I once went out of my way to help someone with Mac. They were so Mac
centric they did not realize that they were not giving us the right information to help them, but this was not obvious until later in the thread. I made some comment about Linux - next moment they were accusing
everyone of not helping them properly because they were using a Mac, as
though we had been deliberately discriminating against them!
I hear ya. I do the same thing setting up a Linux VM to try to help someone on Ubuntu or CentOS. My main point was if you don't have anything helpful to say, don't say anything at all.
I recall someone posting something earlier about on the lists we should have a section like:
HELP US HELP YOU
That details the information anyone having a problem should provide to make it easy for others to help them. Can't find that item on mailing list.
Maybe I'm out of sync with everyone else, but, I think of list- and IRC guidelines as distinctly separate from a code of conduct. I see a code of conduct as a legal document that allows the community to protect itself (and individuals its individuals) from illegal and possibly predatory behavior. Guidelines for posting: "don't top post, don't paste 500 lines in to IRC etc... " are things that could get the community to ignore you, but not necessarily cause them to participate in a legal showdown directly or as a 'third-party'.
ISTM that if we develop a code of conduct, it would need to be designed to insulate the community and individuals within it from becoming targets of legal action. "Mike said I was bad at postgres, it hurt my consulting and I want to sue Joe for replying-all and upping the hit-count on google... "