fact: the use of 3pp (third perspective pronouns) has been a thing since the first children were diagnosed with autism. this one is just one member of a long tradition.

(source: Steve Silberman, NeuroTribes, 2015. ISBN 978-1-101-63964-1)

@Linux_in_a_Bit Another common thing I've encountered is feeling like people aren't really listening to you or aren't willing to take the time to understand the situation before they start throwing stuff at you.

This is sometimes how people recommend Linux itself, as a solution to a problem in a situation where switching to Linux would either be unfeasible or where that'd cause a lot more headache than simply finding a workaround for now and look into switching to linux at a later date when you're not actively trying to solve a problem.

A lot of these issues, I feel like, come from an inability a lot of people have to admit they don't know something. That's why they feel the need to make it out like you're the one wrong for asking the question, or try and steer them towards something you do have an expertise in even if that thing isn't actually helpful in the situation.

No reasonable person is gonna think less if you just admit you don't know. "I don't know, but I'll try looking into it" is a lot better than bullshitting some answer or deflecting the question. And when it comes to computers in particular, I'm pretty convinced there are only two kinds of people: people who don't know what they are doing at least half the time and people who are lying.

@fargate that all definitely makes sense! and it does sound really nice tbh. I really like the thought that I could install software once and have it continue working forever in a little bubble where its environment is perfectly maintained

the impression that I get from NixOS is that it takes a lot of general Linux knowledge, technical skill, and mastery of Nix/NixOS/etc. in order to get a setup that fits one’s daily needs - but once you’ve got that setup it will keep working forever. although changes/additions to the setup are also very technically demanding

I hope that immutable distros get better over time (I’m sure they will) because I’d love to have all of the advantages that I just mentioned, without having to do too much troubleshooting and learning and tinkering

@CedC @Linux_in_a_Bit I might get hate from my Fedi ingroup for this but I find this to be an extremely good use of AI. I use Perplexity (a really nice AI search engine tool) for quickly learning technical stuff that would take me a ton of work reading scattered, sparse documentation otherwise

the trick is to only ask it for information that you can immediately test/verify

(with this said, I don’t financially support AI companies ever because I’m very worried about the risks posed by AI)

@GoodNewsGreyShoes @malte @Slacker @Kancept I totally agree with this. an important aspect of emotional maturity is being able to see someone getting frustrated at something that you like, and not taking that as frustration at you, but rather meeting them where they are and saying “I totally understand why you’re frustrated. would you like some help? this was hard for me too at first but I can share what I know”

I get frustrated at any tech that I don’t immediately understand because it makes me feel incredibly stupid to see others using it (seemingly) so effortlessly. and I try to show others the same understanding and respect that I would like to be shown when I feel that way

@malte @Kancept @Slacker I fully agree:

"New users shouldn't assume they can easily optimize this operating system that's lauded for its optimizability & being more user-friendly than it's ever been" is unrealistic.

New users aren't going to stop wanting the nice things that Veteran users keep bragging about as reasons they prefer Linux.

@malte @Slacker @Kancept On the one hand:

You deserve to be appreciated when offering help to a 'noob', & their frustration does not make it okay for them to be rude. You don't need to put up with abuse.

On the other hand:

"I won't help you b/c you were too frustrated by your problem to adhere to my expectations, & I did not have the patience to tolerate incivility which I knew was not directed at me" doesn't seem like a viable solution.

Thoughts?

@pharmafemboy to be honest I’m probably not the one to explain them since I don’t know too much about them other than that they’re a furry species and the ones on Fedi are super cute

yinglets are…