Post complete logs/output/versions/error messages

Question

When you have an issue, post the ENTIRE output or log. Information is crucial to being able to solve any problem. I've seen threads go for pages and all someone needed to do was ask for a log file or simple command output.
Don't do this
It doesnt work!!!
That is not output, that says absolutely nothing. It's probably the most useless thing you could post.
It said something about this, I think the problem is this
That's not an exact error message, that's an intepretation of an error message. It's like playing chinese whispers.
Responding
When someone posts something like the above, don't respond with a blind guess. Usually it'll just confuse the situation, instead just politely request more details. Don't post some solution that worked for you for something vaguely similar 2 years ago unless you are confident it is the same issue.
Sources of information
Full output of any command involved
Log files (have a look in /var/log)
Relevant configuration files
Drivers involved
Versions of packages involved
Kernel: dmesg. For a boot problem, at least the last 10 lines displayed, preferably more
Networking: Exact output of commands involved, and any configuration files
Xorg: /var/log/Xorg.0.log, and prior logs if you have overwritten the problematic one
If a recent -Syu broke it, have a look through your pacman log and see what packages were upgraded.
Where to put the information?
In the post is fine or if it's very long - pastebins are great, particularly for config files. However make sure it's a long term paste so that it doesnt expire within a day.
A useful tool for pastebins, especially if you can't copy paste is community/nopaste. Just pipe any output through nopaste and you'll get a link. eg
iphitus@korolev:~$ dmesg|nopaste
http://rafb.net/p/W7Z4t761.html
Last edited by iphitus (2008-10-26 23:54:15)

Answer 1

bernarcher wrote:
To be fair, it took some time before I myself became accustomed to the logs. It is just like any other documentation. You need practice to make it really useful.
That said, don't take it for granted that newbies will be aware of what is needed. It takes patience to provide help (rather often, unfortunately). And to me it suffices if I see that somebody wants to learn (and does so).
Bernarcher hints at something else here: it works both ways.  It is fine enough having a sticky at the top of the newbie board to explain the basic locations of various outputs, but the responsibility of seasoned archers doesn't end there.  Experienced users ought to assume the role of teachers when entering forum discussion with beginners, and at the very least should be aware of the gap in knowledge.  Fortunately Arch newbies can boast more familiarity and objectivity than say Ubuntu newbies but they still require some preliminary (and sometimes background) information on where and what to implement.
"Post output of /var/program" or "Post /var/program.log" are better instructions than "Post output of program"