Personally I am not a fan of LMGTFY. I think it is a pretty strong response and saying "you should spend some time researching first" is usually a more appropriate. I do however think it can be an important tool at times. People tend to get in the habit of asking questions that can be found fairly easily or they just don't want to spend the time and you need to be blunt. Sometimes I think it is just people being afraid of making a mistake.
Paul, this is in response to your previous email, but don't think I am saying you never research things. It is meant to be helpful. You started the previous thread with a generic question about finding a PHP debugger. However it didn't say anything about what you were needing it for, what you were looking for or any real details. I agree that you should have done some searching before emailing the list. Trying 3 or 4 debuggers and then writing the list with more specific questions would have helped both you and those with responses. Usually breaking and fixing things, and just trying things for the heck of it will usually result in a net win. You learn why you like one program over another, and what information one gives you that you really wish was shown in another. Regardless you have information to help make decisions that isn't just the opinions of others. In this case doing a search for "php debugger" would have given you a link to an article that uses FirePHP to debug PHP, which falls in line with your desire for a FireBug like debugger for PHP. A lot of times you need multiple tools available to you, because one can't do everything (like FirePHP). I rarely researched software outside of a brief check on if it was a security risk because I found that a lot of times I needed several tools that did very similar things and you have to try lots of things to find the tools you really want to work with. Sometimes it is a very small difference, but that one difference is what really works for you in certain situations. One of my friends has been involved with computers far longer than I have, but he has this "work smarter not harder" mentality taken to extremes that has left him stagnant for years. He seems to think that it is better to just have others teach him and profit instead of spending the time learning on his own. I've gotten in several small arguments with him because he gets pissed at me for telling him to search for things. It was quite regular, and it really came across like he thought I learned all of this just so I could make his life easy. This doesn't mean you shouldn't ask questions, nobody is expected to know everything, but when you have a reputation for solving complex problems on your own and doing research on your own and then asking the right questions people are more comfortable sitting down and walking you through something because they know you can and will run with it. If you don't know something nobody should give you crap for admitting it, but it is good to have a little base understanding to help people give you clarification. Even if you don't get the solution right the first time with more experience you will learn to how to approach situations you aren't familiar with and you can make better decisions that will help you get it right with fewer tries. As a side note on something I noticed in another email. You might be newer to Linux than some on the list you don't need to refer to yourself as a newbie/novice. You have learned a lot and there will always be things you need to learn. Focus on learning and not how experienced you are compared to others. - Peter
_______________________________________________ LinuxUsers mailing list [email protected] http://socallinux.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/linuxusers
