Learning By Asking & Reading

[nujinini]

Hello Guys!

I have not been posting questions lately as much as I have been in the past months. That's because all the basic things I need to learn to help me run linux (at my level) has been answered and made clear to me by you guys! Thanks!

Anyway, I have a new realization. As I was browsing through the forums and reading the threads (even the older ones), I discovered that I can also learn a lot. Most specially the stickies. This forums is really a nice place to stay and hang out so to speak. I learned as I ask, and I learn as I read through the questions of others. Most specially, knowing that I am with a group of super geeks who have generously dedicated time and talent in sharing their thoughts & ideas make me real proud in a way.

Thank you Linux Forums! Have some

[GNU-Fan]

I found that you can also learn a lot by answering questions.
Often I see a question about a problem which I only know a bit about but I think is interesting to solve. Sometimes even somebody else answers to my solution "This may work, but here is another approach", so I can learn even more.

(This is why I am a not so big fan of closing threads with the "solved" button. It suggest that there was only one solution for every problem, which is wrong.)

[reed9]

Yeah. My computers have been working pretty much flawlessly for quite a while now, so the only way to keep fresh and learning is by trying to solve other people's problems.

[oz]

One thing that would help lots of users tremendously is to learn to use the search function for various forums and search engines. Quite often, a particular question has been asked many thousands of times but users will come along and ask it again as if it were the first time the question had ever been posted. I personally think that if a person knows how to search, they can find the solution to almost any problem.

Glad you are having fun with Linux and enjoying the forums!

[reed9]

That's pretty much how I find the solutions to many problems for other people. Oftentimes I'm finding solutions I posted in the past and have since forgotten.

[Bemk]

I also notice that most of my questions have been answered using Google. Some answers I can't find, such as a problem with an IPv6 tunnel I set up or a package that won't finish its installation as it can't be properly configured(found some results between the spam, but didn't work), and then I ask.

Answering users questions is fun, though the things I want to learn, often aren't discussed over here, though there are a lot of interesting things on details. (I'm looking into OS building)

[Bemk]

Here is something else I noticed. I don't know why, but the newbie community seems to be asking very different questions than I can remember asking. Maybe that is because the systems I used to learn how to use Linux were older, or maybe everything just works so well on my system, because the system is considered old, by technology evolutionary standards.