A fond farewell to all

Chat about Zorin
1

It has been a great run, this past couple of years, helping members explore Zorin, troubleshoot issues and debate the issues and developments in Linux that affect us all.
During my time here, I have often taken on others problems as if they were my own, relentlessly pursuing a solution. It became a bit of a joke about me logging in 80 posts in a thread. I always tried to respond swiftly, even if a solution was not yet known. To ensure that members these past 17 months have felt cared about and supported.
I could not always solve a problem or find a fix. But members were left with a hope that they could turn to the forum in time of need.
In that time, I have helped a great many members adjust to the Linux Terminal Emulator.
The Terminal emulator is the most powerful utility on Linux and the go-to tool for the Helpdesk. While we often used GUI methods and included GUI methods in addition to Terminal Commands in posts, many members were able to solve problems using the terminal quite well.

However, the administrator of the forum has seen fit to suggest to me in a paragraph long chastisement that I am making members feel intimidated by the terminal because One Member Claims he felt I had a “mocking tone” when I said that using the terminal is quite easy.
I think my record stands, however, The Zorin Team does not.

And in this, I have come to realize how stifling I have begun to find the New Forum. The Lively Spirited state we used to enjoy is gone. It has gotten to the point where I log in and check the board for problems with a sigh. The life and enjoyment the board had has been drained away by robotic responses and walking on eggshelIs. And most certainly, I will not be asked to take abuse from an Angry Poster for Artyom Zorins Profit given the time I have spent on the forum helping countless people in volunteer time, and also repeatedly attempting to help that One Angry poster, without thought or concern for myself.

It is time to move on to other projects. I have set aside several as the forum demands increased. I would like to get back to them.

To all of you who have made this a great place, @swarfendor437, @KayDee, @Deeanna, @Carmar, @Zabadabadoo and many others; My best regards to you all.
To all of you who uplifted some of my gloomy days with your threads seeking help, successes in resolving bugs, glitches and finding novel solutions - Thank you for keeping Linux in our control, a versatile and highly configurable.

AND USE THE TERMINAL. IT’S EASY!

A fond farewell to you all.

5 Likes
2

Sad to see you go. You always took on the hard issues and left the RTFM issues to the rest of us.

I was always taught, learn in the terminal and then the GUI. You never know when you’ll need to fix something without the GII.

3

I hate to say it, but I foresaw this coming as like prophecy. Once the switch to this forum happened, things were changing quickly.

Yes its true in the beginning, we were all engaged with the forum, enjoying the topics, having discussion. But as time progressed, I noticed a decline in said discussion. Over the course of the last month at least, I haven’t seen much activity.

Oh sure there have been people posting issues that they were looking for guidance to resolve. But the general chat has pretty much went frozen.

It is in my opinion, that you brought a lot of life to the forum, I remember how dead the old one felt before you showed up. And I know that SWARF appreciated your help as well.

Of course, you will be missed by us.

4

Sorry to see you go Aravisian - keep up the great theming work. I am going to have a play with Arch at some point (LUG co-ordinator has sent me a link). In view of my despisement of Pulse Audio, I am now looking for a distribution that is ALSA only, and probable most definitely a non-Ubuntu based one in view of the debacle of snap. I noticed on my other LinuxOS that 'flatpak' is sitting there. Or I may go back to my first computer love, Amiga OS:

It would also be nice to get back to stability where apps are not embedded into the OS which means removing any one of them doesn't end up losing the system.

5

I hope our paths cross again. Regardless, I wish you all the best in whatever ventures you undertake and that you are happy doing them.

6

Oh No. This is indeed a sad day for this Forum.
I am glad to have come across you on the old Forum and early days on this one. You have been a great help to me when things have gone pear-shaped and given me some useful terminal commands to add to my book. It is a shame you are leaving us, but I kind of understand the timing.
Have fun with your new projects.
All the best.
Zaba

7

Thank you for the help you have given me, as a Linux newcomer. Many of us who have just started on the Linux route need a “home” to come to when problems crop up. A few years ago I briefly used another Linux OS and had difficulty in understanding some of the answers that their forum members gave…it’s no good assuming everyone is a computer geek. I am an “average” user, in other words I don’t tend to have much in the way of complex personal programming projects…so am unlikely to be involved in chit-chat…but I do read many posts and learn things from them and the answers given. I’ve certainly not ever felt intimidated. I do hope you’ll find joy in your new projects.

1 Like
8

Aravisian, I’m sorry that my PM came across as criticising or mean-spirited :disappointed:. The sentiment of messages can often be lost when writing on the Internet, and I could have worded it a bit more clearly. I didn’t intend for my message to be a chastisement, but rather constructive and impartial feedback about an interaction on the forum to help you in the future. So that incidents – like the recent one in question that happened with another user – needn’t be tolerated and cause you anguish again.

I have written to the other member in question in response to their transgressions, which didn’t live up to our standard of a healthy and respectful discussion.

In relation to my comment about Terminal, I was hoping to bridge the gap of understanding that happened in this incident, in order to help new users like these feel more comfortable using the Terminal and be more receptive to your advice. When reading over this comment again just a moment ago, it’s clear to me that I fell short of explaining this advice succinctly enough, and I apologise for this.

