I tend to agree - as the author/maintainer of a few fairly popular modules (mainly because they allow you to connect to MS-SQL server from non-MS platforms via a non-standard/Open Source library package) I get quite a few requests for information. Usually it's about some incompatibility between my code and the library (FreeTDS), and in almost all cases the problem has been solved, and the answer has been given multiple times on various mailing lists or newsgroups.

I try to always answer the question politely, and also point the user at the tools that would have answered the question directly (www.google.com and groups.google.com, usually).

That way the user will get his/her answer, and may try a search next time s/he has a problem...

Michael