Got Noob?

[family]

All right, all right, I know this is a bit dumb. I hope it doesn't go to thread jail... Well, I'm a noob. And we noobs have it tough. We're willing to do anything and spend a lot of time figuring this stuff out (and our friends call us nerds) but really, we're nowhere close to being 1337.
For example, some inexperienced Ubuntu user has a problem, goes on a forum, and posts his problem. A dev comes and tells he/she to open, say, the sources.list file as root and modify this and that, save, and reboot. Couple problems:
1) How do you open it as root
1a) "OK, I'm at the login screen and it says the admin can't logon from here as root"-itis
2) I'm scared of gksudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list.save more than rancid broccoli smoothies
3) I opened the file through a file browser and a GUI pops up
4) "What's the difference between reboot and restart the computer" -(Ok, bit drastic)
5) What's a terminal?
6) I changed and saved the wrong lines and I need to know how to boot into recovery mode from the LiveCD (I actually had to do a fresh install that one time, don't ask)

At every one of these problems (and there are more), people like me start new threads or post more replies asking devs for (relatively) simple terminal commands and taxing servers. Not unlike this thread, and sorry for being a hypocrite :(. My suggestion;
instead of beans to show seniority, we devise a noob test. You answer 3 or 4 simple questions, an aptitude test of sorts, and every post you make shows your status so that when people reply, they include all the minor details (or not).

[DoctorMO]

A dev comes and tells he/she to open

Very, very few developers come to the ubuntu forums... I know I'm one of them ans we don't have time for answering support queries. The people who do all the wonderful work are not developers them sevles but do know how the tools work and want to give something back to the community. they give support and in turn are unwittingly training up other support operatives ;-)

btw, your problems seem trivial.

[Depressed Man]

I really wouldn't say beans show seniority. It just shows how much you post. Heck you may be asking questions yourself.

Oh and it's newb not noob. ;)

[family]

Ahh. Newb = newbie, so I guess that's the correct terminologyy. I guess either way it really doesn't matter that much. And an apology, and shout-out to all the people who make my Linux experience possible through the forums. It's not just the devs, it's everyone. Thankx all.

[some_random_noob]

A test isn't the greatest idea (you'd probably just scare people even more). When you make a thread it should request for the poster to mention their level of experience or something like that...

[aysiu]

Too bad there was no poll option like There shouldn't be any kind of ranking or seniority when it comes to knowledgeability or helpfulness.

[buzzmandt]

A test isn't the greatest idea (you'd probably just scare people even more). When you make a thread it should request for the poster to mention their level of experience or something like that...
how about a setting in user cp that is asked and defined during registering and as you improve you can adjust your level from user cp...this is automatically posted as newb level when posting....I guess similar to your sig, you set it and change it at will, and it will post each time you post

[HermanAB]

The greatest problem for a newbie is figuring out where to get information.

Here is the best one:
http://www.google.com/linux

and here is the rest:
http://tldp.org

Cheers,

Herman

[starcraft.man]

Too bad there was no poll option like There shouldn't be any kind of ranking or seniority when it comes to knowledgeability or helpfulness.

Agreed. Beans = posts, not knowledge. I certainly know when I started posting answers to questions with 5 beans I still knew a lot more than a lot of new folk (i.e. partitions, basic/moderate networking + security, a good portion of commands (learned more of course with more posts), etc...).

Anyway, I don't see a problem family... ask as many questions as you like, people will answer and unless there's a large conflict over right fix you can usually trust them :).

[HermanAB]

Well, the trick is *not* to blindly believe everything you read here, but to actually do 'man whatever' on the suggested commands or at least Google it and read up yourself a bit before you follow someone's instructions.

The old RTFM *is* actually good advice...

Cheers,

Herman

[riven0]

I don't know. That test may be insulting to some people. If anything, the test should be optional, so people who want to be treated like n00bs get the option.

