Apache environment strangeness

[Paul Lussier]

Dan Coutu <coutu at snowy-owl.com> writes:

> I'm with Jim on this one. I came up with thousands of Google results and
> nothing in the first 100 or so addressed the issue. None of those links
> was the link above.

I think one of the most important techniques to using google
effectively is understand that the links it returns are often just
better indicators of where else to look rather than links which
actually contain the answer you're looking for.

As I just stated in my reply to Jim's e-mail (which you probably
haven't seen yet :) Google didn't actually return the link I posted.
It told me that I wanted to search in Apache's documentation.

Now, had I (or you) been *really, really* smart, we would have typed
this into google's search:

 'why isn't REMOTE_USER set'

And, check out what the first link is?  Look familiar?

So, maybe the real process should be:

 1. Ask google the exact question you want answered (as above)
 2. Search for very explicit terms most likely to be in your answer
    (which may be redundant with #1 :)
 3. Search the documentation
 4. Ask a list

In 99% of all questions asked on this list[1], my impression is that a
lot of people aren't specific enough with their google queries to the
point where when I go to google for it, I usually come up with a link
right away.  My rule of thumb is:

  If it's not on the first page of google results, my query wasn't
  specific enough.

If I don't see it[3] right away, I change my query or go elsewhere.

> Thanks Paul!

No problem :)

> BTW, I still haven't seen your original email, only Jim's reply to it
> (which fortunately included it.)

Hmm, interesting.  Here are the headers from my original e-mail:

  From: Paul Lussier <p.lussier at comcast.net>
  Subject: Re: Apache environment strangeness
  To: Dan Coutu <coutu at snowy-owl.com>
  Cc: GNHLUG mailing list <gnhlug-discuss at mail.gnhlug.org>
  Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2007 10:44:10 -0400

So, it was sent directly to you and Cc'ed to the list.

-- 
Seeya,
Paul

Footnotes:
----------
[1] Anecdotal statistic[2] made up on the spot to impress everyone here
    with how well I keep track of all the questions sent to this list :)
[2] Insert what Ben says about statistics here.

[3] "It" being whatever I'm looking for, which is often not entirely
    quantifiable.  The phrase "I'll know it when I see it" often
    applies.  I.e. I don't know what answer I'm looking for, or what
    the answer will look like, but I'll know whether or not I found it
    on that first page of results.  In this case, the links returned
    were not "it" in and of themselves, but pointed to "it" via
    references to the Apache docs.