With his massive post count Kev knows more about the workings of this site than anyone. Kev - wind your neck in. Be polite and respond to questions with answers and you'll have a long and fruitful posting life here.

I hope it is obvious that this will depend entirely on what you say in the post......

well i know that at times i can be a bit "short" tempered
BUT
Most of the time the answer has been posted before on 1/2 a dozen threads
Or there IS a wiki page for this problem
Or there is a sticky for this question

-- My # 1 pet peeve --
using unsupported versions of a OS ( RH9, fedora 1 to 10 )

this i AM very "short" on.
( except for the exception of NEEDING to run legacy software that nobody has or can upgrade )

The distribution logo on the post just indicates the distro used for posting that specific post. At work and usually, I use Ubuntu. But if I dont have my desktop around and reply with some other laptop at home, the logo would change to windows. That should not mean I use windows and that my post or question is all about windows.

True but if every poster used google there would only be three or four new threads a day. How long would members or visitors stay interested in LQ?

I would say that maybe half or more of the newbies may not know what a wiki is. Most come from windows and do not understand if a cd/dvd will not repair the problem.

All rubs aside you have done a good job of helping me and others, keep up the good work.

Keep in mind, also, that much of the information you find on the 'net is well outdated (I've found pages that haven't been updated since 1997!!), hence the need for a 'live' forum. Linux, as with every other facet of computer technology, evolves rather quickly.

Kudos to everyone who volunteer their time helping others, here.

Cheers

Amusingly, one of the most annoying things i find is when someone acts like outdated software is so bad.

Well, in most cases it is. Especially when we're talking about operating systems.

Two main areas:

1. no security patches
2. I remember countless examples of eg. something that I spent hours trying to configure in Fedora Core 4 (my first distro) that would require no configuration at all in Fedora 12. So instead of wasting time on configuration of FC4 that is not supported anyway, it makes much more sense to install F12.

When it comes to applications, perhaps, there are cases were running some ancient version would make no difference. I don't know. Usually, though, more recent versions are more functional. Hence, more appealing to the user.

old is one thing but unsupported is another

not everything will run ( without some very serious rewrite ) on a bleeding edge OS that is why i run cent5.4 along with Arch ( was fedora 11 )

There is also a big difference from NEEDING to run a old app on a old os because it is not feasible to update the program ( there is no code just a bin.)

-- and --

installing rh9 because you read someplace that red hat was good and decided to try to install it on a brand new multi core laptop

-- edit --
for me there is a program ( and it would be to much of a pain to rewright the 200+ makefiles - it is a makefile based build--
and it will not run using the current glib in arch or fedora .However it was originally built for rhel5 so runs fine on cent .

another example ( this one SHOULD have been fixed a long time ago )
the FAA runs some lotus programs at night in the background - on windows - but the code works .It dose what it is suppose to do and dose it well . just IE 8 kills it

I also don't like to use outdated software, I just find it frustrating and limiting, I guess that's why I didn't "click" with Debian or CentOS.

But I think it's OK to intentionally play around with old computers as a hobby (as is (i think) in smeezekitty's case).

I don't think anyone would question the hack value of doing it as a hobby. It can be great fun, as long as you don't use such a box as your main computer demanding full modern desktop functionality

I can admit that I have seen a guru or two be rude or at least a bit snobbish to me or another member, but these are extreme cases most of the time where the OP is either asking for something that is impossible to answer or is rude in there post first. I will admit my answers sometimes may seam like I am being a jackass and its possible that I am. Feel free to let me know that I am being one so I can apologize.

Even I have looked at some of my old posts and think, wow what a jerk, but these are some of the early posts that I have made. Some times I am trying to come off as being a bit funny and it can be misinterpreted as being a jerk. I really am not one tho and try my best to give good information in a nice way.

As far as asking what distro you are using in the question I agree that looking at what somone has listed as there distro does not tell you that the question pertains to that. I have a very bad habit of never updating mine or messing around with one that I do not have listed here.
<------ BTW that reminds me to add arch to my list over there

If you'd humor the prospect of some introspection: I once had a manager who said to our team, "Hey, we're all Type A personalities here. I expect you to not get along with one or two of the other folks on board. But if you can't get along with most of the other folks, then I can see where the problem is."

There is no point in arguing with fools. They drag you down to their level and then beat you with their experience.
I wanted not to post again here. But you had a very nice point.

1 members found this post helpful.

about 4 yrs ago i was struggling to install mint on to my laptop so posted a question on the linux mint forum i got one reply it was a bollicking because of my poor punctuation and grammar

now in all fairness i thought i was on a linux forum and not an english language forum it put me off posting another question for 2 yrs
i was annoyed not because of the telling off but because said super guru couldnt be bothered to help with my question i did wonder out of his 3500 plus posts how many had actually been helpful

eventually i stumbled across LQ and it has become home
then one day jeremy announced that the great #### was joining the site
and i can remember thinking did he get kicked off the other site for scaring off the newbies.

human readable text is not the same as a programming language where even a white space can cause headaches yes it would pay to get into the habbit of being precise with your punctuation and grammar but its more important that your post is understandable yes by all means explain the wrongs of the thread but if thats all your going to do and not at least answer the post then maybe you should keep your keyboard "shut".

we all have a responsibility to help newbies even though they have posted in the wrong place or not given us enough info on their hardware. to see some of the replies by members,senior members and gurus to newbies is just shameful and totally ignorant we all started at the beginning .

maybe we should have some sort of 3 strikes and your on a warning
the whole idea of this site is to help not criticise we have the best linux site on the net because many of us take time out to help others. some of todays noobs will become tomorrows experts and contribute to the bigger community . putting people down just to collect a few extra posts isnt doing the site any favours and may put people coming here we need to weed those sorts out and boot them of the site anyone can be polite and tolerant and there arent really any excuses for experienced users to embarrass or put others down .