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by 13of40 3055 days ago
> I'm pretty sure 90% of us would just look for a Stack Exchange question

When you're starting from scratch, I think the bigger barrier isn't "where do I store this data", it's "what the hell is data"? Try to explain to a computer illiterate person that the latest Mariah Carey CD is just a really big number and you'll get a glimpse of this. The person who knows they can jump on Stack Exchange is already past the worst part of the learning curve.
2 comments
mooreds 3054 days ago
> When you're starting from scratch

And other times. I've been working in software for almost two decades. I ran into a particular data problem that I could describe but didn't know the name of (a la wizard of earthsea). So I couldn't search to see how others had tackled this.

Google and blogs and YouTube and stackoverflow have pushed the boundaries of knowledge. You don't need to know exactly how to do something (for many kinds of tasks) but you do need to know what it is called, and how to adapt what you find on the net to your situation.

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tracker1 3054 days ago
You haven't seen some of the really generalized questions that come up on stack exchange then. ;-)

That said, it's often a great resource.

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