Re: Book Project: Working Outline

On Thursday, 28 August 2003, at 00:09AM, Paul Weinstein wrote:

> To show our thanks for your feedback, I wish to welcome you to a  dedicated
> section of my personal website,
> <http://www.weinstein.org/linuxannoyances/outline.html>, where I have 
posted
> our working book outline.
> Please make yourself at home! Look over our outline and let us know  (on
this
> list of course) what you think...

• 	1.1 What exactly is Linux?  - Explains the difference between the 
kernel and various distributions. Could talk about kernel versions here 
as well.

Could you mention "What is GNU?" in this section & how it interacts  with
Linux, please..? I'm sure you intended to already but, as others  have
said here, many annoyances are GNU-annoyances & Unix-annoyances,  not
Linux specifcs. Of course your book  must cover this in an umbrella 
fashion, but I think a brief history of GNU, and how the Linux kernel 
just happened to slot in & create a massive synergy with the GNU utils, 
might help new users understand the background to why Linux is so 
annoying. (Because it's Unix!)


	• 	2.3.2.4 Google Wizardry

Excellent! I have this theory that most any question about a Linux  issue
can be answered by a search of Google Groups... provided, that  is, one
knows how to ASK the question (or phrase the search) and
understand the answers!!


	• 	2.3.3.1 How to get useful answers
based on http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

This is an IMPORTANT section: ESR explains the process well, but not 
tactfully. You have chosen an excellent resource to draw upon.


Chapter 8: Linux Server Annoyances ...MTAs

If you do this well, it alone is worth the price of the book! I found  the
documentation on MTAs horrifically obscure when I approached them  for the
first time this year. My mail system uses fetchmail to draw  from my ISPs
and maildrop for local transport / filtering to maildirs.  That first part
took me DAYS! After that, an IMAP server for my LAN,  webmail & outgoing
ssmtp (I *so* didn't understand how this replaced  sendmail) were easy!

>  If you feel we have missed or misinterpreted
> something or simply wish to reinforce something, by all means let us  know.

Thanks for valuing us enough to ask our opinions, and for allowing us  to
contribute at this stage.

Stroller.

--
Write a book for Dee-Ann, Paul & Justin. Make them rich and famous!

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