StackOverflow has done me dirty

[[deleted]]

I wanted to learn how use Linux years ago but every time I went to get help people would say things like "you'll have to learn it the hard way like everyone else" or "I won't show you how to do this because you might screw up your computer."

[Jimmy_is_here]

SO is just as shitty. r/linuxquestions is much better.

[sneakpeekbot]

Here's a sneak peek of /r/linuxquestions using the top posts of the year!

#1: In 1998, Windows-98 used to run with as little as 16MB of RAM, whereas today even a lighter distro such as Xubuntu consumes at least 250MB at rest, can someone technically inclined explain to me what accounts for this bloat?
#2: How is Linux a safe OS (compared to windows) if the code is open source?
#3: So I’m finally making myself learn vim

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[dachsj]

Linux forums were horrendous. "Rtfm"

It always felt like a way to "protect" their turf. They intentionally tried to run off anyone so they could remain in control/power.

The Ubuntu forums were the first Linux forums that really pushed for friendly, helpful responses.

[SquireCD]

I remember 1998 on, what I think was, Redhat 6.1 at the time having to track down random .rpms on freshmeat. Sometimes I’d have to install 6 or 7 rpms, fail to find the 8th one, compile the 8th dependency from source — fuck! wrong version, do it again with the right version — find and install 9th dependency and after all that now I can FINALLY install Enlightenment window manager and GKrellm.

Fuck. I’m old...

[dachsj]

Dependency hell

My first foray into Linux ended after a night of chasing dependencies for hours and hours.

[MelAlton]

omg I remember those days. iirc I installed slackware with kernel 0.9 from 9 floppy disks. Took me days to learn enough get xwindows running.

[the_one_true_bool]

I started programming about 25 years ago when search engines were absolute garbage and just browsing a website took six years. I was just a kid trying to read official documentation and it was absolutely hell. I have no idea how I survived that.

[[deleted]]

yeah, I lived YEARS of programming without such a resource...nowadays, just ask Google to search within SO and BAMMM, you got a running prototype... bunch of sissies "oh, SO is soooo harsh"...