On Tue, 20 Sep 2016 04:55:19 +0000 Sajjad Heydari via arch-general wrote:

It has been merged with the installation guide.

On Tue, Sep 20, 2016, 9:23 AM David C. Rankin < drankinatty@suddenlinkmail.com> wrote:

...

Archdevs,

I went to review the Beginner's Guide and it was no longer listed on the main page. I then specifically searched for it, found it in the topics, and then was redirected to the bare-bones "Install" page. What happened to the Beginner's Guide?

-- David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E.

On a related note, there is a stale "Beginner's Guide" link that redirects to the new installation guide. This link is now redundant because there is an "Installation Guide" link right above it. --Kyle -- The computer can't tell you the emotional story. It can give you the exact mathematical design, but what's missing is the eyebrows. - Frank Zappa

On 09/20/2016 12:00 AM, D C via arch-general wrote:

TBH, the main install guide looks almost identical to the beginner guide that I used about two years ago, check it out.

I guess I've been using a different beginner's guide for the past 8 years. The installation guide that is currently on the wiki is about 1/10 the size and depth of the original beginners guide. I have fairly good notes on the steps, and my subset of notes alone is 3-4 times the length of the current "install" guide. The beginner's guide always provided an expanded section on each topic in the install where different cards and potential pitfalls were discussed. There was the varying network configuration options, netctl, etc., RAID setup was addressed, etc.. Now - nothing. We should consider the beginner's guide again -- it was invaluable to new and beginner users to help them get a feel for arch. Even for those versed in Linux, and with Arch, for the guys like me that do an install on a biennial basis, that guide was a savior. Did no one want to maintain it? Why was the full beginner's guide deleted? -- David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E.

On 09/20/16 at 01:58am, David C. Rankin wrote:

On 09/20/2016 12:00 AM, D C via arch-general wrote:

The beginner's guide always provided an expanded section on each topic in the install where different cards and potential pitfalls were discussed. There was the varying network configuration options, netctl, etc., RAID setup was addressed, etc.. Now - nothing.

If you look closely the information is there, for example: netctl => "Configure the network for the newly installed environment: see Network configuration." => https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Network_configuration RAID setup => "If wanting to create any stacked block devices for LVM, disk encryption or RAID, do it now." => https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/RAID So it's all in there, you just have to look :-)

We should consider the beginner's guide again -- it was invaluable to new and beginner users to help them get a feel for arch. Even for those versed in Linux, and with Arch, for the guys like me that do an install on a biennial basis, that guide was a savior.

Did no one want to maintain it? Why was the full beginner's guide deleted?

This has been announced and discussed on the mailing list and irc. And the descision has been made to merge it into one page. The new smaller guide just links directly to the pages which contain detailed information without the duplication of information. -- Jelle van der Waa

[EDIT: in the previous post, the phrase "snip hunt" should of course been "snipe hunt".] On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:12 PM, Francis Gerund wrote:

Where have the the most recent versions of the "real" Beginner's Guide been saved? And how can they be retrieved (maybe using git, for example)?

IMHO, for new users, the "Installation Guide" is not, never has been, and may never be a substitute for the Beginner's Guide. The Installation Guide does not have enough detail, and many (most?) new users will not put up with being sent on a sadistic snip hunt through the thick jungles of the Arch Wiki, jus to do a basic console-only install. And the elinks text browser on the install iso "just doesn't cut it".

(Don't get me wrong - the Arch Wiki is a tremendous resource, maybe the best resource in the GNU/Linux ecosystem. But, like Hollywood, it is no place for children.)

I believe this change will only serve to alienate potential new users, who are the "life blood" of Arch, or any other organization or movement. Without new growth, any organism risks withering on the vine. Just ask OpenBSD.

On Tue, Sep 20, 2016 at 3:14 AM, Jelle van der Waa wrote:

...

On 09/20/16 at 01:58am, David C. Rankin wrote:

...

On 09/20/2016 12:00 AM, D C via arch-general wrote:

The beginner's guide always provided an expanded section on each topic in the install where different cards and potential pitfalls were discussed. There was the varying network configuration options, netctl, etc., RAID setup was addressed, etc.. Now - nothing.

If you look closely the information is there, for example:

netctl => "Configure the network for the newly installed environment: see Network configuration." => https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Network_configuration

RAID setup => "If wanting to create any stacked block devices for LVM, disk encryption or RAID, do it now." => https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/RAID

So it's all in there, you just have to look :-)

...