[lepz]

All right, all right, I know this is a bit dumb. I hope it doesn't go to thread jail... Well, I'm a noob. And we noobs have it tough. We're willing to do anything and spend a lot of time figuring this stuff out (and our friends call us nerds) but really, we're nowhere close to being 1337.
For example, some inexperienced Ubuntu user has a problem, goes on a forum, and posts his problem. A dev comes and tells he/she to open, say, the sources.list file as root and modify this and that, save, and reboot. Couple problems:
1) How do you open it as root
1a) "OK, I'm at the login screen and it says the admin can't logon from here as root"-itis
2) I'm scared of gksudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list.save more than rancid broccoli smoothies
3) I opened the file through a file browser and a GUI pops up
4) "What's the difference between reboot and restart the computer" -(Ok, bit drastic)
5) What's a terminal?
6) I changed and saved the wrong lines and I need to know how to boot into recovery mode from the LiveCD (I actually had to do a fresh install that one time, don't ask)

At every one of these problems (and there are more), people like me start new threads or post more replies asking devs for (relatively) simple terminal commands and taxing servers. Not unlike this thread, and sorry for being a hypocrite :(. My suggestion;
instead of beans to show seniority, we devise a noob test. You answer 3 or 4 simple questions, an aptitude test of sorts, and every post you make shows your status so that when people reply, they include all the minor details (or not).

I very rarely look at the bean count and would never take this as an indication of knowledge. I do look at the persons join date if someone is responding to a problem I am having.

[PriceChild]

Beans = posts, not knowledge.Nope.... Beans = posts in support areas, not knowledge ;)

Well, the trick is *not* to blindly believe everything you read here, but to actually do 'man whatever' on the suggested commands or at least Google it and read up yourself a bit before you follow someone's instructions.

The old RTFM *is* actually good advice...

Cheers,

HermanIf you are given advice... don't just blindly copy and paste it... try and understand exactly what its doing. You can use the man pages for this (type man, then a command in a terminal and it gives you its manual)
Or it could be extremely simple and perhaps obvious, e.g.
gksudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list
Do the following with graphical root privileges.
Open up the graphical text editor, "gedit".
Start the editor with the contents of this file displayed.
I very rarely look at the bean count and would never take this as an indication of knowledge. I do look at the persons join date if someone is responding to a problem I am having.Bean count and join date don't mean a thing.

You should look at the quality of advice they give and decide on that. I couldn't give you much help on fglrx troubleshooting for example... but if I give you a link pointing to an fglrx troubleshooting guide from Ubuntu documentation... maybe you should inspect the advice and see if it works for you, then make your opinion of me.

[family]

In retrospect, a test would be insulting to many users. And bean count doesn't exactly measure knowledge, but involvement in the forums. People in this forum have suggested that members should go ahead and ask away for every "sub"problem they have fixing a bigger one... I'm saying that the need for that is eliminated if all the right things are said and explained at the first response from the community. Is there a better way to accomplish this?
I'm sorry if I put-off people with this thread, I just think it's worthwhile to save members frustration when they encounter easily fixable problems.

[aysiu]

There's no need to "save members frustration when encountering easily fixable problems."

If members can't be bothered to help new users, they shouldn't be hanging out in the support areas.

And "easily fixable problems" can be a great training ground for newly intermediate users or slightly ex-beginner users. If those problems didn't exist, I probably wouldn't be helping new users now. I probably would have said to myself (after I got my problems solved), Well, I'd love to contribute, but all the questions seem too difficult. I guess I'll just leave these forums to the experts.

There is not a strict dichotomy in these forums between newbies and experts. There is a wide spectrum of users and experiences.

[family]

Of course there is a need to save members frustration. We depend on all of the members in the forums to help each other.
By " members can't be bothered to help new users", do you mean give the information they need at the right time?? Your idea of members helping new users sounds just like members confusing new users with links and external howtos. I'm not saying that members are lazy at all. It's just that knowing what to do and say to a person with a problem is much better than guessing their predicament and half-solving it. How does a new user learn better by making two related threads as opposed to one, and get the same problem solved either way? With one thread that answers ALL of his/her questions, the new user can fix everything up faster, and _still_ learn the commands necessary to fix the problem.
"If those problems didn't exist," we definately wouldn't need about half this forum. You're right. The new users would have already gotten the help they needed a while back.

[Pragmatist]

....With one thread that answers ALL of his/her questions, the new user can fix everything up faster, and _still_ learn the commands necessary to fix the problem....

I think there are several issues at work here.

Are knowledge and experience the same thing?
I don't think so, but they are definitely related. I have encountered more members who know their way around Ubuntu, than I have members who are computer programmers, hackers, or other computer experts. Both of these "types", computer experts and Ubuntu experts (and yes you can have somebody who is both), required experience to learn what they know. They also both required time spent reading and doing research to increase their knowledge. Theory and practice are both essential for becoming proficient at anything.

