Printable View
While that attitude from users sure keeps a large industry gainfully employed I will say people should at least gain a basic understanding... lets just say a large number of tech support calls after a big summer microburst is "Is my cable out the screen says no signal" They had a power flicker and they did not know they had to turn the computer back on.Quote:
Originally Posted by Schezar
Quote:
E.g. you are in a co-dependent relationship with your miscreants here.
You do realize we only share the funny stories right?
These are the truth:
http://i.imgur.com/VHwPoV9.png
And I'll add two more states of depression/elation:
Circle of Hell 3, indeterminate exit of SNAFU: http://i.imgur.com/gKVzIL3.png
Survival of Hell 3 leads to Hell 0: http://i.imgur.com/gcPT2D6.png
But in an entropic system, fall from grace is inescapable leading to Hell 1:
"I have no idea what I am doing."
Escaping from Hell 1 leads to Hell 2:
"I am a a God."
It is impossible to go through the Hell levels out of order, no exceptions.
"Hey Melcar! I was working on Server04 the other day, and now I can't find the Server2012 DVD. Did you do anything with it?"
Nope.
"Well it's not in Server04's DVD drive".
walk back to server room -- "See it's empty".
That's Server03. - This one's Server04. and TADA! DVD right where you left it. You're welcome.
---- 20 minutes later. "Server04 wasn't doing what I wanted it to so I rebooted it. But I couldn't find it on the KVM, I could only find Server03 -- so I just held the power button in on Server04 - but how do I get the KVM to come up to Server04"
all you have to do is push the button on the KVM. It's this button, 1 button away from Server03.
"Well I did push the button and the screen was black!"
Yeah, did you wiggle the mouse to wake it up?
Also, you could have restarted Server04 through Remote desktop
---------------------
Staff Member to Other Tech: We did a Interview over in the interview room with Law enforcement on this date/time -- could you assist us with burning some DVD's?
Other Tech to me and boss: Can't find the interview on the DVR on that date.
Me: I can what's your problem?
Boss: Maybe the DVR's date/time is wrong?
Me: The Date time of the DVR is synced to our NTP server.
OT: Oh, I was looking at the wrong month.
Me to boss: Unfortunately I can't sync other Tech's brain through NTP.
Good. It shouldn't be. You should put things away when you're done with them so other staff members don't have to go on a disc-hunt or waste a blank to burn an .iso file.Quote:
Originally Posted by Melcar
*twitch*
*double twitch*Quote:
Originally Posted by Melcar
I appreciate that you're not pressing buttons willy-nilly, Staff Member, but PLEASE learn how to use a kvm.
Oh man, sometimes it's SO hard to be professional with people like that.
I worked for an MIS once who used to leave TONS of CD's *complete with VL keycodes written on them* just LAYING AROUND at client sites.
3 Years later, after a voluntary audit turned up about five times the number of XP SP 2 copies we'd purchased in use *somewhere* he said "we should stop keeping those codes with the CD's".
Uhhh, way ahead of you, chief. The rest of have a password protected file on our laptops, a copy on our usb keys, and another mailed to our e-mail accounts in a folder. We carry blank cd's but we haven't had to use one in ages because...those spindles over there? Those are our growing collections of things with your name and the keys on them that we retrieve every time we go somewhere and find them.
He just hung his head in shame and headed back to his office, coming out later to thank us for picking them up.
Thankfully, he was aware that he was a major offender, he just didn't know we'd been cleaning up after him for months and just silently shaking our heads at that one particular quirk of his absentmindedness.
He took a while to get used to but we all know that if we'd asked him to stop leaving CD's with Keys on them everywhere before *HE* brought it up, he'd blow up about how back then he was always dashing from site to site and didn't always have TIME to check that he'd ejected discs. (which was bullshit because we all did it, but we knew his temper better than he did.)
I should add that MOST of them were SQL Server or Windows Server codes, with the occasional copy of Visual Studio and a ton of MS Office for Access licensing, but the only ones most people cared about running off with at client sites were free copies of XP and Office, and mostly XP.
