*BSD News Article 72131


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From: brian@awfulhak.demon.co.uk (Brian Somers)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: A Serious article for the FreeBSD support group
Date: 26 Jun 1996 13:34:40 -0500
Organization: Coverform Ltd.
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k (landau@yu1.yu.edu) wrote:
: I recently purchased the FreeBSD cdrom from crom.com
: (I'll consider the plushie if the price goes down :)

: I must say however, that installing the system if far from easy. The
: first problem many people have is obviously an unrecognized cdrom
: drive. I'm resourceful... so I get a plethora of those floppies and
: feed them to my machine. Now my BASIC system is up and running.

Just yesterday, someone posted that it took less than an hour.

: My problem is that this is where the manual stops! It never mentions
: that if you leave the system alone and come back on the following day
: you'll get an error that you have not configured sendmail.

What error ?  Perhaps it was to do with not configuring your host name
during installation - or not configuring your network devices ?  My
sendmail.cf works out of the box - it's built with
/usr/src/usr.sbin/sendmail/cf/cf/freebsd.mc.  If you want to change the
default behaviour of an application, you'll have to learn to use the
application.

: To the support group ***  please realize that many people want to
: learn how to unix (this does not mean that they already know it!!)

What's a support group?  If you want to learn to use unix, buy a book or
install it and play with it until you know more.  I did this when I first
learnt BASIC, Z80 assembler, DOS, Unix, 8086 assembler, C, and C++.  I
never expected a tutorial on basic principles.


: Now I've asked my questions here on the newsgroup and I will be able
: to configure the application, but what lies ahead?

Good, you're getting the hang of things.

:                                                    What else has no
: one ever told me about?

Everything you don't know about of course.  What do you want to do with
your machine ?  If you don't like sendmail errors, remove sendmail from
/etc/sysconfig.  If you want email, learn to configure it.

:                         These issues must be addressed if FreeBSD is
: ever to be an operating system that people can install at home and
: use. Why isn't sendmail placed in the setup as a mandatory install
: requirement?

'cos it works in the default way - a default that works for most people.
If you want to do anything smart (and this applies for all programs),
RTFM - it's not going to read itself to you.

:              I hate to say it, but I see plenty of people out there
: complaining that they can not install the software. I personally feel
: that someone out there should write up a FAQ which takes a user
: through a theoretical install and tell the user what he will have to
: configure. I would be more than glad to do this myself if someone
: would help guide me in the installation process.  If any of you are
: interested in this joint venture please email me at kenny@essutton.com
: I am determined to get this thing to work! (even though I have yet to
: use the CD I bought)

: Ken

All in all, I think you're expecting a bit much, but if you are willing
to participate in providing that, then that's fine by me.  I would
help, but I have very little time and too much to do.  Anyway, I don't
like writing documentation :-(

--
Brian <brian@awfulhak.demon.co.uk>
Don't _EVER_ lose your sense of humour....