David,
please note that the DS helpfiles do actually carry a lot of info. I
think you can find some areas of DS better covered in the helpfiles.
Andi
david friedman wrote:
yeah... one of the items that i begged, borrowed, & stole was a copy
of the fisherman tutorial which as you know was last issued with
version 5. i made my way through it using version 7. it was/is an
EXCELLENT tutorial and should be updated and provided with all new
systems.
as you alluded to, the getting started guide is good as a prep manual
to the 101 class. but that means that new users are PRACTICALLY
REQUIRED to take the classes in order to learn ANYTHING about how to
use a ds because of the lack of a decent tutorial AND the lack of
clearly written documentation.
that shouldn't be.
david friedman
On Tuesday, October 11, 2005, at 12:50 PM, Benoit Melancon wrote:
Hello David,
Being an ACI for a living, I quite agree with you that the featured
documentation when you first get your DS can be quite dry to read...
Your story about spending a month on your own seems to me something
that most users have to go through somehow (isn't it the case with
most software packages available today?), and where I work we usually
tell the people who enroll for the 101 class to at least go through
the "Getting Started" manual which is good groundwork for DS usage.
When they come to the class after that, their questions are always
more numerous and well-targeted.
I believe as you do that classes are a good way to add to basic
knowledge of the box. The major thing that changed over the years in
DS education is the dissapearance of what used to be called the
"fisherman's project', a 200-page or so tutorial that users could go
through on their own. I seem to remember that one of the reasons was
that some editors missed some key elements when doing the tutorial by
themselves, and having a class environment was therefore considered a
better alternative.
I'm usually better at learning on my own, so I can't really comment
that much on such decision, but I agree it would be nice to have a
choice.
Benoit
david friedman wrote:
agreed. i took all 3 classes too. fortunately or unfortunately all
of my 'classes' ended up being 1 on 1 training.
but before that i spent a MONTH with the manuals and the system
trying to figger out how to work the damn thing.
d/l'ed everything i could from the web site (even stuff from earlier
versions),
read... played... tinkered... cursed a lot (come to think of it, i
STILL do that sometimes) just trying to understand how it works.
i shouldn't HAVE to take classes in order to learn how to use ANY
software! classes should provide supplemental information (maybe
except 101 classes)
i SHOULD have been able to get a fair understanding from the
supplied documentation. that's what the docs are SUPPOSED to be for.
with ds they aren't.
david friedman
--
Benoit Melancon
Avid DS ACI/ACSR
www.nadcentre.com
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Andi Loor
www.andiloor.se
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