Motivation

Hello all,

I am a 16 year old enthusiast and since right now is summer break for me
I have been trying to hit the books. I am working on "Linux power
tools" as well as some books on Debian/GNU. I have 7 distros (Knoppix,
Slackware, Red Hat, Debian, Suse, Slack, Telemetry box) and have
successfully installed every one and played with the desktop
environments, setting up SAMBA, trying to compile .tar.gz files and just
messing around with stuff like the MOTD, Emacs, and vim. However, I am
still a teenager so I have been slacking off and not getting near as
much done as I have planned. My question is: Since you are admins and
deal with reading not only the man pages but tons of other texts every
day, how do you motivate yourself to sit down and just read it all, even
when reading for hours and sometimes going through dozens of code
examples ?? Thanks for answering some of the previous questions I have
posted on this board and I also must thank the whole open source
community for being there, this whole world has been so enlightening for
me. To break out of the Windows/MAC world and experience the breath of
fresh air and interoperability the linux/open source world brings is
such an enlightening experience.

Thanks,
Josh
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Re: Motivation

Josh wrote:

> My question is: Since you are admins and
> deal with reading not only the man pages but tons of other texts every
> day, how do you motivate yourself to sit down and just read it all, even
> when reading for hours and sometimes going through dozens of code
> examples ??

For the most part, we don't.

Anyone who is actually working as an admin generally has more urgent
things to do than read "bulk" documentation (e.g. tutorials).

Mostly, you read enough initially so that you have a reasonable
overview as to how the parts fit together. The rest can wait until you
actually need it.

It helps to know which programs do what, so you know which manual page
(and/or Info file or /usr/doc subdirectory) to read when dealing with
a specific issue, but you don't need to know the manuals off by heart.

Realistically, you can't expect to learn every detail. In computing,
knowledge tends to become outdated faster than you can acquire it.

--
Glynn Clements
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Re: Motivation

Josh,

Over the years I have found the best way to learn is to use the
texts as references and design a project that will actually force me
to learn the skills I am studying. For instance, you might try
setting up Apache. then setup a web space. then a virtual web space.
Then install Mysql. Setup a Mysql database. Connect some PHP pages
to the database. Setup IPtables.

You get the idea. Its much more fun to work on a project that
involves the skills you want to learn. reading hundreds of pages
with no context is boring!

Luke

> Hello all,
>
> I am a 16 year old enthusiast and since right now is summer break
> for me
> I have been trying to hit the books. I am working on "Linux power
> tools" as well as some books on Debian/GNU. I have 7 distros
> (Knoppix,
> Slackware, Red Hat, Debian, Suse, Slack, Telemetry box) and have
> successfully installed every one and played with the desktop
> environments, setting up SAMBA, trying to compile .tar.gz files and
> just
> messing around with stuff like the MOTD, Emacs, and vim. However, I
> am
> still a teenager so I have been slacking off and not getting near as
> much done as I have planned. My question is: Since you are admins
> and
> deal with reading not only the man pages but tons of other texts
> every
> day, how do you motivate yourself to sit down and just read it all,
> even
> when reading for hours and sometimes going through dozens of code
> examples ?? Thanks for answering some of the previous questions I
> have
> posted on this board and I also must thank the whole open source
> community for being there, this whole world has been so enlightening
> for
> me. To break out of the Windows/MAC world and experience the breath
> of
> fresh air and interoperability the linux/open source world brings is
> such an enlightening experience.
>
> Thanks,
> Josh
> -
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe
> linux-admin" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
> More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
>

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Re: Motivation

On Tue, 2004-06-29 at 08:47, Glynn Clements wrote:
> Josh wrote:
>
> > My question is: Since you are admins and
> > deal with reading not only the man pages but tons of other texts every
> > day, how do you motivate yourself to sit down and just read it all, even
> > when reading for hours and sometimes going through dozens of code
> > examples ??
>
> For the most part, we don't.
>
> Anyone who is actually working as an admin generally has more urgent
> things to do than read "bulk" documentation (e.g. tutorials).
>
> Mostly, you read enough initially so that you have a reasonable
> overview as to how the parts fit together. The rest can wait until you
> actually need it.
>
> It helps to know which programs do what, so you know which manual page
> (and/or Info file or /usr/doc subdirectory) to read when dealing with
> a specific issue, but you don't need to know the manuals off by heart.
>
> Realistically, you can't expect to learn every detail. In computing,
> knowledge tends to become outdated faster than you can acquire it.

