[CS-FSLUG] Nathan

[N. Thompson]

Timothy R. Butler wrote:

>I'd agree with David. 
>
>Nathan: Please bear with me all the way to the end of the following.
>It's kind of long, but I just don't have enough time to really condense
>it -- hopefully you can still get the gist of it.
>
>I think you need to reread those messages. None of us have been
>attacking you. Rather, at times you get frustrated (or at least really
>seem to by what I can tell from your messages) with GNU/Linux and beings
>that were just one big happy group, we dispense advice. :-)
>  
>

Its easy to misunderstand posts in the list, I don't so much think that 
the CS-FSLUG list members are attacking me but I do hear the same thing 
every time I try a different distribution. I've often considered leaving 
the list because I try different distributions for fun and to find the 
ideal one, then when I post a mini-review or a commentary on it someone 
has to remind me to "stick with one distribution and make it work".

>In my opinion there is nothing wrong with trying a gazillion
>distributions. But, I think, to be truly happy with GNU/Linux, one needs
>to pick out a distribution and make that the *primary* distribution --
>the one that you use day-in and day-out. Then, on a separate partition
>try all the distributions you want.
>  
>

I'm glad you don't see a problem with my being an "installaholic", I 
install all these different distributions because I'm looking for one 
that the ideal features I'm looking for. Every distribution is 
different, Mandrake and SUSE have the ideal menu layouts and 
configuration software but their bugs make them a little patience trying 
to use, Slackware doesn't quite run KDE and its applications stably and 
Fedora Core had messed up the KDE menu and left out some of the 
applications that I wouldn't want to use Linux without.

>Your primary installation can be customized and tweaked until it works
>or you -- like the others keep talking about. That doesn't mean you
>won't change, but changing distributions every few weeks will mean you
>will never be comfortable with any of them (simply because it takes more
>than that long to make *any* OS the way most people generally want it).
>I've found as I've settled down distribution wise, that I end up with my
>own "blend" so to speak. I might upgrade every 6 months to a year, but
>other testing is done separately.
>  
>

I only have one computer and one hard drive, I've found that running two 
or more distros on the same hard drive can be disastrous, especially 
when they both use the same home partition. My only option if I want to 
find my favorite distribution is to try different ones until I get one 
that I like.

>I can say from experience that this leads to much more GNU/Linux
>enjoyment. Or, let's consider another example. When I first bought a
>Mac, I liked it, but wasn't crazy about the OS. Now, there's only one
>"real" OS for Macs (unless I'd just jump back to Linux), so I just kept
>using it. After a few weeks I started to like it. After a few more weeks
>it started to feel comfortable. After a few months I found some features
>that started to become habit, and I'd find myself trying to use certain
>key combos and such in GNU/Linux that only work on the Mac. The same is
>true of the reverse.
>  
>

I was very comfortable with Mandrake Linux, I used Linux all the time 
with Mandrake 9.0 and 9.1 but as soon as 9.2 came out I couldn't use it 
any more because it wouldn't properly work with mount points, I thought 
I had a reliable system until I upgraded to 9.2 and was faced with the 
need to find a new distribution. If the same were to happen with another 
distribution such as Slackware where every little bit of configuration I 
do is precious because of the time it took to get it done and all of a 
sudden the distribution wouldn't boot or worse the partition were to 
disappear because of another incident with Windows' Scandisk then I 
would have to do hours configuration all over again and thats not 
something I consider acceptable of any operating system. I'm not arguing 
with you're above statement I'm just saying that I can't stick with a 
distribution that I would like if I haven't found it yet..

