What do we consider Simple/Advanced/Complicated things to fix on a machine and how to tell the asker?

Question

I think we all had this issue in the last years:

As we learn and grow our own knowledge, things we once considered hard become easy.

Now, our answers often address issues that are pretty easy to fix by tweaking simple things like...

• leveling the bed
• fixing the settings in the slicer
• replacing a broken endstop for a new part
• correct replacement nozzle
• pretty 2/3rd of the questions in troubleshooting

At other times, we clearly go into advanced repairs and fixes, for example:

• flashing firmware
• small alterations of the firmware
• installing new capabilities to a printer
• most of the remaining 1/3rd of troubleshooting, usually for the points above

And then there are at times rather complicated things, for example:

• sifting through the firmware to find when one function is actually called
• the remaining troubleshooting turns out the be this, because of the oddity of the problem.

Call

Let us make a rough guideline what rough level of expertise we expect from a common user and how to address the required level of details in answers!

Answer 1

I like the points raised in this question as well as the ordering/organisation of the fixes/tasks, but it would really depend on the user and where they are coming from (as @0scar says "the level of expertise of the tinkerer").

As a case in point, (as well as playing devil's advocate) seeing as I still (rather embarrassingly) haven't got around to actually finish building any physical printer, but I have extensively rummaged around in the various firmware out there (as well as coming from an programming/Arduino background), currently I'd, rather ironically, find the advanced and complicated fixes easier to do than the simple things that you listed.

However, I know that I'm not representative of the average just-bought-a-printer-and-now-have-a-problem type user and for those users, your list and ordering probably makes much more sense. The ordering would also be equally valid for a printer-builder user, as they are for a straight-out-of-the-box user, I guess.

However, I don't know if we can expect any user of the site to have any particular certain level of expertise. I guess that can only be ascertained by the reading of their question and how they answer any follow up questions that might get raised, in the comments. Only thereafter could any answers be tailored to best match their level of understanding.

So, I guess what I'm saying is that a guideline would be good/interesting/cool to have, be what happens if a certain user doesn't have that rough level of expertise which is expected? We would still have to play it by ear, as we have been doing so, I think is the answer.

Does that make sense, or did I go off at a tangent or miss the point completely?

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As an afterthought, I guess that the new knowledgebase tag would/could also play a part here too, inasmuch as we could point users to questions/answers that deal with well-trodden paths to fix such common/simple/basic tasks.