My five minutes of me not being cool

The Water Cooler
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I’ve been told that I’m a nice, cool headed, patience guy. I’m not sure if I’m all of those anymore.

The problem

Once you start helping people, you start gathering feedback, hear ideas, and at some point, for a reason that you can’t even comprehend you think it will be cool to do a thing and you have the time and ability to do it, without receiving anything in exchange. I’m not a paid employee of Red Hat or any other company to work for Fedora, I started using it because the community is nice and technically it worked in all my computers (some of them required extra work, but I was quite used to make things work).

But once you do one thing, the first thing you receive is hate, and c’mon, I understand that there are old-fashioned guys that will love to keep everything in the terminal without GUIs and hate everything new and hate every company in the world, but I have written now 3 articles about flatpaks, and the first 2 comments on all of them are pure hate.

The restriction

I get that we are entitled to have our opinions but we have to be, or try to be, polite and civil, not spread hate and be able to agree to disagree, but it’s exhausting. I try to help users, community members and teams, I answer questions, post stuff that I find useful on the magazine, I started the Fedora Podcast (even when I didn’t knew a thing about podcasts), I gave feedback here and there, I use software and report bugs and file features requests, I try to document things (I stopped a while ago because lack of time), and I help with moderation here. And I have to say it:

I’m tired of people and both social and technical rules

My list of things to say that I don’t say to meet the CoC

  • If you don’t like it, DON’T F&$&%$ USE IT
  • If you don’t like it, F%/&%$$/&%/$ DO IT YOURSELF
  • If your way of doing things is better, PROVE IT IN SILENCE
  • if you don’t have anything nice to say, SHUT THE f(/&%(/% UP
  • Yes, YOU ARE F&%$/&%$ STUPID
  • If it works for you, USE IT
  • Yes, vim is better
  • There aren’t absolutely any reason to don’t mention or hide RPM Fusion repos, they provide good stuff that official repos don’t
  • Yes, we force boundaries and sacrifice users in the road, and that’s not a bad thing
  • Hardware that don’t work on Fedora, it’s not Fedora’s problem
  • Yes, code it, compile it or package it yourself (whatever case fits you)

Conclusion

I :heart: :fedora:, I really do, but maybe it’s because I’m getting old (I turned 38 this year) or it’s because I don’t like most people, or it’s because I think IT and FLOSS problems aren’t the most important things in a world that have 2 wars, starvation and climate problems, maybe it’s because I stopped looking to do the things in “the most free and open way”, but I just want to do stuff and don’t receive hate.

Advices

  • If you don’t have anything good to say, don’t say it
  • Do 5 deep breathings before saying (or write) anything
  • Keep these type of post to your blog, becuase it’s going to be moderated (and it’s ok)
  • Put yourself in the other people shoes
  • Don’t judge, just do your thing and keep quite
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I get what you are saying. I used to spend time answering Linux questions on Reddit and on various StackExchange groups. StackExchange is somewhat civil but can easily be a time sink. On Reddit however I’ve found that if you post an answer that sounds like you know what you’re talking about, or you post a helpful guide, it’s immediately sent to down vote hell because someone wants people to see their answers and give them some points for it.

I’ve been doing this for years and find when I Google for Linux help, the majority of stuff out there is very beginner to low-intermediate level info. I’m just trying to put some intermediate to advanced knowledge out there to help the kids learn.

As for your list of things to say; I immediately think of certain posts I often see or even specific users that come to mind. :roll_eyes: :lungs: :lungs: :lungs: Maybe switch to another tab for a while.

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I think when you do active support and community work, it is important to recognize the moment when you reach your limit.

I spent about 7 years sitting on Fedora IRC/Jabber/Telegram channels whole day. It gave me a lot by extending my understanding of Linux. Googling for the answer for someone else’s question is a great way to learn something new for yourself.

But over time it gets harder. Because new people keep coming with the same old questions. For them these questions are new, for you these questions and flamewars become annoying.

I saw multiple cases when old-timers start to shut down the conversation which they are no longer interested in. In several cases they just start actively banning folks for raising the questions which they have answered so many times.

And I can get it. Honestly, if someone approaches me with KDE vs Gnome debate I would just shut it down immediately and run away. And when I hear anything about systemd nowadays, I would roll my eyes.

But it is important to remember that you had those debates in your life. You went through them and they gave you some experience and knowledge and understanding and the feeling of belonging. You formed your opinion. And we can not deny others the possibility to get their own part of it.

So instead of trying to make newcomers stop doing things newcomers do, it maybe better to move on or take a break yourself?

You did your share of support and communication, let them now make the same old mistakes and get that flame burning for a while. You don’t have to always be there actively participating and pointing them that every question they ask has been asked and debated for 10 years before them.

I pulled myself out of most active support channels. And those channels are still standing. And still debating vim vs emacs. And that is actually good for them :slight_smile:

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Thank you for all of your time and effort put into the Fedora system.

