On 2 Apr 2012, at 10:12, Craig Dunn wrote: > >> Would it be a good idea to have a puppet beginners list, where people can >> post dumb questions, and maybe have some patient people posting links > > [snip] > > Without wanting to pigeon hole or stereotype anyone, my experience from the > IRC channel in particular is that "dumb questions" that get asked often show > that the poster has not read through the online documentation and has jumped > straight into the community support channels instead. No-one minds helping a > struggling beginner, but the old "him who helps himself" saying applies and I > think for most people, if they genuinely read the excellent language guide > properly they would answer the majority of beginner questions on their own. > Some people take offense when told on IRC to RTFM, or given an anchor link to > the docs in response to a question, but it simply is the best source of > information to their issues. > > Providing a beginners mailing list IMO would only encourage people to bypass > the docs even more. > > 2p/w :) > > Craig > > -- > Craig Dunn | http://www.craigdunn.org > Yahoo/Skype: craigrdunn | Twitter: @crayfishX
Good Evening Craig, and thanks for your reply! I appreciate your comments, but having reflected more on the point "Providing a beginners mailing list IMO would only encourage people to bypass the docs even more" While this may be true, the number of people searching, finding links via twitter, or having a casual intrest, is only going to go up. And the docs are written from the perspective of a technical manual. Docs are great and I applaud the effort that goes into it. But it's still just documentation. When your in school, college, university, <insert place of education here>, a massive text book is not dropped in your lap on day one, and then your sent off into the world. Every FOSS project pretty much comes with documentation these days - yet we have support forums. The same for a lot of technical products that are sold in our shops, but everyone has support lines. If documentation worked, most of us will be out of work. I think the community aspect is the key. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Puppet Users" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/puppet-users?hl=en.
