Getting help or technical support with FOSS can be a strange and new experience. Some programs might not come with complete help files. Or, the Help files might be stored online in Wikipedia-like "community documentations" - it's the community of users and developers who write the Help articles as they come across problems.

More often, though, a FOSS product has an online forum or bulletin board, where members can post questions for more experienced users to answer. What makes that so great?

Traditional tech support can make you wait for several business days before you get your answers. On forums, questions can receive multiple answers within the hour, as people are constantly online and checking the boards.

Traditional tech support can charge you fees. On forums, answers are free.

Traditional tech support might make you interact with unfriendly agents, or worse, machines. On forums, not only do you write to fellow users who like helping each other, but you can sometimes speak to the developers themselves, too! And the interaction doesn't have to end when the problems are solved; forums are often where personal friendships between users are made.