I find myself really appreciating what LLMs can do when it comes to help with software and tech support. I am a pretty adept PC power user who is not a programmer and (until recently) has only had a modest amount of experience with GNU/Linux. However, I have started to get into self-hosting my own FOSS apps and servers (started with OpenWebUI, now Jellyfin/Sonarr via Docker compose etc). I’m also reading a book about the Linux command line and trying to decipher the wold of black magic that is networking etc myself.
I have found that LLMs can really help with comprehension and troubleshooting. That said, lately I am struggling to get good troubleshooting advice out of my LLMs. Specifically, for troubleshooting docker container setups and networking issues.
I had been using Qwen3 Coder 480b, but tried out Claude Sonnet 4 recently and both have let me down a bit. They don’t seem to think systematically when offering troubleshooting tips (Qwen at least). I was hoping Claude would be better since it is an order of magnitude more expensive on OpenRouter, but so far it has not seemed so.
So, what LLM do you use for this type of work? Any other tips for using models as a resource for troubleshooting? I have been providing access to full logs etc and being as detailed as possible and still struggling to get good advice lately. I’m not talking full vibe coding here but just trying to figure out why my docker container is throwing errors etc. Thanks!
Note: I did search and found a somewhat similar post from 6 months ago or so but it wasn’t quite as specific and because 6 months is half a lifetime in LLM development, I figured I’d post as well. Here’s the post in question in case anyone is curious to see that one.
As someone who didn’t start listening to the pod until around 2020 and basically doesn’t listen anymore except once in a blue moon when they have an interesting guest (honestly the loss of Matt was huge) I’d love a best hits list of Christman takes. Also how are his books and the spinoff pod with him and Chris?
I did watch a handful of the cushvlog videos back in the day as well which were entertainingly impromptu and unhinged..