[techtalk] Techtalk FAQ

[Fan, Laurel]

jenn at simegen.com said:
> There is currently no techtalk FAQ. The rough outline exists, but is
> really nothing more at this stage than a set of docbook tags and a
> couple of headings. 

Haven't been able to do much on it, since I'm away from my unix machines,
and therefore don't have a) cvs, b) docbook/sgml stuff, or c) root. It
would be great if you'd take over, and here's the outline I have so far:

There's quite a bit of how-to-ask-for-help stuff, which apparently
some people don't like, so feel free to ignore this.  This is also
not very techtalk-specific, but oh well.

I. What is this list for/ what is this list not for.
   (eg techtalk topic thingy)
II. How to get help.
    A. Suggestions of things to try before asking
        1. documentation (how to find and how to use)
            a. HOWTOs
              (what kind of stuff is in them)
              (where to find them: http://linuxdoc.org, http://oswg.org,
               others?)
            b. man/info
               (what kind of stuff is in them)
               (how to use them/find them/search within them)
               (how to use man, more/less, apropos, info viewer)
            c. project/distribution web pages & mailing lists
               (search engine, freshmeat, sourceforge, project.org,net,com)
            d. random scattered documentation 
               (/usr/doc, /usr/*/doc, etc.., web search)
         2. is it a known bug?
            a. look in bug tracking or faq (if exists)
                (ref. II.A.1.c above)
            b. upgrade to latest stable version (if possible)
                (ref. II.A.1.c above, how to check for
                 later package management versions)
         3. strace/gdb (possibly)
    B. Helpful information to provide and how to get it
        1. exact command arguments and output
           (how to copy/paste, how to use script)
        2. system/distribution info
           (uname, where various distributions store version numbers,
            how to get kernel/libc/other important stuff versions)
        3. installation method (package management, source, binary...)
        4. package/program version info (--version, -v, --help, etc.)
        5. strace and/or gdb (maybe)
III. Actual FAQs
    A. What distribution should I use? (possible distribution faq)
    B. How do I do this in Linux?
       (look in software list sites, search manpages)
    C. Is there something in Linux similar to this in another os?
       (look in software list sites)
       (decribe in detail, not everyone is familiar with every
        other os, even windows)
    D. Will this hardware work in Linux?
       (mostly links to stuff like hardware compatibility list,
        linux laptop page, Xfree video card list, etc)
    E. Various modem/ppp questions
       (winmodems, modem HCL, various modem-related HOWTOs)
    F. How do I install this
        1. how to use package managers
           (pointers to package manager documentation, maybe a few
            more frequently used commands)
        2. how to compile from source 
            (how to un-tar.gz stuff, how to use
             ./configure;make;make install, make -n, )
        3. It's won't install, what's wrong
            (dependency problems, -dev/-devel packages, compile
             problems, don't have a compiler (configure sometimes
             spits out a really not-useful error message when
             it can't find the compiler))
    G. It doesn't work, what's wrong
        (ref II.A)
    H. etc.
           
IV. Links 
    (mostly references from above, newbie sites, other faqs, other lists,
etc.)
    (possible overlap with web site links? offtopic, the links would
     probably be more helpful if there was a way to submit them besides
     bothering Deb, say, something like http://kanga.nu/library/. even
     more offtopic, it would be nice if other stuff (profiles, software
     reviews, FAQs, etc) was automated as well.  surely the php hackers on
this
     list could implement this easily..)