We should consider the beginner's guide again -- it was invaluable to new and beginner users to help them get a feel for arch. Even for those versed in Linux, and with Arch, for the guys like me that do an install on a biennial basis, that guide was a savior.

Did no one want to maintain it? Why was the full beginner's guide deleted?

This has been announced and discussed on the mailing list and irc. And the descision has been made to merge it into one page.

The new smaller guide just links directly to the pages which contain detailed information without the duplication of information.

-- Jelle van der Waa

On 21/09/16 at 08:36pm, Dave via arch-general wrote:

see below

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:12 PM, Francis Gerund via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

I believe this change will only serve to alienate potential new users,

I strongly agree.

This will only alienate new users that are unwilling to read man pages and the community provided documentation, ie., people for whom Arch is the wrong choice anyway… /J -- http://jasonwryan.com/ GPG: 7817 E3FF 578E EEE1 9F64 D40C 445E 52EA B1BD 4E40

On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 11:01 AM, Dave via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:58 PM, Jason Ryan via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

On 21/09/16 at 08:36pm, Dave via arch-general wrote:

...

see below

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:12 PM, Francis Gerund via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

I believe this change will only serve to alienate potential new users,

...

I strongly agree.

This will only alienate new users that are unwilling to read man pages and the community provided documentation, ie., people for whom Arch is the wrong choice anyway…

As a new user of Arch, I think this attitude is incorrect as well as harmful to Arch.

Arch is geared towards (and I quote) "the competent Linux® user" and the installation guide offers everything someone familiar with their system needs. The main benefit of the beginner's guide was that it offered all the information in one location, but this information hasn't disappeared as it's available on other pages, linked to when necessary. This once again shouldn't pose an issue to the more advanced users. The beginner's guide did a lot more hand-holding which if we're catering to more advanced users is not only adding unnecessary information it's potentially attracting users who are not going to be able to properly run and maintain the system after the install. As a personal example, I recently installed Arch on one of my PCs and I found the beginner's guide to be way too verbose. I got lost trying to find what else I was meant to do and was hit with a whole bunch of unneeded information. The install guide is nice and concise and I was able to quickly skim through it and get the information I need. It saves me the need to write my own notes, which I'd be tempted to do if we had only the beginner's guide.

Where have the the most recent versions of the "real" Beginner's Guide been saved? And how can they be retrieved (maybe using git, for example)?

On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 10:46 AM, Francis Gerund via arch-general wrote:

Where have the the most recent versions of the "real" Beginner's Guide been saved? And how can they be retrieved (maybe using git, for example)?

That would not be useful because wiki instructions go out of date over time. On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 10:36 AM, Doug Newgard wrote:

On Wed, 21 Sep 2016 21:01:55 -0400 Dave via arch-general wrote:

...

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:58 PM, Jason Ryan via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

This will only alienate new users that are unwilling to read man pages and the community provided documentation, ie., people for whom Arch is the wrong choice anyway…

As a new user of Arch, I think this attitude is incorrect as well as harmful to Arch.

I think putting a list of commands in the wiki is much, much more harmful to Arch. Arch is a niche distro, not meant to be something grandma installs because someone told her it was the thing to do.

While I agree that Arch is not for everyone, comparing users for whom details on their operating system are not clear/important to 'grandma' is unnecessary and probably discriminatory (what do you have against grandma?) Jason Wryan is correct, Arch is targetted at a particular type of user. No need to belittle those who don't fall into that type.

On Thu, 22 Sep 2016 12:58:23 +1200 Jason Ryan via arch-general wrote:

On 21/09/16 at 08:36pm, Dave via arch-general wrote:

...

see below

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:12 PM, Francis Gerund via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

I believe this change will only serve to alienate potential new users,

I strongly agree.

This will only alienate new users that are unwilling to read man pages and the community provided documentation, ie., people for whom Arch is the wrong choice anyway…

/J

Unless you are already an arch install expert (the clear target of the "Installation Guide as it stood about 15 months ago) you are unlikley to get to a point where you can comfortably access the 'community provided documention' let alone find examples that clarify things.

On Thu, 22 Sep 2016 12:58:23 +1200 Jason Ryan via arch-general wrote:

On 21/09/16 at 08:36pm, Dave via arch-general wrote:

...

see below

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:12 PM, Francis Gerund via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

I believe this change will only serve to alienate potential new users,

I strongly agree.

