Blue sky only?

[winddrift03]

So why is there no venue to discuss the things that are obviously broken in Mint? Only blue sky here? I have a background in UNIX so I'm no stranger, though currently rather rusty, to NIX environments. I last used linux when Ubuntu 7 came out. installed onto a Dell D420 laptop.It worked flawlessly. If fact, it found and installed my networked printer without my even asking! Now I install Mint 13 KDE, after reading all the glowing reviews on the web, on a plain old Compaq. What a disappointment! Instead of a newer, even more improved linux, I might as well be running Windows Vista!
Well it boots and works ok BUT there are so many things broken in it its not even funny. Yes I check the MDSUM,reinstalled it and still get error messages like: Can't find Network configuration. USB wireless devices that worked then disappeared and the system won't see then again. Menu items that don't exist. No option to enter a tcp/ip address for a printer ( don't even open your mouth about the command line, yea i can use, yea I will when there's no other option and I have time to waste, NO i don't want to, or I would still be running SUN OS!
And as for support, while i know that there are many well meaning people helping out, your forums are still full arrogant so called "ubergeeks" who could care less what you want to accomplish with your pc, as long as you do it from the command line. and God forbid you might want to get through life with a pc and not know what "grep" is.....as much as I despise MS, the linux community could learn something from the support community surrounding windows.

[homerscousin]

I kinda like posts like this because I felt the same way with my first Linux install. I didn't know enough to ask an intelligent question to solve the many problems. I hung in there. I've learned a bit in 4 months. Mint 13 KDE works perfectly for me. Seriously, how much have you tried to learn with this as your second post?

[winddrift03]

I'm new to mint, not to Linux. I have a technical question posted that A) I haven't found an answer to, and B) no one else seems to have an answer for either!
I started with Mandrake Linux years ago, and as I mentioned, I have a background in UNIX. I'm a mainly hardware tech with experience dating back to the Comodore 64.

I have a technical question posted that A) I haven't found an answer to, and B) no one else seems to have an answer for either! Because i haven't yet received a reply to my tech question, Its looking more and more like Mint will get dumped and I'll begin the journey of testing other distros. Think I'll look at their forums a bit before i do! Its too bad really, there is much to like about Mint, but it needs to FUNCTION to be useful. The Ubuntu install I mentioned ran perfectly for almost 2 years, and may still be for all i know, i sold the laptop. And don't get me wrong, I don't mid fixing an issue here and there, but too much is broken out of the box in my case.

And my next pet peeve? documentation. there IS NO technical documentation worth mentioning except this forum. I learned Sun OS from from its manuals. there was almost no issue i couldn't solve on my own because I had 13,000 pages of documentation!! Forums are ok, but time consuming. mainly because the search function sucks on all of them! God forbid I had tried to run a business with this OS! 3 days without tech support would kill it. Maybe Redhat ( NOT Fedora ) is the way to go, i could at least least pay for support and get going quickly.

Think I'm wrong? the last time i had this much trouble with an OS was installing a CR-Rom drive under Windows 3.0...........

[odo5435]

Far be it from me to suggest you should keep using something that doesn't work and if Mint isn't working for you then by all means find an OS that will. It's not as if there isn't any choice.

But, in defence of this forum I would like to point out the following...

I don't mid fixing an issue here and there, but too much is broken out of the box in my case.

From what I can see there is only one issue and you provided little information for anyone trying to help you (no error messages, no description of what program you used to gain access, etc.). I see that someone has now asked for some specifics that will help diagnose the problem so hopefully it is on the way to being resolved.

And my next pet peeve? documentation. there IS NO technical documentation worth mentioning except this forum.

You have a point there and there are many who agree with you. Unfortunately, like most other distros, Linux Mint has been developed and maintained by a very small group of unpaid volunteers who probably spend all of their spare time in development and maintenance. I'm sure one day another kind volunteer will come along to write what you are looking for (or the project will attract enough financial support to afford professional documentation) but, until then, we've got what we've got.

I learned Sun OS from from its manuals. there was almost no issue i couldn't solve on my own because I had 13,000 pages of documentation!! Forums are ok, but time consuming.

Reading through 13000 pages of documentation isn't time consuming?

mainly because the search function sucks on all of them!

This is an unfortunate aspect of the program, chosen by the developer, to run this forum (refer to my comment about financial support). In time, a lot of members end up resorting to their favourite search engine instead and appending something like "site:forums.linux.mint" to their search requests.

I found this at the end of the Xfce FAQ webpage but I think it's appropriate here also:

I have asked a question / reported a bug on the mailing list / bugs.xfce.org and no one is answering

Give it time. Maybe the responsible developer is on vacation, maybe he didn't check the mailing list / bugzilla yet. Keep in mind that someone may be having a bad day and may not care to respond at all. Time can help.

Try givng more detailed information. Perhaps no one can figure out what it is you are trying to say, and they just don't want to take the time to contact you or reply to your post to find out. Usually, the more information, the better.

Maybe you have been disrespectful when asking your question / reporting a bug. While you are totally allowed to rate a product just as you please, you do have to realise that in the case of open source products you didn't pay for the product or the support on the product, and the developers may not value your feedback. So when you report something that affects you, you are actually asking a favor. When reporting such a problem you can improve your chances on goodwill of the developers by asking your question in a polite, respectfull way. Do realise that even if you do so the developer might not be interested in/lack time to implement the feature/fix the bug you reported. A patch that fixes the issue might still convince him to spend time on it. |Read what Jannis has to say on the topic

When you are reporting a legitimate issue, it is understood that you are taking your valuable time to offer feedback to the developers. That does not mean that they will appreciate it, so don't have any expectations for a particular type of response. Sometimes you must just roll with the punches and meet them on their own terms. Unreasonable expectations often lead to bad feelings, so you are better off just not having them in the first place. Everyone thinks differently, and you should expect that your issue and/or approach may be misunderstood.