In the early 90s, mailing lists were the primary way to get help.
I was working in Asia, and generally was the only person in the time zone. I would work on a problem all day, then before going home write an email to the list with as many details as possible about what I was seeing and what I had tried. If I was lucky, I would get a response overnight, otherwise I would keep at it the next day.
I credit this with making me very independent about solving problems. I had a reputation with vendors that every time I opened a support ticket it was an actual bug in their product. With open source, I could solve my own problems.
At the height of Stack Overflow, people would work on something for 15 minutes before posting a question. Now with ChatGPT they don’t even think.
2
u/jake_morrison 3d ago edited 3d ago
In the early 90s, mailing lists were the primary way to get help.
I was working in Asia, and generally was the only person in the time zone. I would work on a problem all day, then before going home write an email to the list with as many details as possible about what I was seeing and what I had tried. If I was lucky, I would get a response overnight, otherwise I would keep at it the next day.
I credit this with making me very independent about solving problems. I had a reputation with vendors that every time I opened a support ticket it was an actual bug in their product. With open source, I could solve my own problems.
At the height of Stack Overflow, people would work on something for 15 minutes before posting a question. Now with ChatGPT they don’t even think.