Merrillee

 My Wikibooks talk

A little bit about me

I originally registered with wikibooks as a reader. I was interested in computer graphics, and 3d art, and wanted to learn more about using the available software. As a reader I love wiki, wikipedia, wikibooks etc. I read a lot, and explored more than just the wikibooks books I'd originally been looking for. I learned a lot about the software I'd wanted to use, enjoyed using it and wanted to help other beginners learn it to.

I soon discovered that one of the text books I was interested in contained language errors that made the lessons very difficult to understand or follow. To make matters worse, much of the information was horribly outdated, and just plain wrong. It had been correct when it was written, but as the software had changed, the wikibook had not kept pace. I began to think maybe I could help to make it better.

I had already been a wikibooks member for a little while by then,but had not investigated becoming a contributor, editor, or author. I made a few small edits to the text, timidly, and no doubt made as many mistakes as I corrected. It should have been a fairly easy transition, and might have been for many people. ...but for me it wasn't easy.

Attempting to contact the authors and editors who might have been actively working on the book at the time was something I didn't know how to do. I tried, and searched the history of the book edits as well as I could, but reaching other wikibook members to ask if they objected to changes in their work was , once again, something I didn't know how to do. I was afraid of making mistakes. I didn't want to be the pestering newcomer, persisting in my attempts to get started on the work I wanted to do by continually attempting to get some response from experienced wikians who just didn't have the time to spare.

If I'd had the help links I've recently noticed that most new users seem to have, on their talk pages, I must have deleted mine somehow, and couldnt figure out how to get them back. The help topics I could find, like "how to use wikibooks" were long. Pages didn't link to one another in a way I could recognize to navigate from page 1 to page 2, and so on.

Wikibooks authoring and editing was quickly turning out to be an overwhelming, daunting and confusing process. I did attempt to let more experienced wikibooks users know I needed help, but I didn't know how to do even that. That would have required knowing where to ask my question, separating it properly from the rest of the discussion, possibly giving it a title like “Help! How can I contact this author?!” and signing my question. I didn't and dont yet know how to do that properly. Eventually I gave up in frustration and decided that my love for wikibooks would have to be confined to reading.

However ( yes , you knew this was coming.)

Now I am once again active in learning about an open source software that I enjoy. Like before I'm just a user and supporter, and like before I want to share my enjoyment with newer users, and help their process of learning go a little smoother.

So, here I am, back at wikibooks again. I'm reading the “how to use wikibooks” and wikitext books again. It's all still very complicated and confusing. I don't use markup languages of any kind. I'm not a programmer, or a web admin. For me, trying to contribute even in a small way will mean a lot of study, practice and learning.

Please be patient.

--Merrillee (discuss • contribs) 22:31, 29 January 2013 (UTC)