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Building a Large Linux Knowledgebase
linuxfan writes "It looks like LinuxQuestions.org is aiming to build the largest independent Linux-related knowledgebase using a Wiki. They are using the same software as Wikipedia (MediaWiki), are using a Creative Commons license and look to be off to a good start."
This is a great idea for those of us who find certain aspects of Linux a bit daunting. Between outdated HOWTOs and sometimes cryptic MAN pages, newbies such as myself can get a bit frustrated.
My hope is that this database doesn't grow out of control with redundant and/or meaningless data.
"You're getting brutal, Sark. Brutal and needlessly sadistic."
"Thank you, Master Control"
-Sark and the MCP
Wikipedia is a projekt driven by an community, LinuxQuestions.org is somewhat unclear to characterise: not clearly a community only or a business company selling ads within their content.
As on always you should read the Rules before posting. registration is required, but email is optional.
Isn't OSDN trying to do that already? Why is an OSDN board advertising an upstart competitor like LinuxQuestions? Is this article an inside joke Michael?
Maybe it's just me, but I find that site hopelessly in-navigable. Hours of clicking in circles and the unfriendly color scheme, and you get about sick and tired of trying to learn the operating system. Maybe if they had a tutorial on how to use the site, I could learn more... ;)
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
You answered your own question.
Yes it works, as proven by neverwinter nights.
It needs developer support.. which requires a userbase.
So you just sit there, giving your market share to Microsoft, and keep wondering why noone develops
any games for linux.
Genius!
This seems like a great idea, untill some smartass decides to mask harmful commands as solutions to obscure problems. /bin so that when you list all the files it does an asciiart of the goatse guy, or just throws in a "sudo rm -rf /" or something.
Since it looks like anyone can update this thing, what happens when someone sneaks into a solution a command to write morse-code on the hard drive, or some command to rename all the files in
Not that I don't think this is a good idea, but without some sort of review process I would personally feel nervous about sending some of my more inexperienced friends to the site and having them execute commands all willy nilly.
I know that 99% of the users who would post something would do it out of an honest desire to help, in fact I will probably post a few things that I have had to do as obscure solutions to weird problems myself, but it only takes a single post to a problem that is just commen enough but not too comment to get a lot of people to fsck up their machines.
Famous Last Words: "hmm...wikipedia says it's edible"
I dunno if the "wiki" part is anything newer than what I saw a month ago, but after jumping through several account creation / e-mail verification / etc hoops to try to post a detailed, working answer to someone else's problem (the problem and distro which happened to be the same as mine -- and for which no "good" answer had yet been provided), I kept getting denied any ability to actually post a reply to the thread. Tried for several days and gave up. I'm hoping it was a fluke... I know I need answers all the time for things, but the one time I CAN HELP and try to do so, DENIED. Blah.
Shouldn't it be Linuces?
Unix => Unices
Matrix => Matrices
I don't know... I'm just asking.
I would like to see documentation that's prolem oriented. It would start with "How do I ...?". It would list the most basic, high level steps. Then, each of those steps is a link to its own "how do I...?". You could then drill down each step that's a problem to you, and find out how to do the step. That way you don't get stuck. Sure, it would take a long time to build, but then you have pretty complete, robust documentation.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso
I have been using Wikipedia for a while and one of the biggest selling point IMO is the great browsing experience. I often find myself actually surfing again by going from hyperlink to hyperlink, trying to soak up all the information, something I have stopped doing a while ago with most other webpages. There is lot of very good, indepth content on there.
TLDP is a bunch of mostly technical articles (HOWTO's, guides, FAQs and man pages) that are very usefull, but don't really form a coherent whole. It would be wonderfull to have a somewhat more encyclopedia oriented linux documentation to consult, that is updated consistently to boot. A encyclopedia aproach also alows you to cover a wide spectrum of topic, from, say, obscure technical details to general *nix design philosophies.
However, wiki's for this type of large projects (like wikipedia) need a certain critical mass of contributors for it to, I would think. While I don't know if this project will be "it", I think a wiki aproach would be a great idea.
Seriously. I visited the local LUG and was appalled at the attitude some of the older members had whenever a relative newbie or younger kid asked them a question. The boilerplate answer from the "gurus"?
"Just read the man pages".
I tried to hit them up for a simple answer to the nodev, user and suid options in fstab and all I got was "Read the man pages".
I wasn't looking to the answers to everything, only the differences between "user" and "nodev" options and when it is best to use them.
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. -Frederick Douglass
How can you make sure some numbnut doesn't get rid of useful stuff?
I've often thought about installing/hacking together something like slash and posting each of the howtos as "articles" or maybe each section of each howto as a sub-article. Then the howto could be discussed and kept live and up to date. After some period of time take the highest moderated posts and rewrite the howto and start over.
Slashdot's moderation system seems to mostly work and that would be the key to success for something like this. I could never think of a good name for it and wasn't good enough to pull it off so I never got around to it. Now I could probably pull it off but don't have the time and still don't have a good name.
G
I have a better idea about wiki: use it instead of CVS or on a top of CVS making possible for everyone to submit changes or to roll back the bad code. Mo more waiting when the maintainer has time to check it in - just do it yourself. If it works for open-sourced documents, why can't it work for open-sourced software?
Less is more !
You did miss your's too. Only C++ compilers would requier you to prototype (or c compilers using the right -w compiler switch). Were you thinking about, heavens, Visual C++? ;-)
"...normal evolution would have gone Word to Frame to troff, but instead, the computer industry has gone the other way!"