How do you determine how knowledgeable somebody is about Ubuntu? How is Ubuntu knowledge measured?
It is hard to measure "computer expertise" in Ubuntu, as most people are self-taught. Since there is no fixed curriculum, there is only an intersection of knowledge between any group of people; One person is a wiz at the command-line, another at using GNOME, another with KDE, another at fixing hardware problems, and another who knows a little about all of the above, and the list goes on.
So you can see, it is difficult to measure Ubuntu knowledge.


How detailed should help be for newbies?

I think this is the question at the root of this thread.

The problem is, what is a newbie? The assumption is that a newbie is somebody at the bottom level, and this is interpreted as somebody who knows "nothing". This is certainly not true. That means, there is a spectrum of levels of knowledge amongst newbies. Since there is also such a spectrum for everybody else, it really is just one big spectrum of knowledge. There is always somebody who knows more than you and somebody who knows less. What can someone, helping somebody else, assume about the one needing help? There are some newbies who know more about certain technical details of computers than some advanced users of Ubuntu. It is impossible to determine the complete knowledge of anybody you are helping.

So how detailed should an explanation be? I have some friends and relatives, mostly older people born before the advent of computers, who require unbelievably detailed explanations and I can take nothing for granted. What is a "title bar", "a mouse", "a window", "a menu", "an icon", "a tab", "a Right-Click", "CTRL-C", "drag", "double-click", "copy, paste", "attach", "browser", "google", and I can go on and on and on and on and I usually have to :) This may seem like an absurd example, but, sadly, it is a real example.

So there is some expectation of a base of knowledge. All of the concepts in the previous paragraph are included in that base, but there are many others and they will vary by who is helping you. In the olden days of unix/linux, and this is still true of some groups today, you would get the "RTFM" (Read The Free--or is it Fine, I can't remember :) Manual) or "STFW" (Search The ______ Web) The idea is that why should I take my time to help somebody who isn't willing to spend some time helping themselves. I can spend the same time helping 2 other people who have put in some effort and demonstrated their willingness to learn.

Personally, I like to teach while I help. If somebody asks something that they could very easily solve by using Google, I either won't help, or I'll just paste the page they need and I won't give any explanations. This may sound like "hard love", but really you are hurting somebody by spoon-feeding them everything. They are going to be stuck sometime, and have nobody to turn to--or not have the time to wait for a reply, and they'll have no idea where to begin. If I say, "open a terminal and type:" and they respond with "what/where is a terminal?" then I will explain. But I won't keep explaining it to the same person. If I'm not in the mood, I might just refer the poster to a basic guide for using Ubuntu.

Overall, I don't think that newbies should be absolved of reading and learning. There are many basic guides that are easy to follow. My definition of a non-newbie is: Somebody who knows how to ask a good question:
http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html (http://catb.org/%7Eesr/faqs/smart-questions.html)
They are a pleasure to help.

[aysiu]

Overall, I don't think that newbies should be absolved of reading and learning. There are many basic guides that are easy to follow. My definition of a non-newbie is: Somebody who knows how to ask a good question:
http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html (http://catb.org/%7Eesr/faqs/smart-questions.html)
They are a pleasure to help. I find that link not in line with the principles of Ubuntu. It also isn't focused on forums and isn't really digestible. So I wrote my own: Getting the Best Help on Linux Forums (http://ubuntucat.wordpress.com/2007/08/06/getting-the-best-help-on-linux-forums/)

As for knowledge, it really also depends on the issue at hand. I know nothing about how to fix sound or wireless card issues. I know a little bit about mounting partitions and fixing screen resolution. I know a lot about desktop environments, but I know relatively little about Compiz/Beryl.

Really the best thing to do is just post your thread and see what help comes. People will self-select. If they feel they can offer something useful, they'll post a response. If they offer inaccurate information, another forum member will explain how it's inaccurate or post a link showing how the information is inaccurate.

[Pragmatist]

I find that link not in line with the principles of Ubuntu. It also isn't focused on forums and isn't really digestible. So I wrote my own: Getting the Best Help on Linux Forums (http://ubuntucat.wordpress.com/2007/08/06/getting-the-best-help-on-linux-forums/)
Thank you aysiu! I have bookmarked your page. At a glance you seem to be covering many of the same principles, but with a more, um, "modern" language. ;)

[aysiu]

Thank you aysiu! I have bookmarked your page. At a glance you seem to be covering many of the same principles, but with a more, um, "modern" language. ;)
That was the goal. I think Raymond makes a lot of good points... they just got lost in a lot of language berating new users.