This will only alienate new users that are unwilling to read man pages and the community provided documentation, ie., people for whom Arch is the wrong choice anyway…

/J

So, is making people hunt for information a ritualistic hazing? As much as I love the Arch Wiki (and I really do because it is a great source of information), I don't understand why basic things like this change very often. Removing the Beginner's Guide from the home page? This is just another Big Change made with the best of intentions. Moving stuff around like this is like that supermarket that keeps reorganizing its shelves. Everything is there, but it is in a different place, and you need to waste time looking for what you want. Anecdote: when I installed Arch a few years ago, I followed both the Beginner's Guide and the Installation Guide simultaneously. The duality was a little confusing, and I agree that if these guides can be merged in an elegant way, they should. But I disagree with the "hazing" attitude. The whole point of a wiki is to make information accessible. Yes, while installing Arch for the first time you will definitely hunt for a lot of information. It is a lot of hard work. However, purposefully making that information harder to find is wrong; wikis are supposed make that job easier. I also think that expecting a new Arch user to know *exactly* what software configuration he wants is unreasonable. I personally know many experienced Linux users (whom I consider far more experienced than myself) who can't tell you which desktop environment they prefer. However, they can blow your mind with their C and shell knowledge. If/when these advanced users decide to learn more about distro innards and try Arch, we should welcome them, not haze them. --Kyle Terrien -- The computer can't tell you the emotional story. It can give you the exact mathematical design, but what's missing is the eyebrows. - Frank Zappa

On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 7:58 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:

Everybody is able to participate at the Arch wiki...

Ralf touches a very intriguing argument here, which might just boil this thread down to "telling others how to structure their wiki". As someone who hasn't looked at the guides in question in ages, I consider this form of entertainment questionably constructive as well. cheers! mar77i

While I agree with the guys saying the Beginner's Guide was harmful to the distro making lazy noobish users choose the wrong distribution for 'em, I strongly think that the Guide was pretty helpful as a quick setup checklist to seniors too. The solution to this could be taking it back enriching the first paragraphs with some philosophical details about Arch, and caveats. Ale On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 8:51 AM, Jason Ryan via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

On 22/09/16 at 08:47am, Martin Kühne via arch-general wrote:

...

On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 7:58 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:

...

Everybody is able to participate at the Arch wiki...

Ralf touches a very intriguing argument here, which might just boil this thread down to "telling others how to structure their wiki". As someone who hasn't looked at the guides in question in ages, I consider this form of entertainment questionably constructive as well.

The Installation Guide is one of the few pages on the wiki that are locked and can only be edited by the staff. Changes can be made by gathering a consensus on the Talk page.

/J

--

http://jasonwryan.com/ GPG: 7817 E3FF 578E EEE1 9F64 D40C 445E 52EA B1BD 4E40

On jeu., 2016-09-22 at 10:36 +0200, Tinu Weber wrote:

On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 09:46:30 +0200, Alessio 'Blaster' Biancalana wrote:

...

While I agree with the guys saying the Beginner's Guide was harmful to the distro making lazy noobish users choose the wrong distribution for 'em, I strongly think that the Guide was pretty helpful as a quick setup checklist to seniors too.

Honestly, the Installation Guide does a tremendously better job at acting as a "checklist" than the old Beginners' Guide, which was filled with lots of additional noise concerning (arbitrarly chosen) special cases.

Just take a look at that beautifully concise "Contents" table on https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Installation_guide. That's one perfect checklist :-)

More seriousyl, I think it's a healthy approach to first give an overview of what is required for the installation, and then let the user/newcomer search the information in the wiki on their own (rather than giving them one big chunk where they miss the forest for the trees).

Even though the Installation Guide does not detail every operation, 1/4 words are links to other pages, which contain these informations. There's no deep search to conduct individually; everything is linked on the Installation Guide. ArchLinux is all about the user shaping his own system, whether begginer or experimented. By forking to the related page of every service to setup, with installation procedures, alternatives and troubleshooting, it allows for proper customization and education. Personally, being a newcomer to Arch (not to Linux though), I found it more useful than an overloaded Begginer's Guide. It is tougher to setup, but it properly follows Arch's philosophy, and acts both as an introduction for newcomers and a checklist for experienced users.

On 21/09/16 at 09:53pm, Kyle Terrien via arch-general wrote:

On Thu, 22 Sep 2016 12:58:23 +1200 Jason Ryan via arch-general wrote:

...

On 21/09/16 at 08:36pm, Dave via arch-general wrote:

...

see below

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:12 PM, Francis Gerund via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

I believe this change will only serve to alienate potential new users,

I strongly agree.