You’re getting old? I’ll trade you. I’ll be 67 in January. I’m getting old, not you.

I’ve been a member here since roughly the site’s inception. I don’t post too often.

I’ve been a member of Fedora Forum since 2004. Closing in on 20 years. I have thousands of posts there and have enjoyed helping fellow Fedora users any time I can.

A Fedora user since FC1.

These days I rarely help. Can’t be bothered frankly, and usually I have no idea how to help. Though I do feel bad for the zero reply threads.

I think I’ve done my share

All this because I really wanted to say “you aren’t old”.

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Take it easy, but take it!

Set new priorities who load up your batteries or at least, not suck so much energy out of you.
I can totally understand what you are saying. Keeping distance is the best you can do now.

I went thru your badges and saw that you achieve/make a lot in the community. So just try to show you my respect and I recognize your hard work you are doing.

Thanks a lot!

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The Fedora Docs used to be my goto for a long time. Then after F26(?) they changed to their current doc style and they are seriously lacking. In another post about docs I had suggested that Fedora use a Wiki so users can populate it, and it can better evolve along with the OS. I think having better documentation could help with having new users looking for answers. They can come here and we can always refer them to the wiki and tell them to keep it bookmarked.

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Your article about ‘how do you Fedora’ back in 2018 inspired me to explore various working groups, and I anchored in Docs team and it became a way of life for me.

In any walk of life, negative comments from opinionated people are hurtful. a vs b argument happens anywhere. Whatever good content we put out, there are critiques and unreasonable comments.

We don’t expect everyone to be nice because our cause is altruistic and unselfish.

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There will always be haters, unfortunately.
The only advice I can give is that as you get older (and I’m much older :slightly_smiling_face:), it gets easier and easier to ignore the haters completely.

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Hi Eduard! I want to personally and publicly thank you for everything you’ve brought to Fedora. I’m sorry you’ve gotten those comments — that really takes the fun out of everything.

And, I can relate to many of those letting-off-steam bullet points. On top of everything else, I appreciate that you’ve taken all that frustration and turned it into a good post which has sparked a good conversation.

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reasons why i quitted Discord, matrix facebook etc and moved only Forum community based the hate and toxicity on platforms are just growing i even saw many community discord channel admins abusing users and telling if you dont like it just leave and these are Linux discord channels dont tell the channel names, but those are Big ones.

i can so relate all of the above seen it felt it way too often

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I’ve got quite some bruises and scars from newsgroups. (NNTP, you know?) Those were harsh times (arround 2000 and on), lot of brutality. As more newcomers joined, culture of communication kept dropping. Curses, threats, useles flamewars … :slight_smile: Newsgroups have eventually fallen in obsolescence. Forums took most of functionality. Until social networks have risen. I gave up from those, not because I’ll be hurt, but because there’s no much of interesting communication there. “Time lost”/“interesting stuff” ratio is unacceptable for me. (Some reddit communities are OK, so I still have account there.)

This place is amazing, sometimes I got scared that I’ll wake up … :slight_smile:

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This really resonates with me, thank you for this new way of looking at things.

I’ve been struggling with similar things that x3mboy mentioned at the top. I’m getting tired of explaining the same thing over and over again every week (maybe I should put them into a comprehensive blog post instead, so I can just point people there instead of repeating myself forever :rofl: ), and constantly debunking disinformation / FUD about various topics … so yes, I guess this does mean that I too should take a break now and then.

Jokes aside, I’ve tried to spend more time on writing / updating documentation instead of just writing code / doing packaging work … it’s not necessarily what I like to do, but it’s probably better to have this knowledge written down in some place where people can find it and don’t have to ask me (for example, for when I’m off taking one of my aforementioned breaks).

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I fully agree just to a point where it is still possible. I watch many discussions which would make the ways I use software obsolete, between hard to impossible to maintain. I don’t say it’s correct that people get emotional in such cases, I just say that I understand.

  • If you don’t like it, F%/&%$$/&%/$ DO IT YOURSELF

Ah yes, the never to be understood by most people, base building block of volunteer work.

  • If your way of doing things is better, PROVE IT IN SILENCE
  • if you don’t have anything nice to say, SHUT THE f(/&%(/% UP
  • If it works for you, USE IT

All of the above up to here also applies in general to any volunteer work.

  • Yes, vim is better
  • Yes, YOU ARE F&%$/&%$ STUPID
  • There aren’t absolutely any reason to don’t mention or hide RPM Fusion repos, they provide good stuff that official repos don’t

A well as Red Hat, RHEL, CentOS Stream, and other OSs and projects. It’s needed to be kept in mind that they are NOT Fedora. But they are part of the ecosystem which means they have right to be discussed too, with any theme that affects them.

