Hi all,
I write and publish a software library called DataTables - a plug-in for DataTables that simple adds controls for developers over HTML tables. I’ve been fortunate enough (and bloody minded enough :-)) to be able to turn this into a full time business. That’s the background.
DataTables has a very active forum with 40+ new threads a day asking for help. Primarily that comes from me (solo founder), and recently the support requests just seem to have gone through the roof. So much so that I’m simply not getting any time to develop the software (I should point out that most of these are free support). Personally, I’m reaching a bit of a breaking point with it - I love being able to help, but I want to develop the software and therefore the business more.
So I’m planning on running a few experiments to see if I can reduce the load. My biggest concern with me reducing my support time is the forum being full of unanswered questions and lots of “why no answer” type threads and that putting others off from using the software, or buying the commercial add-on.
First experiment I’m planning on running is doing 1 hour of free support a day with a nice big timer saying “Developer support time for community support remaining today: 45min (what is this?)” (with a link explaining).
Another is simply not answering any questions that don’t provide a test case showing the problem.
Does anyone else have any thoughts or suggestions?
Regards,
Allan