Hi all, One of the concepts we see arise on the forums time and time again that's poorly understood is the concept of an Enterprise Class OS and everything that involves. I think it would be of benefit to have a one stop page to point users to that explains the concepts and provides the information required. Much of this content already exists on the Wiki but it is scattered over many individual pages and new users often don't find it (new users often don't search at all!) I'm thinking something that covers the following topics: Relationship with the upstream product stability and long term support (vs bleeding edge) Support lifecycle backporting Not installing software from source ... Much of this could be a narrative linking to existing content on the Wiki where possible - not really that much new content, just bringing it all together in one place in an easy to read/navigate format. Initially I envisaged this as an "About" type page but that already exists (in title), so maybe something like "Understanding an Enterprise Class Operating System". I'd also written a forum post in the FAQ and ReadMe First section on "Installing Software": http://www.centos.org/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=14408&forum=47 and am wondering about transferring this content to the Wiki too - maybe under the /HowTos/PackageManagement section, and some of that obviously relates to the content above. IMHO it makes sense to have this information centrally available on the Wiki rather than separately on the forums. I guess the reason for this post stems from frustration that the information is there on the Wiki but many new users are simply not finding it (I think forum users are maybe less inclined to search before asking than ML users). This makes me think we need to look at how we can restructure the information on the Wiki to make it more accessible or maybe produce pages that bring together related but individually scattered content in a more structured (easier to find and navigate) manner. ATM we tend to find ourselves writing the same answers over and over again which demonstrates a need for a centralised page covering all of this related content. Any thoughts?
On Sat, Nov 08, 2008 at 12:59:02PM +0000, Ned Slider wrote:> Hi all, > > One of the concepts we see arise on the forums time and time again > that's poorly understood is the concept of an Enterprise Class OS and > everything that involves. I think it would be of benefit to have a one > stop page to point users to that explains the concepts and provides the > information required. Much of this content already exists on the Wiki > but it is scattered over many individual pages and new users often don't > find it (new users often don't search at all!) >My cynical view is that, as you say, new users often don't search at all. That being said, in theory, at least, it's a good idea. In practice, you, Alan and Toracat are the ones who voluntarily shoulder the greatest load in answering newcomer questions--the rest of us step in once in awhile, but you three are certainly the most diligent. Therefore, anything you feel might make it a little easier for you is worth trying. I wonder if it might also be worthwhile trying to get a pointer to such a document on the CentOS distrowatch page--as I suspect that's where some percentage of the beginners start. Something like new users, to avoid disappointment, please look at <link here>. Although those users are the ones that stand out in our minds, I suspect that the majority of CentOS users are still sysadmin types using it in more production or production like (e.g., home server) environments. Anyway, for those that don't frequent the forum, Ned, Alan and Akemi san do the lion's (tiger's?) share of the work in dealing with the newcomers and answering the same questions again and again, and anything that one of them feels might help is certainly worth considering. -- Scott Robbins PGP keyID EB3467D6 ( 1B48 077D 66F6 9DB0 FDC2 A409 FA54 EB34 67D6 ) gpg --keyserver pgp.mit.edu --recv-keys EB3467D6 Buffy: I gotta stop him before he unleashes unholy havoc and it's just another Tuesday night in Sunnydale.
Akemi Wrote: ""This makes me think we need to look at how we can restructure the information on the Wiki to make it more accessible or maybe produce pages that bring together related but individually scattered content in a more structured (easier to find and navigate) manner."" JohnStanley Writes: Well I thought I was the only one thinking like that. Color of the Wiki is a great choice but one problem. It needs to be designed with ADD in mind. "Attention Deficent Disorder" That's right. Things need better organization and classification. What I get asked a lot is what the heck is CentOS? Well the wiki doesn't tell you and the main centos.org doesn't really say. Every one does not know it is a derivative of Red Hat EL. Besides, What is an Ent. Class OS there could also be How CentOS can be utilized as a Desktop. Just my thought and opinion...