>On the other hand, before I committed to using GNU/Linux, I'd often
>spend a few hours every so often in it (often I'd upgrade the distro,
>then try it, then forget about it) and then go back to Windows. It never
>felt comfortable. Then I switched and spent six or seven months tweaking
>one distro -- that's when I really started to enjoy GNU/Linux.
>  
>

The only time I've gone back to Windows was with Slackware, because I 
cannot stand the thought of picking it as my favorite distribution, then 
having something go wrong with it and having to reinstall and 
reconfigure it. For that matter I'm not comfortable with Slackware, ever 
since I've started using computers I've had a graphical user interface 
for the majority of the work and a command line for some programs and 
for compiling my own programs. Slackware turns that all upside down, I'm 
using a command line for just about everything and I start KDE only to 
check my e-mail, play music or browse the internet.

>At any rate, just keep in mind we are a bunch of Christian Linux users
>that try to do our best. We give each other help and advice, and try not
>to break down but only build up the people of this little Christian
>body. But, we are all humans and it isn't going to be perfect. 
>
>  
>

I'm not angry or anything with the list or its members, just frustrated 
that every time I mention another distribution I know I'm going to get 
at least one reply telling me to stick with distro X until I'm happy 
with it. Much earlier on everybody was telling me that by not sticking 
with a distribution I would eventually frustrate myself and wind up 
going back to Windows but thats not true, whats frustrating me is that 
everyone seems to be telling me that I can't try any distribution, I 
have to stick with the first one I run into and "make it work". The 
other think thats pushing me away from Linux are the other users in the 
IRC channels, for example the people in the SUSE channel on freenode 
gave me a hard time for asking whether or not the personal edition of 
9.1 would have any development tools, at the time there was no list of 
software packages available for SUSE 9.1 and very little information was 
made available yet somehow they expected everyone to know. Sure SUSE 9.0 
personal didn't have much more then the required libraries to compile 
software but later on you could download and install KDevelop and all 
the Qt tools after the professional edition had been out for almost a 
month. The Mandrake IRC channel isn't much better, I didn't get any 
replies at all there because there were too many people, they just 
figured it would be easier to ignore me because I was a stranger to 
them. My blog post wasn't just our of frustration with anything that 
might have happened in this list but with the entire Linux user base in 
general.

>On a mailing list, you can't see what other people are really thinking.
>When talking face to face, you can see people's facial expressions, on a
>list, all you see is this text. So you need to provide people with a lot
>more slack for potential disagreements on a list because something that
>is just helpful advice might seem to the recipient as an attempt (as you
>put it on your blog) to "tell me off." 
>
>  
>

I've personally felt like I was being told that if I weren't going to 
stick with one distribution I might as well not bother asking the list 
for any help at all when I run into a problem with Linux, I've from time 
to time asked whether there might be a distribution that would fit a 
certain description and I've gotten no replies except for the "stick 
with distro X and make it work" messages, in fact thats all I can even 
remember hearing from the list recently despite the other ongoing 
topics. I know the authors of the posts most likely didn't realize how 
they made me feel but several times I'm sure I tried to make it clear 
how I felt about their replies and I didn't think I was getting through.

>If I might make such a bold suggestion: whaddya say about taking off
>that blog post for now? Try the peacemaking steps Jesus gave us: go
>contact the people privately that you feel have hurt you. I bet they
>will apologize and say they never meant to imply what you feel they are
>implying. If not, talk to this list as a whole and see if we can't
>resolve things. If none of that resolves the situation for you, then go
>ahead and paste that entry back online -- I just doubt that will be
>necessary.
>
>	Just keep in mind we all love ya, bro. 
>
>	Blessings to you...
>
>	-Tim
>  
>

Sure, I can take the blog post down, I didn't realize how it would be 
interpreted until I read David's post.

>On Sun, 2004-04-25 at 10:18, David McGlone wrote:
>  
>
>>Your Blog does not have the ability to post comments, so would you care if I 
>>posted your most recent blog entry on my blog, because I think all this has 
>>been misunderstood and you should at least give some of the people you 
>>refered to a chance to explain themselves and explain to you why they chose 
>>the words they did.
>>
>>I really think you owe that to some of the people on this list, including me.
>>
>>
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