You might want to consider getting that looked at...Quote:
*double twitch*
Just need more potassium.Quote:
Originally Posted by Melcar
Went into a Five Below store today. (Basically like a dollar store, but everything under $5)
Woman walks up to the register and hands the cashier her phone, and a stack of packaged cell phone cases that the store sells.
Woman: "You need to tell me if this'll fit my phone."
Cashier: "What kind of phone is it, ma'am?"
The phone is already in a case.
Woman: "You need to tell me, and tell me if one of them will fit."
Cashier: "Lady, you bought the phone, not me."
I wanted to high-five the cashier.
"So, I exported the database to a csv for the reporting team."
"Uhhhhh, okay? What are they going to do with it?"
"They said they wanted to run some stats on it. Stuff like gross sales, average inventory age, you know. But they keep telling me they can't open the file. Excel keeps crashing."
"Didn't we have like... twenty million records in the primary table like three months ago? Did we finally throw out all the dead records?"
"Oh, I don't know anything about it."
"How big is the csv?"
"22 gigs. Do you think it's corrupted?"
"I think opening a 22 gig csv in any program is probably going to be bad idea."
Oh god - that reminds me of one time way back in the late 90's in the Air Force - Don't remember if it was Win95 or 98 -- our Tech orders (manuals for EVERYTHING) had changes that came out, they distributed it as a single text file that was several hundred mb in size.Quote:
"22 gigs. Do you think it's corrupted?"
"I think opening a 22 gig csv in any program is probably going to be bad idea."
I was finally able to open this file by dramatically increasing the size of the Windows swap file.
----
hmmm, bet you could open that 22 gig CSV by throwing in a SSD and dropping a 50gb swap file on it. :evil:
I think a 22gb anything not a video or audio file being opened in one shot like that will choke a computer.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ikeya
My computer makes moaning sounds if I try to choke it.Quote:
Originally Posted by FilanFyretracker
If it's still making noise that means you're not choking hard enough.Quote:
My computer makes moaning sounds if I try to choke it.
There is a politically incorrect joke I could make but I will resist.Quote:
Originally Posted by Schezar
Tech: These instructions don't work.
Me: ???? Ok, what are you trying to do?
Tech: Moron wants to change his voicemail greeting - and we're following these instructions and they don't work.
Me: They work perfectly fine - Dial voicemail phone number enter passcode when prompted, Dial 3 like instructions & voice prompt says for user options, dial 1 to change greeting, (again like both printed instructions and voice prompts say.)
see watch! puts phone on speaker dials number, enters passcode... you have 32,767 new voicemails, press 1 to listen to new voicemails, press 2 for other options, press 3 for User options.
(3)
To change your greeting press 1!
See just like instructions!
Tech: Ok.
5 minutes later.
Tech: These instructions don't work!
Me: I just showed you they did.
Tech: Well they don't work on mine either! Come watch.
dials voicemail phone number --- (enters system default passcode from 8 years ago). That was an invalid entry..... Please re-enter.
Tech: See Instructions don't work!
Me: .................................................. .......................................And That's when I shot her your Honor.
I'd hate to say it, but your tech is right! They Don't work! (For stupid)
Ok folks, boss is on vacation - so I forwarded his desk phone to "main" office number. So if you answer it, and somebody wants to leave a voicemail for him you must use the Transfer to Voicemail function. -- If you use the cnf/trn function it will just come right back to "main office extension". Ok?
great sure...
Tech on phone: "Sure let me transfer you to his voicemail." -- Main office starts ringing. "Teeeheee ooops... I screwed it up, Melcar how do I do this again?"
Melcar: Press Transfer to Voicemail, dial 3 digit extention Press Pound"
Tech: "But that's what I always do".
Melcar: Well, if you already follow the procedure daily what's the problem?
Tech: "You confused me by telling me to do what I always do".
Melcar: Right, well, if that's what you always do then carry on procedure has not changed.
