Well, that didn't work: Getting Help

When things dont work, it may be frustrating.

Believe me, its hard to not get frustrated after your tester gets pissed at you for sending them the 17th broken build.

The following are a few resources to get help. Also ensure to ask fellow maintainers of your device and the maintainers of your rom in their support group.

When asking for help, ensure you follow general etiquette and chat rules.

If you think the issue is device/device tree related, ask fellow device maintainers. They may have faced a similar issue in the past.

If you think that this is not a device bug but is a ROM side bug, make sure to ask the maintainers in their support group (NOT VIA DM!)

Else, consult the communities below

Crave.io Community

  • Discord(Crave Only)
  • Telegram(ROM Builders telegram, you can ask general questions here too)

Other Useful Communities

Telegram

Web

Discord

General Etiquette

Also check out RFC 1855 - Netiquette Guidelines

Because these are 3rd party chat groups, remember to follow these while/before asking for help:

  • Be respectful
    • Be nice to people and don't start needless drama or fights
    • Do not spam chats or DMs. Try to give details in a clear, concise manner that's respectful to the other person who is interested in helping you.
    • Try to follow instructions and ask questions instead of ignoring someone who's trying to help you and pinging someone else
    • Respect People's work, no matter how small and insignificant or how big and impactful
    • Respect the Terms, Agreements and Licenses attached to someone's work. Don't "kang" works without permission and if you used someone's work, credit them as it is good courtesy(as per the license too)
  • Do some research
    • Show the person that you have atleast tried to fix the problem.
    • Accepted:
      • "Hey, I faced this issue, does anyone know how to solve it? My sources have x and the sources have y"
      • "Does anyone have any idea why this happens? I checked popular gerrits, telegram chats and checked around the source"
    • Bad:
      • "log.url/paste/asdf.txt @sounddrill me get error"
  • Give list of relevant device sources and info when needed
    • Also try to explain what you've tried to do/are trying to do
    • Stuff like chipset, and specifics on camera, display, audio, storage, etc if needed
    • Give links to device sources like device trees, kernel sources, proprietary blobs, any external repos, etc if you think they're relevant to the problem.
    • Try to always link device trees and kernel sources
    • If you synced using Local Manifests or used a Build/Sync script, it would help to link it as long as you still link the other repos seperately
    • Be respectful for the other person's time, effort, and energy.
    • If it takes them more than a few short clicks to get to the problem point, you're doing something wrong.
  • Share minimal(like out/error.log file) logs in a convenient form like a hastebin/pastebin link and try to give full logs as well, if the community allows it
  • Read the notes(
    /notes
    , almost all telegram groups have important things mentioned here)
    • Don't forget to read and abide by the community's rules.
  • Do not DM people without consent