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Please Read - Subforum Information

New to Debian (Or Linux in general)? Ask your questions here!
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FreewheelinFrank
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Please Read - Subforum Information

#1 Post by FreewheelinFrank »

Hello, and welcome to the Debian forum. I am FreewheelinFrank, the moderator for this subforum.

As this is the Beginners Questions subforum, I will briefly lay out some points you should be aware of when posting here, extracted from the Debian Philosophy and Code of Conduct at the Debian Website (which I hope you will read!).

The key words relevant to posts here are: Freedom, collaboration, diversity and respect.

Debian is a free operating system, meaning both that it is not paid for, and that it is open. Open means that anybody can view the source code, bug reports, and help and support messages like this forum. An important point to make here is that while all software in the official Debian distribution is free (as in open), Debian also provides many packages of software which is restricted in its use (or depends on restricted software) in separate sections. Enabling these sections is an easy task, but in Debian it has to be an informed decision. Bear this in mind if you find that something that worked in another Linux distribution doesn't work for you in Debian.

Debian is a collaboration between developers and users. This is a user forum, and most of the contributors are here to put something back into Debian by helping other users with questions they have. As a beginner to Debian, you can collaborate with us by reading relevant sections of the Debian Wiki and the Debian Administrators Handbook, and by searching this forum for previous answers to users' problems. It is fair to say that users here will make more of an effort to help you if you help us. Having said that, we appreciate that you might be new to Debian, or even to Linux, so don't be afraid to ask a question. Of course, if you become a regular Debian user, please come back and help future beginners with their problems here!

Debian welcomes and encourages participation by everyone whatever your age, gender, ethnicity, religion, disability, sexual orientation, education, or national origin. In addition we appreciate that not everyone is a software developer or computer geek, works in computing or even with computers, and that you may have expertise in other areas. You will be made welcome here and get help with your issues, as long as you interact constructively and collaboratively with other users.

Respect is part of the Debian philosophy. Users here should respect each other. Poor behaviour and personal attacks will be challenged. Disagreement and difficulty in collaborating does occur, but users should remain respectful. This applies to people and organisations outside this forum as well. If you feel that you have been made to feel unwelcome, or have not been respected on this subforum, I am the person to approach first: please send me a PM explaining what happened with a link to the topic.

For more detailed information on Debian, what it is and how to use it, check out the forum Beginner's Guide

Beginners are strongly recommended to read DontBreakDebian: Advice For New Users On Not Breaking Their Debian System

Some suggestions for users replying to beginners' questions.

Here are a few suggestion for anybody replying to beginners' questions on the subforum. The aim is to make it less likely that other users will ask the same question, by making it easier to find the answer. Please bear in mind that if one person has asked a question, many others may find that post through a web search for key words. If that post contains a satisfactory answer to the question, not only is it good for these users, it means we won't get asked the same question again.

There is nothing more frustrating than doing a web search and finding a post from somebody who has asked the same question and received the answer "Do a forum search", if, when you do a forum search, you can't find the answer! Often I can't find the answer to a problem with a forum search, even though I remember the question has been answered before. Before giving the answer above, please consider that the poster may not have English as a first language, or the technical background to choose the best search terms.

Ideally, please check if a search does bring up an answer easily. Could you suggest search terms that bring up an answer which might not have occurred to the user? Is the answer in on thread, or in multiple threads? Is there a definitive post with explanation and references you could link to? If not, could you reread relevant threads, collate the information and give a reference so your post will become the definitive link?

man <package> is a very useful resource, but users without a computing background may need a little more help. Even I do sometimes! If you are experienced with the package, bearing in mind what the user is trying to achieve, can you give a brief explanation of what the command does, what inputs are needed and what the output will be? A concrete example with the options the user needs is extremely helpful.

Users sometimes want to use a package as a tool to do a task. While there is excellent documentation for packages in Debian, and becoming familiar with a package is an excellent learning process, it may not be what the user wants. Asking somebody who knows the package to tell them how to do what they want to do, rather than spend an hour or so reading the documentation for an application they may never use again may not actually be an unreasonable request. If you are familiar with the package, can you tell the user in a few words how to achieve what they want to achieve?

Of course I realise nobody is paid to post here. If you feel that a user is making an unreasonable request, and is not collaborating by doing some work they seem capable of doing, you are free either to respectfully tell them so, or to simply not post in the topic, but if you can take the time to put your experience into a brief answer, or to point out where the question has been answered before, bear in mind that your post will probably come up in future searches and could be the first impression that users get of the forum. This will be a much more welcoming impression than "do a search" or "read the manual"

Edit 20/1/23: added "Don't Break Debian" link.

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