Hi Warlin! On 5/24/06, Warlin Pantoja <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
I'm not really into engaging in philosophical debates on what is the better pedagogy but I will just like to drop some thoughts and leave it for the vultures to feast on.
Amen, brother, there's the rub.
But then again, I've also a need to balance this approach with the need to _properly_ instruct them to do so. Ethicality does not need to give way for well intended but rudely placed instructions.
This goes for the lists too, as I am inclined to think that along with the new folks posting questions here, cometh the cynics and crackpots who can't think much of anything better to do than to to confusticate and bebother them. I hope someone prays for them.
For one, I personally believe that many of not most of the resources available in Google do not very well connect with the newbie (i.e., most are written for intermediate or expert users). We could take this in the positive by way of reflection on how poorly *nix materials are organized in the web and the need to organize these body of knowledge (thus explains the impetus for such projects as the Linux Documentation Project).
Well, the Web pretty much like an intelligent person with a mixed-up memory, which is kind of interesting for theorists, but scary for simple folks. I do suppose writing a set of truly coherent and integrated help documents (or even improving the existing hodgepoge) would be of tremendous help, but that's just one half of the solution. The other half lies in conditioning the people to be confident that they can do their work in GNU/Linux, and that there's always someone `out there' who they can turn to for help. RTFM is a two-edged sword. It is beautiful indeed, but if we as GNU/Linux advocates were to live the way of the sword, then we would definitely die by it (metaphorically speaking, lest the cynics contest some Tasyo debacle.)
One cannot really blame them to pose these questions because their problem stems not so much as being non-resourceful and non-diligent in personally searching for answers to their questions as to not knowing how to formulate the proper question to ask. Had it been easy to pose the question properly, Google would have been an easy tool for them (and also for us) in exploring the big world of *nix.
Actually, asking questions is a basic instinct, even if one lacks the capacity for asking. Everybody has an inquisitive mind, and thus, everybody will sooner or later stumble upon a question or two that has been answered once or twice, but they'll ask anyway, since that action, for them, will be more convenient in the short term.
What I'm driving at is this: we do not need always to rudely tell newbies to search for the answer first on the net. They may have already and probably they've been passing keywords erroneously on these search engines or were missing the solution right before their eyes. They just probably need a nudge on the right direction... also a mild exhortation for them to always exhaust all possibilities within their reach before bringing it up to any ML or fora.
I'm somehow reminded of Constantine's dialog: humans are capable of doing evil things, but once in a while, someone comes along and nudges them in the right direction.
There are other alternatives... one of them is to completely ignore newbie questions and the other is to limit the ML for technical questions only (this then gives us license to lambaste such amateurish queries).
I do not believe we can afford the latter option, for that will be the nail for our coffin. Nor does the former sound really feasible, for the silent treatment is more often than not worse than the verbose lambaste. -- Zak B. Elep || http://zakame.spunge.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] || [EMAIL PROTECTED] 1486 7957 454D E529 E4F1 F75E 5787 B1FD FA53 851D
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