[buug] Re: Jackpot!

[Rick Moen]

begin Nicolai Rosen quotation:

> But it can be done. If the people who manufacture these computers
> configured the install themselves & then burned it onto a CD so it
> could always be fixed then this would work.

I was referring to Linux _distributions_, per the current model.  

My perspective is that of a long-time Linux community member, vexing by
an ongoing flood of whiney and _wilfully_ hapless new users coming into 
community forums, and noisily demanding to be helped, but insisting on
dictating ridiculous terms.

Those are the people who've already bought inappropriate and usually
crappy hardware, have already bought a generic distribution in some
boxed set, and only -=then=- come whining to us about their problems.

It's all very well for you to say they shouldn't buy computers from the
corner clone shop and expect to be able to successfully ignore
hardware-compatibility lists.  In this, you're quoting my own advice 
back to _me_.  The point (or, one point) of this discussion, however, is
how best to contend with the wilfully hapless.

> Not a bad idea, an install fest HOWTO would be nice.

I was _not_ speaking of an InstallFest HOWTO -- though I have a draft of
one of those, from a different and in my view more useful model than the
three or four already floating around.

What I've been working on is a preconfigured set of Web pages, ftp
directories, and setup instructions that can be quickly placed on any
*ix computer to serve as a largely preconfigured InstallFest server.
That server would (thereby) present to users browsing either on the 
console or nearby boxen a coherent set of Web pages welcoming them to
the InstallFest, telling them what distributions are available for
network or other installation, giving them step-by-step instructions 
for how to get on the InstallFest LAN (if necessary, whom to borrow an
appropriate NIC from, and how), which local experts are available on
various topics and how to get their attention, what IP, netmask, gateway
(if any), and DNS address to use, if there's DHCP active, where to make
boot floppies from, what mirrors of important informational Web sites
and file collections (including distribution update packages, new X
server packages, and crypto code) are on hand, and what they'll want to
do next, after going home.  That sort of thing.

Most InstallFests I've attended (or help run) are sadly chaotic, and the
newbies who attend are allowed to follow their natural inclination to 
ignore the InstallFest LAN and remain blind to the distinctive
advantages of Unix.  

That is bad because you then miss about 60% of the point of using a
Unix.  Metaphorically, these are goatherds you've just given a horse.
Left to themselves, they'll turn the horse into the best possible goat
they can make it.  If we're going to go to all the trouble of running
InstallFests, we need to show them how to ride.

-- 
Cheers,                                      Right to keep and bear
Rick Moen                                  Haiku shall not be abridged
rick (at) linuxmafia.com                      Or denied.  So there.