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Office Hours

Self-paced doesn't have to mean alone. Office Hours are a recurring live call where you bring a stuck lab, a half-working detection, or a "is this the right approach?" question — and work through it with a maintainer, a mentor, and other learners on the same track.

They run in the 🎙 Office Hours voice channel on the Plaintext Discord. Everything happens there: screen-share for the hard parts, the #labs-and-docker and *-help forums for the threads that outlive the call.

How it works

  • Open format. No fixed lecture. We triage what people bring — env that won't make up, a Vulhub container exiting, a detection that won't fire, a capstone you want a second opinion on.
  • Bring a specific question. "It doesn't work" gets "what doesn't?" Have the module/lab, the exact command and full error, and your OS/Docker version ready — same ask as the help forums.
  • Screen-share encouraged. Most lab problems are five minutes once we can see the terminal.
  • It stays searchable. Anything broadly useful gets written up in the matching *-help forum afterward so the next person finds it without needing the call.

Schedule

Cadence is being set with the first cohorts — placeholder below

We're not publishing a fixed time we can't yet honor. The schedule lands in #announcements on Discord once a regular slot is set; react 🎙 on the announcements seed post to vote for a weekly call. Until then, treat the rows below as the template.

When Focus Host Where
(e.g. Weekly · Thu 18:00 UTC) (open triage / rotating track) (maintainer or mentor handle) 🎙 Office Hours (Discord voice)
(ad-hoc, announced in #announcements) (capstone reviews) (maintainer) 🎙 Office Hours

Times will be posted in UTC with a converter link, since learners span time zones. If demand clusters in another region, we'll add a second slot rather than force one time on everyone.

Between sessions

Office Hours are the live layer on top of the always-on community — they don't replace it:

  • Async help: the per-track *-help forums and #labs-and-docker (the busiest channel). One question = one post, mark it ✅ Solved when sorted.
  • Study Rooms & Co-working: the 📚 Study Room and 🧑‍💻 Co-working voice channels are open any time — grab a peer and pair on a lab without waiting for a scheduled call.
  • Show your work: post finished capstones and phase projects in #wins, and they may land on the Showcase.

Hosting an Office Hours (mentors)

If you're a @Mentor or @Maintainer and want to run a session, see the Instructor & Cohort Guide — it covers pacing, scaffolding a question, and how to review phase projects and capstones without just handing over the answer.

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