Agreed, now that I'm the person getting these questions, it's hard to reconcile "it would have saved me a ton of time when I was new to this codebase" with "why can't you do even a basic amount of due diligence to even figure out what you're trying to do". (As I mentioned -- it's still important to figure out what the right question is!)
It's hard to find the right balance, and I agree with the author's framing of it as a spectrum, but I also agree that I at least (and most junior engineers, in my experience) leaned way too far on the side of being, um, self-motivated.
I certainly do notice myself getting frustrated by people asking questions when IMO they should know better, and I'm never sure whether I should be more lenient there or if I should tell them off for not putting in that tiny bit of effort.
It's hard to find the right balance, and I agree with the author's framing of it as a spectrum, but I also agree that I at least (and most junior engineers, in my experience) leaned way too far on the side of being, um, self-motivated.
I certainly do notice myself getting frustrated by people asking questions when IMO they should know better, and I'm never sure whether I should be more lenient there or if I should tell them off for not putting in that tiny bit of effort.