On 8/30/07, Roland Mainz <roland.mainz at nrubsig.org> wrote: > michelle olson wrote: > > This is alpha review of the OpenSolaris User FAQ. It is intended to > > answer questions asked by new users, refer them to all the other FAQ > > resources available, and is a work-in-progress.
This is a "New user FAQ." I just realized that I need to make it clear that this is not a "user" FAQ, but a "new user" FAQ. I have added the folllowing Question to the FAQ to address this issue: Q: What is the target audience of this FAQ? A: OpenSolaris NOOBs. ;) That begs a question. Do people agree with my decision to keep this FAQ aimed at new users? (As opposed to a large and intimidating comprehensive user FAQ?) > > http://www.genunix.org/wiki/index.php/FAQ_Prototype > > General nits: > - Is there any way to make the master of this file a DocBook/XML file > that we convert it to single/multipage HTML, PDF etc. ? IMO Wikis are > nice for online usage but have only limited use for printed media and > other uses (e.g. convertion to manpage format etc.) I feel that this would create a needless barrier. (I never would have assembled this, if I needed to use DocBook) Also, this document is pretty much a linkfest, so it probably won't translate to the printed medium. (I suppose that includes PDFs as well.) If you really need to put it in printed material, print a link. > - ZFS is there but both QFS and UFS are missing I haven't seen many Newbie UFS or QFS questions... I think it might be better to create seperate FAQs for QFS and UFS. > - Question: "Where can I download Solaris/Solaris Express ISO images" ? > Answer: See http://www.opensolaris.org/os/downloads/ (and please find > someone who can describe the difference between "Solaris Express > Community Edition" and "Solaris Express Developer Edition" - I always > forget which of these I have to avoid and usually I have to click around > until I get the stuff with the newest Nevada release...) Will do. (It's in my working note's at the bottom for now.) > > The are a couple of unanswered questions about boot up and partitions, > > if anyone can help there. There is a section for ZFS that doesn't yet > > include links to the best practices doc on solaris internals. Check the second question, "Where can I find out more information about ZFS?" It links to the following page: http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/zfs/links/ which has a link to th best practices guide at the top of the page. I thought this would be sufficient. (I am thinking on of the issues for new users, is that they ask questions many times because they don't know how to navigate the site, this faq aims to aid with that) Mull it around and let me know what you think of this approach. > > Plus Q/As for the new user about general OSOL information, installation, > > log in, networking, DTrace, > > What about making an item "diagnostics tools" and make "Dtrace" a > sub-item ? IMO there are other usefull tools (like "coreadm" which is > able to track core dump generation and log it into the system log). New users have heard about dtrace, and ask about it on osol-discuss/help all the time. It is on the FAQ for that reason. > Two items for this section: > 1. coreadm: > -- snip -- > Question: "How can I see if an application, service or any other process > crashed ?" > Answer: "Enable coreadm like this: $ mkdir -p /var/core ; coreadm -g > /var/core/core.uid%u.gid%g.pid%p.%f -e global -e process -e log -e > global-setid # - this will send a notification of any generated core > dumps to the system log (/var/adm/messages) and put a copy of the core > dump into /var/core/" > -- snip -- Let me noodle this one... This one feels like it is on the cusp of being too advanced for a new user FAQ. (For now it is in my working notes section of the FAQ) > 2. pstack: > -- snip -- > Question: How can I get a stack trace from a core dump when I don't have > a debugger installed ? > Answer: Use $ /usr/bin/pstack <name-of-coredump> # to get the stack > trace Is this a frequently asked question by users, or developers? (I am not considering developer aimed questions as on point. Well, the dtrace stuff is there because everyone asks questions about, even non-developers). Maybe we need to start a more comprehensive FAQ?? Or a developer FAQ that we link to? Thoughts? > -- snip -- > > > NFS, ZFS, > > What about making an item "Filesystems" and make "UFS", "ZFS" and "QFS" > sub-items ? So far I haven't really seem alot of questions on osol-discuss, or osol-help regarding UFS or QFS. (At least since I've been following.) I would consider expanding to cover if that situation changed. Also feel free to let me know if you guys are seeing something different. (I get the sense that once ZFS mirrored boot is supported any talk of UFS(+) is going to fade into the background, and SAM/QFS is a rather involved arcane and hardcore filesystem(s).) These are good points, that do need to be addressed, I am just wondering where is the best place to address them. > > Zones, Upgrading, Shells, > > Minor update for shells (quoted lines are the old text): > -- snip -- > > Q: Why isn't bash the default shell? > > > > A: Ksh93 is a better shell. It is more standards compliant, has all of the > > features you love about bash, and more. It also happens to be the best > > scripting shell available. > > Erm, neither "bash" or "ksh93" are the "default shell". IMO the term > "default shell" itself is a problem because there is no "default shell", > the nearest terms may be "default system shell" (=/bin/sh) and "default > user shell" (e.g. the shell used by default when a new user is created > (which is unfortunately /bin/sh)). Most of the ravings&&rants are AFAIK > about /bin/sh which is the "Bourne shell" (not "bash" (="Bourne Again > Shell")) and not a POSIX shell (like "bash" in POSIX mode) as many > applications and users seem to expect. Problem is now how to phrase it > (I'm notoriously bad at that stuff...) ... I have tried to combine your and Robert's comments into the following entry: ===Q: Why isn't bash the default system shell?=== A: Solaris uses the Bourne shell (/bin/sh) as the default system shell to satisfy backward compatibility with historic releases of Solaris. A decision has been made to replace /bin/sh with a more modern/user-friendly default system shell. Ksh93 was chosen because it is fully backwards compatible with /bin/sh, is fully standards compliant, has all of the features you love about bash, and also happens to be the most powerful scripting shell available. > > > Q: Where can I find more info on ksh93? > > > > A: Check http://www.kornshell.com/doc/ (In particular, the book "The New > > KornShell" is an excellent resource.) > > Q: What shells are available for use with end-user accounts? > > Could you please add > http://www.opensolaris.org/os/project/ksh93-integration/ to that list > (at least until we have the new ksh93s+ manual page online) ? Done > > > A: bash, csh, jsh, ksh, ksh93, sh, tcsh, zsh > > Erm, it may be better to list the full paths, e.g. > /usr/bin/bash, > /usr/bin/jsh, > /usr/bin/ksh, > /usr/bin/ksh93, > /usr/bin/sh, > /usr/bin/tcsh, > /usr/bin/zsh Done > -- snip -- > > ---- > > Bye, > Roland > > -- > __ . . __ > (o.\ \/ /.o) roland.mainz at nrubsig.org > \__\/\/__/ MPEG specialist, C&&JAVA&&Sun&&Unix programmer > /O /==\ O\ TEL +49 641 7950090 > (;O/ \/ \O;) > _______________________________________________ > docs-discuss mailing list > docs-discuss at opensolaris.org -- - Brian Gupta http://opensolaris.org/os/project/nycosug/
