Here is my take if your interested.
To answer your first question I want to write so that I can contribute back. I am a one time coder but got paid too write in non-C based languages long enough I forgot all my C coding skills. Never really liked that style of syntax anyway. Linux is very heavily C/C++ oriented. So contributing code is not practical. Documentation is often skimpy, not especially informative and often obsolete to the point of being counter productive. So one reason I want to write is simply to do something useful for a community that has given so much too me.
A second reason is I strongly believe in Linux. I believe in what it can do. While I hate and despise M$, that only got me interested in Linux. I love working in Linux and with Linux. It allows me to do what I want to do. I spend my time working on stuff not fixing my OS. Not dinking with settings or reinstalling things. No virus scans to run. No defragging or rebooting to fix a misbehaving app. No more saving every 2 mins because the app I'm working in might crash any second. No more watching my whole system go under because I installed too many apps or one app that did not work and play well with the rest. I can go on and on about the things I love about Linux and how it is superior to windoze.
Most of them are positive reasons. For me KDE is an awesome window manager. The key bindings are natural and intuitive. I don't fumble in many KDE apps trying to figure out keyboard shortcuts. They are almost always CDE which is what I've used going back to many DOS apps. Even before M$ standardized on CDE I was using CDE shortcuts. I get feature rich apps that work and don't crash on me. The management of my window manager and system in general is well laid out, non-intrusive, easy to use and pretty much everything is 2 clicks or less away. Windoze, Gnome and other systems often hide/bury stuff several clicks down. Which leads to short cutitus.
I really like the power of Linux. It is truly cutting edge in many areas. I love the stability. The security. Not relitive stability or security, it's rock solid. It's not comparitively stable it's really stable. Sometimes going six months to a year without any real problems that require user intervention. It's customizable. It doesn't hurt that it's free but I used to buy distros just to support Linux development. I've owned several RH versions and sub versions. Mandrake, SUSE, even bought a Corel distro once and remember eagerly buying Caldera
2.0 the first distro that I'm aware of sold at CompUSA. (Spits on Caldera name now). So for a reasonable price I'd bought Linux distros. I really like the OS that much. Even though I could get it for free I figured buying those distros, some of which I never really used like the Corel, man did that distro suck LOL, at least I felt I was helping Linux develop.
So as a Linux advocate I want to do things to help Linux. In my opinion one of the biggest challenges is old guard vrs the new wave of windoze refugees. Man pages make sense to the old guard. They look like gibberish to noobs to Linux. Many times they tell you what you already knew but are useless in trying to figure out how to use an option. They tell you that you can do it but give no syntax examples and leave out rather important details. To the old guard they are unnecessary since it makes sense by understanding the history and how things work. The new refugees don't want ancient computer history lessons. They don't want to understand the difference between System 7 and Posix and why some stuff use -R and others use -r for recursive. They often don't even want to look at a command line. Most distro documentation is about like man pages. It tells you that yeah you can use a digital camera. Just wait for it to pop up. That's not real useful in troubleshooting if it doesn't. That doesn't help somebody who wants to get accidentally deleted photos off the camera. It states the obvious without giving any real help. Folks turn to documentation mostly for help.
Another problem with converting people to Linux is that they are given often some very poor choices in apps to use. For many documentation writers they've used these apps for years, are comfortable with the quirks and are blissfully unaware of windoze equivs for these apps or Linux apps that are equivs for the software people used in windoze. I crucial factor in retaining people who try Linux is the comfort level they feel in Linux. Remember a computer OS is a really big thing. They are literally scared. Afraid they'll break it. They often are slightly technophobic to start with. For years M$ and others have been drumming it into their heads that computers are evil and incomprehensible. Leave the yucky stuff to geeky techs and all will be well. That computers should be like a toaster and require no more thought to use. That's unrealistic, they know it but they've managed to promote the stigma that Linux is technically difficult and Linux documentaion has played right into their hands. It shows only one way of doing things which is often a very poor choice. Most windoze users use WinAmp or something akin to that. In Linux Audacious and XMMS are so close that a windoze user can sit right down and in minutes be playing files. I cannot think of a single distro's documentation that takes that into account. Instead users are pointed at an array of bizzare apps that really do not corespond to commonly used windoze software. The burn process from IE is so buggy few windoze users use it. They use software like Nero. Which happens to have an equiv called K3b which would leave them right at home in burning a CD. I have a very good rate of retention in people I convert to Linux and actively convert people. The key to this is making them comfortable in Linux and the key to that is giving them max functionality with as small a learning curve as possible. A second big selling factor is just how many ways you can do something. I often show them several ways till they start looking glazed from all the choices or they see one they just light up on and love. I might hate that particuler app but who cares. It's THEIR computer. If that's the software they like and using that keeps them in Linux then I've done something good.
