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Rails Hotline (live phone help with RoR)

railshotline.com

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Re: Rails Hotline (live phone help with RoR)

#41

Post by patja »

_chap wrote: post #37
GavinB wrote: post #13

It does seem like this would be a lot easier if there were also chat (or even if it were chat-only). If you're talking about code, it would be really helpful to be able to paste in snippets or links to resources.

Agreed, some questions are more easily answered through chat and #RubyOnRails on freenode is a great place to get help. However, I think the cool part is that it's not text. Personally I've find it to be really helpful when I'm stuck just to talk through the problem with somebody else. Often just the act of vocalizing dislodges the log jam.

"Often just the act of vocalizing dislodges the log jam."

Got my next product idea: mashup of SAM and Eliza as a developer help line

Re: Rails Hotline (live phone help with RoR)

#42

Post by davidw »

stevefink wrote: post #18
michaeldhopkins wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It better be free so long as they're not picking up the damn phone. :)

I'm assuming they're getting overwhelmed with traffic after being linked here and other high traffic properties. With only two volunteers on staff, there's only so much you can do. I am sure they are rapidly going to look into adding volunteers if the volume stays persistent (and/or hopefully grows even larger).

Perhaps raising the price would help keep demand from outstripping supply?

Re: Rails Hotline (live phone help with RoR)

#43

Post by Ygor »

_chap wrote: post #37
GavinB wrote: post #13

It does seem like this would be a lot easier if there were also chat (or even if it were chat-only). If you're talking about code, it would be really helpful to be able to paste in snippets or links to resources.

Agreed, some questions are more easily answered through chat and #RubyOnRails on freenode is a great place to get help. However, I think the cool part is that it's not text. Personally I've find it to be really helpful when I'm stuck just to talk through the problem with somebody else. Often just the act of vocalizing dislodges the log jam.

"Often just the act of vocalizing dislodges the log jam."

Hence the rubber duck debugging method:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber_duck_debugging

Re: Rails Hotline (live phone help with RoR)

#46

Post by rhizome »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #28
_chap wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to make that more clear on the site, we don't entend the volunteers to get paid, but rather rewarded with discounts, early access, and recognition from the communities they help.

Ah, I see. The last item on http://www.pockethotline.com/ has a big dollar sign and starts with "The expert earns rewards", so yeah, more clear would help. Re-reading it, now I see that you meant the dollar sign to attach to "and you save money on support", which makes sense. As an aside, you may also want to make it more clear why your service works better than existing croudsourced support, such as community forums…

Maybe replace the dollar sign with a giftwrapped box.

Re: Rails Hotline (live phone help with RoR)

#47

Post by raywu »

_chap wrote: post #24
jat850 wrote: post #14

This is a neat idea and I commend you for the effort this has taken and will continue to take. I have some questions for you about how you perceive people using the service: How do you bridge the code-to-voice gap; that is, someone calling in with a question about coding and you have to describe something that requires a lot of code syntax. Do you pass that off to some sort of e-mail type discussion or screen-sharing…

Thanks! Obviously, some questions you're going to need to work through the code, so we can always move the conversation to text. So far lots of the calls have been about documentation and best practices which are pretty easy to talk through.

Agreed - maybe an Rails environment similar to http://tryruby.org/ for Ruby IRB?

Re: Rails Hotline (live phone help with RoR)

#48

Post by dsifry »

Just used the service and had a great chat with Chap, one of the founders. There's something qualitatively different when you're talking to someone using voice - it makes it easier to articulate some of the bigger questions that aren't just syntax or "help me debug this" type of questions. Anyway, I think this is a great idea, and love that these guys are making it happen. Kudos.

Re: Rails Hotline (live phone help with RoR)

#49

Post by dpkendal »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #34

Reading this and pockethotline.com, and thinking about your offer to help set up other community hotlines: what about a Founders Hotline? Call to talk to a real live business founder, whether to get some advice, get a recommendation or opinion for a particular service, bounce an idea or pitch off someone for feedback, or just get a different perspective. And the "experts" would get the benefit of hearing from some in…

The only issue I forsee with this is that such a hotline would get spammed up with idea-mongers who refuse to share anything without signing an NDA, and who equate a TechCrunch link with a guarantee long-term success.
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