[Asterisk-Users] FAQ, Documentation, How-to, etc

[Steven Sokol]

Would anybody be willing to shell out some money and hire (or offer a
bounty for) a viable "Getting Started with Asterisk" or "Asterisk for
Dummies" or "The Complete Idiot's Guide To Asterisk" or something like
that?  RTFM is better/easier than UTFG, IMHO.

The Vovida/vocal team (granted they are funded by Cisco) has actually
written a book that was published by O'Reilly (sp?) an company last
year.  While a printed book may not be a great idea, considering the
pace at which things change, how about an e-book?

I know that Mark has (rightly) held onto the distribution rights on the
existing rather thin manual.  I don't want to do anything to cut down on
the draw to his site.  But I think an independently created and
maintained manual (rather an Opensource book?) might be the best answer.
Kind of a combination of the current manual and Olle's Wiki, plus
additional information on advanced topics:  AGI programming, Festival
TTS, the Manager interface, the billing interface, etc.

Rather than telling newbies (especially the technically challenged) to
"google for it", we could send them a link to the ebook and tell them to
run the search in Acrobat reader to find the answer.  Anybody want to
start a thread building the outline for the book?

Regards,

Steven Sokol 
Sokol & Associates, LLC

-----Original Message-----
From: asterisk-users-admin at lists.digium.com
[mailto:asterisk-users-admin at lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Andy Hester
Sent: Thursday, November 20, 2003 10:26 AM
To: asterisk-users at lists.digium.com
Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] FAQ, Documentation, How-to, etc

Just a had to put in a few points on this...

	First, it is correct that there is no cause to be rude, either
by repling
rudely or posting without doing any research.  I think that a response
directing them to the proper resources is better than not responding at
all.

	Second, one of the main problems has been documenatation as
everyone knows.
As one of the people suggesting a wiki several months back, I am
thankful to
those who have hosted/maintained/posted.  Searching the mailing list
archives can be futile in a lot of cases because it can be to
tedious/laborious to find an answer in a timeframe that is practical.
This
is why we need the wiki.  I would suggest that we start refering them to
the
wiki as well as the mailing list. Props to Olle & BKW for responding
with
their docs.

	Lastly, I'm not sure that the footer idea will work at all.  It
is doubtful
that the people asking the questions in question will read the footer.
The
idea is to put links to the documentation, wiki, unofficial * pages and
instructions BEFORE the mailing list stuff on the Asterisk support page.
Other wise many will not even see it much less take the time to read it.
I
believe Critch suggested something like this in a thread a few days ago.
ie
you can only post after you've read the instructions or something.

Snip

With the exception of I don't know how hard it is to setup, I wouldn't
mind this going to a semi moderated group. RO access requires little
intervention. Basically it is the default. Posting requires a quick read
of the FAQ with a quick push through a small and to the point netiquete
page, and then maybe a 2 or 3 question pop quiz afterwords. After that,
release the posting restriction. It is fairly minimalistic, and
shouldn't get too in the way of users who want to lurk and read first.

Snip


	We as a community have made great strides from even a few months
backas far
as docs goes, I think we just need to make sure it gets out there and
then
if people still ask questions without research, we can turn Critch loose
on
'em. ;)



Sincerely,
Andy Hester

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