This will only alienate new users that are unwilling to read man pages and the community provided documentation, ie., people for whom Arch is the wrong choice anyway…

/J

So, is making people hunt for information a ritualistic hazing?

Hazing implies psychological, and often physical, harm. Please refrain from this sort of hyperbole, it does your argument no favours and is both unfounded and irrelevant; we are talking about installing an operating system…

As much as I love the Arch Wiki (and I really do because it is a great source of information), I don't understand why basic things like this change very often. Removing the Beginner's Guide from the home page? This is just another Big Change made with the best of intentions.

Moving stuff around like this is like that supermarket that keeps reorganizing its shelves. Everything is there, but it is in a different place, and you need to waste time looking for what you want.

Anecdote: when I installed Arch a few years ago, I followed both the Beginner's Guide and the Installation Guide simultaneously. The duality was a little confusing, and I agree that if these guides can be merged in an elegant way, they should.

But I disagree with the "hazing" attitude. The whole point of a wiki is to make information accessible. Yes, while installing Arch for the first time you will definitely hunt for a lot of information. It is a lot of hard work. However, purposefully making that information harder to find is wrong; wikis are supposed make that job easier.

See above about the “hazing attitude”. It is about simplifying the information and making it easier to maintain. Having two guides, as I said at the beginning of this thread, does neither prospective users nor the wiki maintainers and good. You seem to really be arguing for making the installation guide easier; Arch is not intended to be easy, there are plenty of distributions that have that goal and do it extremely well. The current version of the wiki does make it easier, insofar as the information is clear, organised efficiently, links to the authoritative source wherever possible (man pages) and contains no cruft. What it no longer does is include lots of irrelevant information and corner case examples, code to cut and paste and material that is duplicated in multiple other pages on the wiki which makes it a nightmare to maintain. That is a significant improvement. No-one, me included, is pretending it is perfect. There is a Talk page where people can discuss enhancements. Patches, as they say, are welcome.

I also think that expecting a new Arch user to know *exactly* what software configuration he wants is unreasonable. I personally know many experienced Linux users (whom I consider far more experienced than myself) who can't tell you which desktop environment they prefer. However, they can blow your mind with their C and shell knowledge.

If/when these advanced users decide to learn more about distro innards and try Arch, we should welcome them, not haze them.

Arch has from the start been clear about its goals and intentions. I'll quote from a section of the wiki that people seem much less familiar with: ”Whereas many GNU/Linux distributions attempt to be more user-friendly, Arch Linux has always been, and shall always remain user-centric. The distribution is intended to fill the needs of those contributing to it, rather than trying to appeal to as many users as possible. It is targeted at the proficient GNU/Linux user, or anyone with a do-it-yourself attitude who is willing to read the documentation, and solve their own problems.” https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch_Linux#User_centrality /J -- http://jasonwryan.com/ GPG: 7817 E3FF 578E EEE1 9F64 D40C 445E 52EA B1BD 4E40

On 22/09/16 at 05:55pm, Kyle Terrien via arch-general wrote:

On Thu, 22 Sep 2016 18:16:27 +1200 Jason Ryan via arch-general wrote:

...

Arch has from the start been clear about its goals and intentions. I'll quote from a section of the wiki that people seem much less familiar with:

”Whereas many GNU/Linux distributions attempt to be more user-friendly, Arch Linux has always been, and shall always remain user-centric. The distribution is intended to fill the needs of those contributing to it, rather than trying to appeal to as many users as possible. It is targeted at the proficient GNU/Linux user, or anyone with a do-it-yourself attitude who is willing to read the documentation, and solve their own problems.” https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch_Linux#User_centrality

/J

Yes, several people have quoted "Arch philosophy" for me. I am familiar with it. I read it 3 years ago when I first installed Arch. I am also familiar with the fact that there are slightly different interpretations of it.

For me, the issue is about framing the goal. If the goal is to "alienate new users that are unwilling to read man pages", then people will surely find a way to alienate them. However, if your goal is to give people a minimal amount of information and direct them to the man pages where they can read more, then the wiki will be more inviting.

The difference is all in the framing. I personally prefer to see the latter because it is more optimistic and invites those interested to help with the distro.