And of course there's the whole "trial by fire" indoctrination that
often gets mislabeled "learning by doing" or OJT, but is really just a
frantic boss pulling hair and squealing "This has to be working again in
3 minutes or the world will stop turning, and if that happens I'll have
your whole department trampled by rhinos!".

You see, an ADMIN (sound of trumpets, averting of eyes, genuflection,
etc) generally starts as a user just like you, Josh, somebody who is
willing to feed themselves rather than be fed; somebody with a higher
than average level of curiosity, and a desire to know what happens
behind the scenes and how everything interrelates,
who is then forced by circumstance to solve one crisis after another at
figurative gunpoint.

It's pretty much a case of reading whatever is required to understand
and repair a problem so that you can choke down the next problem and so
on and so on until one day you start seeing problems that you've dealt
with before.

The 3 greatest resources available during the crisis and the morph from
user to admin, are man pages, lists like this and the usenet newsgroups.
Oh, and any single thing about which you can become passionate, that has
nothing at all to do with computers.
If you can't find a place to "kick it" away from a keyboard, they will
eventually medicate you against your will.

Andy

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Re: Motivation

on "6-29-2004" "Andrew Kelly" writ:

: The 3 greatest resources ... man pages, lists like this and the usenet
: newsgroups

.... ciao:

a real favorite of mine is 'apropos' ...

--
.... i'm a man, but i can change,
if i have to , i guess ...

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Re: Motivation

Josh wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> I am a 16 year old enthusiast and since right now is summer break for me
> I have been trying to hit the books. I am working on "Linux power
> tools" as well as some books on Debian/GNU. I have 7 distros (Knoppix,
> Slackware, Red Hat, Debian, Suse, Slack, Telemetry box) and have
> successfully installed every one and played with the desktop
> environments, setting up SAMBA, trying to compile .tar.gz files and just
> messing around with stuff like the MOTD, Emacs, and vim. However, I am
> still a teenager so I have been slacking off and not getting near as
> much done as I have planned. My question is: Since you are admins and
> deal with reading not only the man pages but tons of other texts every
> day, how do you motivate yourself to sit down and just read it all, even
> when reading for hours and sometimes going through dozens of code
> examples ?? Thanks for answering some of the previous questions I have
> posted on this board and I also must thank the whole open source
> community for being there, this whole world has been so enlightening for
> me. To break out of the Windows/MAC world and experience the breath of
> fresh air and interoperability the linux/open source world brings is
> such an enlightening experience.
>
> Thanks,
> Josh
> -
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-admin" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
> More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
>

Josh,

It's really quite impossible to master everything there is in
opensource, so don't bother trying. Pick a distribution (or a couple of
similar ones) and learn it, learn it well. I personally suggest that you
don't use package management tools unless you have to. If you install
things from source you'll end up being forced to learn how they work. If
you really want to get to know your system, you could always try doing a
LFS install, as every single item in your installation will be built
from source. Also, if you really want to learn the inner workings of
your system, you'll have to get used to the idea of not using the GUIs
for everything. Try setting up a box without gnome or KDE on it (I
recommend leaving X, since some source packages need the libraries), and
then making it do something useful (web server, file server, router,
etc.). I've realize that linux books are rarely the way to go (though
I'll admit there are several good ones), mainly because linux is
changing so fast. Google and grep are your most essential tools, master
those and you can do just about anything.

And no, I'm not saying that if you use RPMs or a GUI that you aren't a
"real" admin, but if you don't know how to function without them you
aren't a very good admin. I use slackware packages all the time :)

~Brad
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