mainly to help people, and I applaud them, but they are in the minority.

As for always providing GUI solutions, while this is a good idea it is not always possible/easy.  Windows users are often wary at first of the command line but it is not that difficult to get a command prompt and cut/paste a command from an email.  It is often quicker for someone to give a command line solution than tell people where something is on a menu structure and tell them what fields to fill in etc.   Everyday operation of a system will not need the command line for most people but when things go wrong/need setting up it can be invaluable.  Please give it a try - The command line is your friend.

>>> "s.roman" <s.roman at gmail.com> 10/03/04 04:12am >>>
I think have a ubuntu newbie mailing list would be awesome. currently
im getting all emails from the ubuntu mailising list so that if i
needed to fix anything I could just search through it instead of
emailing about the same problem again, but there are so many emails
about complex solutions to simple problems that it's overwhelming. I
haven't installed Ubuntu yet, but am planning to do so soon, and
coming from windows I have no idea on how to use linux. Hope this
email wasn't too confusing.

Roman

On Sat, 2 Oct 2004 19:38:42 -0700, Matt Zimmerman <mdz at canonical.com> wrote:
> On Sat, Oct 02, 2004 at 07:39:15PM -0400, Richard Schinnell wrote:
> 
> > There has to be a better way to figure out and recommend solutions to new
> > Linux (Ubuntu) users problems.
> 
> In an ideal world, you would be able to solve all of your problems through
> the GUI.  New tools are being written and enhanced all the time to move
> toward this goal, but there is still a Linux system underneath it all, and
> when the time comes to debug a problem, it's very useful to be able to peek
> under the hood.
> 
> Ubuntu is in what is essentially a public beta period right now, and there
> are still some significant bugs being worked out.  Debugging things with
> users who are familiar with the command line accelerates this process, and
> gets us more quickly to the point where everything Just Works for all users.
> That accounts for a lot of the command-line traffic you see here.
> 
> Yet another segment of it is just Linux users helping one another.  If a
> user has past experience with Linux, they likely already have command-line
> skills, and welcome answers in that form.
> 
> This doesn't mean that if you are a stranger to the command line, then
> Ubuntu is not for you.  Quite the contrary, we are working hard to bring
> Ubuntu to a broad audience of computer users, including those without Linux
> experience.  But if you have Linux experience, that's a useful language in
> which to converse about Ubuntu.
> 
> > I have problems getting a printer installed on my stand alone Ubuntu
> > machine.
> > I have a windows 2003 network with a few XP workstations and a couple of
> > Linksys print servers for a HP LJ 4000 and a HPLJ 3330.
> > I have shared the printers on a couple of workstations and even did it on
> > the server.  I know the ip of the print servers but can not get either to
> > print a test page.
> 
> What happens when you try?
> 
> > Maybe Linux and the graphics interface still has a way to go to be able to
> > bring  the unwashed and unworthy into the Linux fold.
> 
> We've only just begun. :-)
> 
> --
> - mdz
> 
> 
> 
> --
> ubuntu-users mailing list
> ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com 
> http://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-users 
>

-- 
ubuntu-users mailing list
ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com 
http://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-users 

______________________________________________________________________
This email has been scanned by the MessageLabs Email Security System.
For more information please visit http://www.messagelabs.com/email 
______________________________________________________________________

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-users/attachments/20041004/ae6d3ae4/attachment.html>