> ... big picture view of how things actually work and fit together instead of the twisted ways I may have come up with. I can seldom find anyone with this ans

> ... big picture view of how things actually work and fit together instead of the twisted ways I may have come up with. I can seldom find anyone with this answer at work. It requires that I read up on the tech/product being used, then exploring the repository for the configuration and code, asking six or seven people who have committed recently for their perspectives on why we're not doing what's in the docs (they don't know, they just followed the pattern and have no idea where other parts of a system rely on this particular thing...) Ultimately I discover that the diagrams on the wiki are outdated by several years, so, in text on that page, I note the differences. Then I discover that one of the first people I talked to were indeed The Subject Matter Expert who just can't be bothered to explain (or can't admit they don't know...)