  • Yes, we force boundaries and sacrifice users in the road, and that’s not a bad thing

There are people (cases?) that don’t care, people that case about those affected and those affected. Through the years I’ve been all three many times.
Regarding the being the affected - I think that usually it is about that the affected person didn’t choose the right way / tool to achieve their thing. They chose the easy way (e.g. I use Fedora in general, so let’s try to use Fedora for an obscure stuff too!) instead, so they could expect they could be cut off any time.

  • Hardware that don’t work on Fedora, it’s not Fedora’s problem
  • Yes, code it, compile it or package it yourself (whatever case fits you)
  • Do 5 deep breathings before saying (or write) anything

Or leave it for tomorrow.
Either way, I had to be taught that, when I first started to engage in tough, harsh discussions in Fedora. Unfortunately It’s not an innate ability.

I think the takeaway point is:
How can we better explain to people, what volunteer work really means in practice, and what are the proper ways to react to it ?

Thank you for you work.
Take some time off. Don´t burn up.
Find people from the community who makes you comfortable, to recharge.

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we could start making pinned post/topic/thread how to ask questions and before asking and there is provided all details what to need to do and how before posting questions/help so it will help for faster debugging and provide all base information at start.

maybe even make wiki page of most common issues and what they are and how to debug and common solutions and how to that will definitely reduse some repeating etc stuff on forums.

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I’ve attended this cool talk on this year’s DevConf:
https://youtu.be/IAacwv9pyRg?t=11377
Titled: Ask for help like a pro!
By: Jakub Scholz
which does a good job summarizing it for people new to the problematic.

Anyway, this may general will help to reduce some question redundancy, but won’t help much with people spilling highly negative emotional comments wherever they go.

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There’s category here with common issues: https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/c/ask/common-issues/82/none

And also a list with commonly asked questions: https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/this-is-a-list-of-commonly-asked-questions/76986

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I think half if not most of my documentation and blog articles are written out of frustration rather than as an intentional thing.

You get so tired from people misunderstanding and misinterpreting things so you got into that writing mode where you finally can address all of it in a nice and comfortable conversation with an imaginary newbie friend who is actually willing to understand what you are saying :slight_smile:

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This puzzles me most. When trying to help with someone’s issue I enter keywords from ,e.g., original Fedora discussion post, to a search and in TOP5 of those results I find solution, it makes me wonder why OP couldn’t do the same. I realize that searching is tricky these days, but people manage to find clothes, computers, gifts, other people - why not to try problem related keywords in an internet search before posting in forums ? :smiley:
I remember the beginning of my IT career - if i dump my question without preparation to some computer related forum I was getting silence for some time at best or a lecture not to ask stupid questions (stupid=unprepared) and stop wasting others time (for them doing my “homework” for me) :smiley:

Sure, one is learning a lot when trying to help others and doing a “research” for them, but appreciation of others time in helping got somewhat lower… :slight_smile:

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So I guess that makes me a fossil :wink: as I’m 62 this spring, and I still don’t “feel” it.

Customer service is something I have done for all of my working life, and if I think on it most of my life period. Some of us are helpers, and some aren’t. The helpers are chronically under-appreciated and the benefactors of their efforts often seem to have greater than deserved expectations. I don’t notice the chaff so much these days, as I get a great thrill from assisting someone solve a difficult problem in all cases. The root cause analysis has taken over my priorities if I am interested in the problem that needs a solution. Also, I don’t always answer a request for help (anymore). I have found that controlling that compulsion to help everyone has been a boon to reducing the drain of feeling like you’re everyone’s support division.

In any case, I would like to thank you @x3mboy for what you do in the community of :fedora:

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I worked as a Junior Support Engineer in my early days, and I would have literal conversations like this:

client: My site is not working
me: What does it say on the page?
client: It says it can not connect to the database because the password is wrong
me: Well, it might be that it cannot connect to the database because the password is wrong
client: ah, i will check then
…client ends the call…

And the problem is not that the client is stupid. They are just not trained to think that whatever message they see as an error can actually be useful for them. They are trained to think that they are not capable of understanding error messages and that there are separate skilled people who use dark magic to solve problems.

And it gets some time and effort to learn that there is no dark magic :slight_smile:

You would still do it, right? At least at the very beginning. You may get a snarky comment as a response but that’s how you would learn not to do it.

And that’s the hardest part of the work as a support: you always deal with people for whom this is their first time. It is like always teaching the first graders. You don’t get to see the impact of your help on a person, you rarely know whether the person who did the mistake has grown and learned and became better. They just get replaced with a new person and you start from zero again.

In the community it is slightly better than in commercial support, because at least some folks stick for a longer time and become more skilled in finding solutions for themselves and for others.

But still, you have to allow newbies to be newbies :slight_smile:

And maybe rather than snarky comments let’s teach by uncovering the actual magic. I usually try to not just answer with “do this or do that” but rather say something like “I don’t really know anything about this thing, but I googled for these keywords and found this advice on this site so may be you should try it”.

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