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From: Tony Lawrence <tony@aplawrence.com>
Subject: Re: Is anyone else annoyed that there is NO good admin tool?
References: <4Jp18.16747$TI2.3206598@typhoon.nyc.rr.com> <jgbe4ukq6qm7p2io59nrrrbofdj1va37ak@4ax.com> <3c4c0bee$0$31664$afc38c87@news.optusnet.com.au> 
Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 13:11:43 GMT

Peter Jones wrote:

> Gareth Jones wrote:

> 
>>(* I do occasionally read articles that say linux is better documented
>>than any other system - esp. proprietory ones. I guess if you include
>>the source code, then this is true. If you exclude souce code, it is
>>actually pretty badly documented.)
>>
> 
> Hmm, dunno if I'd agree with that statement.  I actually quite like 
> documentation of the man style: terse commentary on what a program does and 
> what its options are.  Sure, occasionally it would be nice to have your 
> hand held when you're starting something new (there's always the HOWTOs, I 
> guess!) but mostly I find the MAN pages to be more helpful than most of the 
> help files I've seen for Windows programs.  [But then, by the time I feel 
> the need of running Windows Troubleshooter, I've already tried everything 
> it recommends...  :-)]


I've never had Windows Troubleshooter come up with anything useful.  As 
you say, I've either already tried whatever it says or what it says is 
completely useless in the context of the problem.

I'd say documentation on BOTH (and ALL) systems sucks.

Linux/Unix man pages are only helpful reminders for things we already 
understand but have temporarily forgotten some detail of.

How-To's- arrgh, generally useless for me.  Perhaps some of the more 
basic  are useful for someone coming in with zero knowledge, but I have 
yet to have been even partially enlightened by any How-to on more 
advanced issues.  Almost always, the tough stuff gets written up by 
people who assume that your level of knowledge matches theirs except in 
this one little area they are talking about.  Of course that's rarely 
true, so now I have to go off looking for some other thing that I need 
to grok before I can understand this guy's explanation of the thing I 
really want to know about, and that in turn forces me into something 
else again, and pretty soon I'm confused,ticked off, and still 
un-enlightened :-)

I find I get most of my good answers from the newgroups, because unlike 
a How-to, people talk back here- they say "Huh?" and "Watcha talking 
'bout?" and SOMEBODY fills in the missing blanks (not always of course).

There are exceptions.  Now and then I've stumbled across a beutifully 
lucid explanation of something I didn't understand well prior to finding 
it.  However, I suspect that these things are only clear and to the 
point FOR ME- that is, the writer and I happened to share similar 
background knowledge and perhaps have similar ways of explaining things- 
that person might find some of *my* tech-help articles equally 
illuminating, but someone else will feel that both of us are either too 
confusing or too basic.  And that's the problem: any single piece of 
writing ALWAYS covers too much or too little from somebody's POV.  For 
someone else, it hits the mark, but that's rare. Really good writing 
tells "too much" without boring people who already know parts of the 
puzzle, but that's hard to do too consistently- and I'm never really 
sure whether someone has done it or have they just come close for me!

So, to sum up, http://www.google.com and http://groups.google.com are my 
best pals and the LDP pages are usually not, or at least are usually 
only part of what I need.


-- 
Tony Lawrence
SCO/Linux Support Tips, How-To's, Tests and more: 

Macworld Digital Photography Superguide

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