The goal of the forum is to create a welcoming place where new users and veterans can help each other in a positive and respectful environment, and enjoy doing it. All of this intending to contribute to the overarching goal of spreading Linux to more people, for the benefit of everyone.

When building this new forum, we set aside time to look through the feedback our users had about the – now old – forum. Both from existing members and those that had the intention, but decided not to be. This feedback directed us towards taking this opportunity to improve upon the old forum by trying to strike a more healthy balance between open, helpful, and respectful discourse between members.

However, as with many new things, we didn’t get it fully right on the first go, and it’s still not 100% perfect. Growing pains, one can say. Some of you may remember the issue about the over-zealous word filter back in August, which Aravisian was very kind to spend the extra time to resolve with us. Just as before, we’re always open to feedback; to help make the forum a better, more helpful and more lively place for everyone.

@Aravisian I fully respect the decision if you don’t wish to continue being a member here. It’s not the easiest thing to do when not everyone is as patient and thankful as we hope to be treated ourselves, so I completely understand your position.

What can’t be taken away is the fact that you’ve helped a lot of people make their first steps to Linux and been a valuable member of the community and friend here. On behalf of everyone here, I’d like to thank you for your contributions to the community. You’ve made a big and positive impact here which will be appreciated for a long time to come :slightly_smiling_face:

4 Likes
9

In addressing troubleshooting on this board, it opened an avenue to me to explore Linux in ways I normally would not and to learn, constantly, how to address bugs and glitches. Thanks to all for the kind words, but also for the teaching your questions enabled to me.

@Azorin, received your email and I have replied rather lengthily to you via that PM with poorly worded and emotionally rattled details as to just exactly I feel is the “Big Mistake” in wording. It will be hard to read, consider yourself warned.
This entire thing really revolves around intentions behind a post- and assumptions made about them. But there also comes a point where it is very hard to consider a meaning to be misunderstood when changing the wording of it in several different ways does not alter the way it comes across. Honestly, I would have really preferred that you worded yourself poorly. That is something I can relate to, at least.
I hope that my meandering PM still manages to relay that point.

11

Thanks for the help you have given me in the past, it was much appreciated.

Farewell and good luck!

12

Aravisian, in my estimation, you have always been a charitable and kind hearted man

I hope you don’t quit

1 Like
13

Aravisian,

I for one appreciated your helpfullness and commitment.

I also sadly agree that the new forum has lost its way - the old one used to be so relevant, simple and interesting.

Best wishes - which distro will you be favouring in future, I wonder.

14

Best wishes - which distro will you be favouring in future, I wonder.

Finston, I still have Zorin on all my machines. I did look around at a few but nothing stood out in a way that interested me enough to try testing them out.
I have always found the best performance from Zorin in an Ubuntu based distro.

3 Likes
15

Thats right, you know why? Cause Zorin’s the best, so there! LOL

Nobody gonna tell me different, I eat my Zorin ice cream sandwhitch every day. :stuck_out_tongue:

16

I skipped that bit, life is too short. I started with Zorin, and unless sound problems finally drive me nuts, plan to stay with it. @Aravisian, good to hear from you again I must say.

1 Like
17

Well, Zab, I did not fall over dead or anything. :wink:
I have been enjoying de-stressing, though. Up to and including moments of bonafide boredom. Mostly have been catching up on garage work that has been waiting.
In the meantime, Swarfendor had mentioned a clue to sound problems that deal with integrated Gnomeisms. Worth looking into, though not easy to solve on an Ubuntu based distro.

1 Like
18

Hi @Aravisian. Good to hear change is good as a rest as they say. Boredom is rife here, but come 3rd December, we can expect a mad post lock-down Christmas shopping stampede. I will try and keep well out of that.
Regarding sound and Gnomeisms, I assume you are referring to this post by Swarf: The promises of ZorinOS

19

Dude, its not even Christmas yet, and I am getting stupid Black Friday spam in my email box from retail companies trying to milk more money out of my pocket. Its really sick how evil capitalistic this country is. I can’t wait for this year to be over, its all been a complete mess.

20

Hi StarTreker,

I recently rescinded my Consumer Advice organisation over here subscription with Which? (Which? is the name of the Consumer body fighting for consumer protection). Laughingly it’s cover sheet was offering their app for the best Black Friday deals. I responded by saying that Which? clearly does not think that Black Lives Matter - most people are unaware that Black Friday was a reference to the sale of African Slaves in the US 200 years ago. I also did not like their take that the Test and Trace app was secure - having read many years ago that lots of NHS data was sold off illegally due to badly written software I won’t touch it.
Having recently been advised that systemd is like having a barcode that anyone can read I will not be rejoining the Zorin fold in respect of running the OS. You could say I have had a Linux Nirvana moment - an epiphany if you will. There is a new sysinit that quite a few distributions are now taking up, obviously none of them are Ubuntu-based. For information about S6-linux-init read here:

And Devuan has quite a number of forks:

So if Zorin looked seriously at no longer forking Ubuntu … I might just come back!

1 Like
21

No, it isn't:

...Sorry, Swarf.

1 Like