On Fri, 6 Dec 2002, Paul M Foster wrote:
> Folks:
>
> I get fairly regular requests for people to come out to someone's home
> or office and assist in installing, tweaking or teaching Linux. Are
> there people here who are willing to do that sort of thing?
>
> <snip>
>
> Paul
>
Absolutely. Count me in.
I'm even willing to do it for free. I already do, sort of. I spend
Saturday afternoons at a local retirement community teaching basic
computer skills and Internet use. I have to deal with what I found
there, so it is AOL on Windows. Please stop gagging and just pity me. :)
Sometimes I call it, "Showing old people how to push the mouse around",
but I really get a kick out of it. The people are fun. They're becoming
more sophisticated users of technology too.
If I end up at someone's office going over how to implement a firewall or
Samaba disk realestate, I would expect to be paid if I didn't find myself
out of my depth.
If you've got people who just need help installing a distro (any distro)
and getting connected to their ISP so they can browse and do email, I'm
all over it. I'm not in a position to contribute to the kernel, but this
could be a way for me to give something back. Most home-use/support
issues aren't going to kick my butt. Besides the hard skills, I've got
the soft skills, such as patience, that are very important in such
situations. And they won't be looking over my shoulder. I'll be looking
over theirs. The idea is that they need to know how to drive; I already
do.
At the last meeting that was rescheduled to Robin's house we were
discussing some other LUG. They had a strong emphasis on community
out-reach and support. I've read of other folks putting Linux on
abandoned old harware and getting low-income households connected to the
Net. This might be a way for this LUG to do something similar.
This might turn into something.
Greg
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