Then we are in agreement; the goal is to provide people with what they need and to encourage them to explore in more depth, or for edge cases, the official documentation. Incidentally, that approach is documented in the talk page leading up to and after the merge. /J -- http://jasonwryan.com/ GPG: 7817 E3FF 578E EEE1 9F64 D40C 445E 52EA B1BD 4E40

On 22/09/16 at 08:16pm, Kyle Terrien via arch-general wrote:

On Fri, 23 Sep 2016 13:00:53 +1200 Jason Ryan via arch-general wrote:

...

Then we are in agreement; the goal is to provide people with what they need and to encourage them to explore in more depth, or for edge cases, the official documentation.

Then I think I misinterpreted the snark as seriousness in your post yesterday. I apologize.

No need to apologise (but the fact that you did is a testament to your character); I was mostly typing for the people that read the ML but are not necessarily contributing to this discussion. I think it is important that on issues around our core values we are quite resolute. Cheers, /J -- http://jasonwryan.com/ GPG: 7817 E3FF 578E EEE1 9F64 D40C 445E 52EA B1BD 4E40

Am 22.09.2016 um 02:58 schrieb Jason Ryan via arch-general:

On 21/09/16 at 08:36pm, Dave via arch-general wrote:

...

see below

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:12 PM, Francis Gerund via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

I believe this change will only serve to alienate potential new users,

I strongly agree.

This will only alienate new users that are unwilling to read man pages and the community provided documentation, ie., people for whom Arch is the wrong choice anyway…

/J

I just had a look at the Installation Guide and as a seasoned user I must say it's pretty comprehensive and right to the point! *BUT *being a seasoned user I can't take the perspective of a beginner any more. When I came to Arch I had some experience with other distros (mostly the once that obfuscate the insides of a Linux distro). The Beginners Guide helped me to get on track to start learning how a Linux distro really worked. It was the beginning of great experience and I'm thankful for every Arch Linux boot on my machine since then. I don't know, if starting with such a scarce Installation Guide would have made my motor running like the Beginners Guide. I just can't say. Time has past, as for almost every one on this mailing list. My point is, that it's not wrong to engage new and even inexperienced users in Arch Linux, because IMHO it is the distro you can learn most from about Linux. Sure, beginners break their installations, lose their data, etc. That's nothing bad. The more you lose the more you learn and be more careful next time. And if they get disappointed or frustrated about that and go back to Ubuntu or whatever, so be it. Then they are really the wrong people for Arch. That being said, I'm still in favour of the merge of Installation and Beginners Guide, but maybe we could include some more background information for beginners (not to much though ;)). And to not distract the seasoned users, these infos could be placed in collapsed boxes with some header like "Beginners information". There is a wiki template https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Collapse for such boxes, but I think it's not included in our wiki yet. It would be still nice and tidy and maintainable, while being informative for beginners. pogo

Someone did mention that the two guides merged, so now that only one list is being maintained, they can focus on making the one list more comprehensive. On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:36 PM, Dave via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

see below

On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 8:12 PM, Francis Gerund via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

IMHO, for new users, the "Installation Guide" is not, never has been, and may never be a substitute for the Beginner's Guide.

As a new Arch user, I completely agree.

...

I believe this change will only serve to alienate potential new users,

I strongly agree.

I'm in favor of the merge as well. For beginners there are plenty of Youtube videos that cover common desktop setups. That should be more than enough for users who are first learning how to setup a Linux distro. On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 6:06 AM, Dario Giovannetti via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

I thought I'd make a graph about the reactions to the merge :)

http://imgh.us/archwiki_complaints.svg

On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 10:36 AM, Tinu Weber wrote:

Just take a look at that beautifully concise "Contents" table on https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Installation_guide. That's one perfect checklist :-)

I think you are ~right.

From my point of view beginner's guide was a perfect entry point to Arch and to a new setup, no matter how old you were as a user, but things can change and the Installation Guide is, well, good enough for this. :)

More seriousyl, I think it's a healthy approach to first give an

overview of what is required for the installation, and then let the user/newcomer search the information in the wiki on their own

I think I agree with this, but Beginner's Guide wasn't harmful from my point of view, even if I would rewrite a similar chunk of instructions with a philosophical disclaimer and a bunch of links to stuff explaining the Arch Way. IMHO the only sane approach to Arch Linux is to first comprehend The Arch Way understanting all the technical and philosophical choices. People now are setting up Arch boxes because it's cool. On Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 1:06 PM, Dario Giovannetti via arch-general < arch-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

I thought I'd make a graph about the reactions to the merge :)

Dude you missed the "systemd's fault!!1!" line :D Saludos, Ale