That is why I came to the Fedora docs project. Fedora is the distro I use and one of the best to start new people converting to Linux on.
The problems I see with the project start with the complexity to actually write something. First nobody knows what needs written. I suggest a greeter committee spend some time in IM and or email exchanges and get to know new volenteers. Walk them through the process of account creation. How things work. Get a feel for their skills and connect them with areas that need work.
Second I suggest more flexibility in the docs. Lets show people the strength of Linux, not restate the obvious. I gave some examples and I hope I didn't offend anybody. I suspect that they may have had more detailed documents but that decisions were made to make it ultra simple. The problem is ultra simple got to be so simple it's useless in my opinion. Lets take playing music for example.
Topics I personally think should be covered are.
A variety of music players representing classes of music players (ie XMMS style, Jukebox style, Album organization). Then link to different project pages where they can learn more about each.
Ripping music. Doesn't have to get format specific. Just a quickie on ABCDE, Lame for command line, GRIP and other GUI rippers.
Organization software, taggers, editors, converters. In other words what you can do with a ripped file after it's ripped.
Doing this would show the power of Linux. Provide meaningful links to answers to common problems. It would be informitive but not take ages to write and maintain as most of it would be pointing to project docs to give readers the details.
In my opinion the red tape surrounding docs leaves them so devoid of content that I personally feel like writing them will not be all that helpful to anybody. This robs me of the desire to write. Instead I've focused on other work I can do for Linux projects. There are 100 places I could start at about scarcity of documentation. A number of places I could contribute. But I feel that the scope itself is so limited that many of these are just out of scope. For example if I contributed on the burner page, I would want to write at least short blurbs about ISO tools, different types of burner software availible. Links so readers could look and choose the software that best fit them. Utilities for dealing with ISO files. A great example. Long ago I used to burn from the command line. K3b changed that. There are however occasions I'd love too but the command line cdrecord tools either had a different syntax or were broken in Fedora last time I tried. Wouldn't hurt to put a short doc on burning from a command line.
Another impediment is the access control. I never could edit wiki content. Maybe my ID finally got straitened out, maybe it didn't. I heard other users complain of same thing on this list. So the two docs I did write never got submitted. I pasted one in frustration into the list. Got good constructive criticism on many parts on others I felt the scope limitations were going to limit my ability to write meaningful documentation. The other which was probably more in line with the kind of docs being asked for I never could submit. I tried for weeks. Exchanged emails trying to find the right person to ask about getting my rights corrected. Finally just gave up.
Second do we really want people editing content directly? Shouldn't that go through a review before being placed out there? So why not have a submission process? Submit it for peer review, corrections, additions. This means no more fumbling in the dark trying to figure out how to add content or getting frustrated when your account isn't given sufficient rights. People tend to feel slighted when that happens. I'm sure no slight is intended. I've seen no malice on this list toward people. No cliqueism or people feeling above others. Folks seem quite friendly and very interested in doing a good job.
So it's more a matter of organization really. There are lots of people who want to help. They don't know where to help, how to help. They come in and feel like outsiders. The red tape is confusing. There is no process to make sure they know what is expected of them. The work to do work can be exasperating and confusing. Create a sig, create accounts here, there and hope that all the various people in each step get it right and that the new members do it correctly.
What I suggest is that this process is streamlined. The welcoming committee can filter out the passing ships and filter based on ability. They can walk folks through the initial process of getting all those accounts created. They will actually know who to buzz if the rights are set wrong. They can also help get people to areas where they will do the most good. There are two types of people needed in projects like this. The organizers who unfortunately will probably spend more time working with people than on actual docs and the writers. The fewer organizers the more get's written. The more the ogranizers do the more time writers have to write.
Once they've gotten their first doc written and submitted most users will be pretty self sufficient. They can after a few docs in turn serve as ast mentors on other new writers and eventually get forced kicking and screaming into admin roles.
Anyway that's my 2 cents. I personally would like to see far more covered. See support for real life usage. See better help for windoze refugees. See a streamlining of the induction process. I still feel very much an outsider with this project, a heratic even. So maybe I just wasted everybodies time but thought I'd make an attempt before I unsubscribe and move on completely to other projects instead.
Drac
unsigned remote heratic/lunitic.