Josh Saddler

This entry is the result of having to report countless identical threads, as well as just sitting back and watching what's going on in the Gentoo Forums lately. I care about the forums, otherwise I wouldn't post some tips on how to raise the quality of what goes into it, and what people can get out of it.

So, now that you know the background, here are a few important tips on being a better forumite:

1. Make sure you search before posting.

99% of the time users don't bother to search before posting their issue, which at least 80% of the time can be found in the Forum FAQs, to say nothing of being found in the official documentation. Just take a look at most of the posts in Installing Gentoo. You may think your problem is unique and no one else has ever found a solution, but the statistics and sheer numbers of posts indicate that more than likely, it's been solved before. We've such a huge community in the forums that a solution of some kind is inevitable.

So, search first, and if you do find threads on your topic, don't start a new one asking for explanations because you don't understand; it's okay to just add your post to the existing thread. That's what it's there for! The fewer duplicated posts, the better.

2. Use confcat to strip comments from config files.

Too often users create ridiculously huge code blocks for kernel configs, xorg.conf, make.conf, etc., and 99% of it is junk. We care about the options that are enabled! I stuck confcat in /usr/local/bin, making sure that's in my environment's $PATH. Such a world of difference. Instead of spamming threads and forcing readers to sort through 250 lines of comments, you can just show the 11 lines that actually matter. It saves time and trouble.

A related tip for 2 is learning how to only post the relevant parts of your Xorg.0.log. Usually, what's needed are the errors printed in the Xorg output. These errors appear on lines that begin with EE. Thus, to display only the errors when you're trying to troubleshoot your X setup, use the following command:

$ grep EE /var/log/Xorg.0.log

If you're just looking for warnings, which can usually be ignored, grep for WW. You can find descriptions of what all the line indicators mean at the very top of Xorg.0.log itself:

Markers: (--) probed, (**) from config file, (==) default setting,
        (++) from command line, (!!) notice, (II) informational,
        (WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown.

Use grep wisely, and avoid posting ridiculously long config files if you don't have to.

3. If you're using an ebuild from the xeffects overlay, do not report it on the Gentoo Forums.

See this thread for reasons why -- in short, ebuilds from the xeffects overlay are not supported by Gentoo developers. Use the xeffects bugzilla to report xeffects bugs, and use the xeffects forums to get help on using ebuilds from that overlay. This includes the xeffects compiz-fusion, compiz, beryl, etc. I really can't emphasize this enough: proper support for the overlay is found only on its forums and on its bugzilla; only the xeffects maintainers can fix your xeffects bugs.

If you're using the compiz-fusion etc. packages found in Gentoo's Portage tree (not the xeffects overlay packages), then you can post your issues, tips, problems, solutions, discussion, etc. to the Gentoo Forums. Note, though, that as of this writing the versions in Portage are still marked ~unstable, as they have been added very recently.

The xeffects maintainers specifically requested that all xeffects package issues be sent to them. Please honor their wishes and direct your xeffects issues to their websites, and not the Gentoo Forums.

So there you have it, three tips that will help you go far in the forums. Follow them, and you'll avoid having your threads moved to different forums, locked, duplicated, or merged into other threads. You'll also make it easier for Gentoo developers, forum administrators/moderators, and other users to help troubleshoot your problems.