Tech: "but you said..."
Melcar: /sigh
One of my problem users sent me an IM.
PU: We got a secure file transmittal email from a customer
Me: Okay
PU: What's the password?
Me: Have we received files from the customer before? You can find that out in the call tracking system under their profile page.
PU: I've only been handling the email box since lunch time for this week
Me: Okay... but if you look at the customer's profile (or give me their info so I can do it) I can tell you if they've sent us similar emails before, because typically we try to keep the passwords complicated and hidden
PU: It's the first email I responded to today
Me: Okay... what's their account information?
PU: They sent a file, I need their password
Me: I need their account information
PU: I need their password
Me: Make one up and write it down
PU: Make what up?
I've got an internet cafe that I wired electrical for over at my main building.
I put in my two cents that the windows administrator accounts should not be the primary means of entry, in fact, I configured user accounts that were essentially guests so that no one would do anything stupid. I locked out all software installs, etc from the user accounts.
About 3 weeks in, the manager called me and asked for me to change everything over to administrator because they were having problems with printing. I made a suggestion that I could install the drivers that would be capable of doing it, and the manager said she just wanted everything to be easy for the users.
I said that I didn't think it was a good idea, but i could do that, explained that there would be shit loads of terrible software that would come up installed on them and it would be a nightmare as soon as the two computers became unusable.
about 6 months ago the first problems occurred. People were installing software with toolbars onto the computers.
about a month ago, I started noticing porn pop up, as well as the pop-ups with obnoxious Audio saying, "YOUR PORN IS A VIRUS!" And the like.
That all being said, I don't want to have anything to do with it. I'm not paid to be the IT guy. I chose not to pursue the career of an IT guy, because like you guys, I don't like users, and no amount of money you could pay me would make me feel remotely okay with the idea of fixing others mistakes when it comes to software. (I can rip a pipe out of a wall, but dealing with software uninstalling is a painfully boring process for me, and I don't ever have the luxury of sticking 8 PCs in one room in order to work on all 8 at once. I have to do it as a case by case basis, and I don't have time for that).
From fixing family computers, to these silly, preventable work dilemmas, I don't have time for it.
I fix my cars, not because I want to be an auto mechanic, but because I don't like paying someone to do what I can do myself.
I build my own furniture, not because I want to be a carpenter, but because I don't like paying for a lesser product made out of particle boards, even though it is more expensive to do the same thing myself.
I fix my computers and optimize them, not because I enjoy working on them, but because I have a specific task that I have in mind, and because I need to optimize what I am using them for.
This thread is the perfect argument for why I have no desire to be everyone else's IT guy.
YOU guys get paid for it. YOU guys have a salary, a commission, and a particular rate of pay for how you will be compensated for it.
ME fixing someone ELSE'S mistake is NOT changing the tire in the car that I was in on my way to Disneyland because I chose to carpool. ME fixing other's problems is they not heeding my advice to make backup disks, and make a drive account, and backup their critical data.
THEY complaining about their computer's misfortune is THEIR misfortune, and will NEVER be understood, because they choose not to understand.
I Can show someone where water comes out of a pressurized pipe in the form of a spray, and how a drip from their garbage disposal is simply a drain. But as soon as "water coming out of the sink" becomes a phrase that I hear, I know that they have no idea what they are talking about, just as much as the know-it-all smart-ass who is telling me about the water at his Silicon Valley condo tastes like crystal pussy juice compared to the gruel that comes out of the pipe's in this god forsaken town because his brita water filter is making all the difference, because the particulate meter says so.
Riiiiiiight.
Stupid rant, but this is mostly just a word of respect for you guys who actually get paid to deal with this bullshit day in and day out, and how someone who doesn't can hardly tolerate getting the same shit you do every single fucking day only once every six months because someone worked up the courage to ask me.
You guys on the other hand have to deal with, "Hey, can you tell me how to fix my home computer too?"
I can hear some of your stomachs groan.