Mininal skills

[David Christensen]

On 2020-06-03 14:54, Brandon Helsley wrote:
> I've searched around FreeBSD documentation and have found that most 
> of the contributions require at least minimal programming skills. My 
> question is whether or not there is anything I can contribute or 
> maintain for freebsd without any skills. What direction should I
> take my education if I wish to be able to maintain a port. Is c++ 
> programming required? What else is required?


On 2020-06-03 16:26, Brandon Helsley wrote:
> By "without any skills" I mean that I'm new to computers and am not 
> even familiar with the terminology thrown around in the FreeBSD 
> community.
> 
> I've never heard of this documentation updating, I'd love to learn 
> more. Who should I be talking to or where should I be referring to
> so I can learn...
> 
> I sent a PR from some account I created about a bug in the loading 
> of> the kernel modules for bhyve. I'm starting to think I didn't
> quite format it correctly or rather communicate the issue correctly.
> I heard that filing PR's is also a good starting point to get
> involved. Could someone help me find the documentation that explains
> how to file a PR or update documentation.


Computer Science and Engineering (CS/E) is a huge field.  More 
knowledge, projects, and products are added every day.  The canonical 
way to learn CS/E is to pursue a CS/E curriculum at a school, college, 
or university.


For self-learning, the starting point is to obtain a working personal 
computer (PC) and Internet access.  I suggest a Windows or macOS desktop 
or laptop computer with at least a dual-core processor, virtualization 
support, 4 GB of RAM, and 120 GB of storage.  Get an external USB drive 
and set up backups using the vendor-provided tools (e.g. "Backup and 
Restore" and "File History" for Windows, and "Time Machine" for macOS). 
Do not make any dramatic changes to the PC, and do not attempt to 
install FreeBSD or any other operating system (e.g. "dual boot").


To learn FreeBSD, get "Absolute FreeBSD" (AF3E) and read chapters 1-3:

https://mwl.io/nonfiction/os#af3e


Install virtualization software on your PC (I suggest VirtualBox). 
Create a virtual machine (VM).  Install FreeBSD on the VM (see chapter 3 
of AF3E).  Don't worry if you make mistakes during installation -- 
delete the virtual machine and start over.  Once you have a working 
FreeBSD VM, shut it down and take a snapshot.


Get "Learning the Unix Operating System" and read chapters 1, 3, 4, 5, 
7, and 8.  Type the commands shown into the VM and read the manual page 
for each command:

https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/learning-the-unix/0596002610/


Where you go next depends upon your goals.


David