[ILUG] Linux today will there be a Linux tomorrow

[Niall O Broin]

On Sunday 16 May 2004, feargal at helgrim.com (Feargal Reilly) wrote:

>> Try to respond to one ``newbie'' posting each week. Seek out the tough >
questions, you may be the only one to respond and you may learn 
>> something in the process. However, if you aren't confident that you 
>> can respond with the correct answer, find someone that can.
>
>There are various software features that I now use regularly that I
>would never have discovered except that I delved into the documentation
>on the behalf of another user who felt it was beyond them.

I'll second that. I know I have often answered a question by thinking "I know
blah can do that, bt I'm not sure how. A quick man blah, or a little HOWTO
reading, and I have found the answer, and often surprised myself by how little
I knew about blah (that's often been because I've been using blah for years,
and it has moved on hugely behind my back. Don't these authors know they
should email me if they're going to add functionality to my old tools?).

And it brings another thought to mind, inspired by the recent furore over
Lars' post about Exchange, and the furore which may yet arise about Justin's
question about TripWire.

As it happens, I first met Lars (AFAIR) on the Sun Managers' mailing list
which is by a LONG way the most clueful mailing list I have ever used (though
it has maybe gone a little downhill in recent years). Every month, if memory
serves, Sun Managers sends people a reminder of what the list is about. This
serves to remind new (and maybe not so new) users what the list is about. I
must dig out a Sun Managers mailing, and use it as the basis of a prototype
mailing for this list. Maybe we could send it out with the monthly mailman
reminder.




Niall