I don’t think the time sink is that significant with many tools, especially since you can take existing projects and change them. And it’s fun to hack!
replyIt is significant if you don't want to sit at a computer all day just to MAYBE get basic functionality, then find you've backed yourself into a corner because you didn't know some esoteric detail and have to spend another day doing a refactor, etc etc
replyI don't want to sift through docs and man pages and debug cryptic compiler and runtime errors in my spare time.
There are far richer things for me to do with my life.
I want to use my computer to get my tasks done and be done with it. Slogging through technical details an LLM could crush in minutes is a much better use of my resources.
You might find it fun to hack. Others don't.
replyAlso I don't want to take someone's existing project and change it. They have too much cruft and don't work Just The Way I Like It.
That's why we create custom stuff from scratch.