[ale] I am so tired of Linux Fanatics

[drifter]

Responding to a vent/rant by Joshua Roberts about the quality of support
from within the Linux community as a whole,
On Wednesday 07 July 2010 14:22:16 James Sumners wrote:
> That depends on your environment. Do you want to start something on
> boot? If so, what init[1] system are you using? Sys V? BSD? Something
> else? Or are you trying to start something when you launch X? Then you
> have to specify which desktop environment you are using, if one at
> all.
> 

As a novice user (who isn't as afraid of the command line as I should be!)
I can say that the ALE list has been most helpful to me.

But take a look at the paragraph quoted  above as if you were coming to
 the table fresh from the Microsoft world.

init[1]
Sys V
BSD
"launch X"

These terms are unknown to the typical Windoze user, who has no idea how
to deal with a corrupted Registry file -- or even what that might be.

Take a look at my recent problem trying to upgrade Ubuntu on a netbook.
After reboot the thing would only boot to a login prompt. No error
messages, no clues at all as to the nature of the problem. Just no desktop
in sight.  I have enough experience in Linux to deal with the surface level
issue -- getting to the GUI desktop -- but not enough experience to solve
the root problem.  Finally realized I had a Kbuntu 10.04 disk at hand and
installed from scratch, saving the partition table and reloading the 
critical files on /home. Now most of the pieces parts are working again.
I still have to deal with a truly goofy list of KDE defaults:  Drag-and-
drop doesn't work as installed!; want a different image for the desktop
background? Good luck!  It took me nearly an hour to figure out how to do
that. It doesn't work anything like KDE on this box.
But life goes on and I continue to grow more knowledgeable, if not
wiser.

Sean