I have four rules for advising and helping others on software matters
Never tell them to read X and that will solve their problem
It is a big world and free software is about giving people choices to inform
themselves on and grow knowledge. There is nothing wrong about simplifying
something that will be entered into a search engine later.
Always advise FOSS whenever possible
FOSS works with everythings, is more secure, generally cheaper if not
outright free, has community support and most importantly does not try to
control the user.
Do not tell them to use X
Commenting someone doesn't “get it” because they don't use software your
familiar is arrogant. Help when you can. when you can’t advise rule 2 or
learn more yourself.
When rule 2 or 3 are conflict, apply rule 3 then use rule 2.
Trisquel perfects rule 2. It's the perfect OS in that regard. Still it does
not violate rule 3. It gives you 100% FOSS OS after that if you choose to use
non-free. Trisquel steers you away but allows it. You know all the non-free
blobs you are using, you can keep them limited or you have a VM with that
software isolated.
If the whole world started doing FOSS improperly we would go a lot further
than a half a dozen laptops with perfect Trisquel. Take pride in how close
you are.
