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Is there some insane reason people use Pages on Macs, then can't figure out why nobody can open their files? I've had no fewer than two students at the desk today confused about why Word won't open their pages document.
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May 8, 2015 19:31
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m.hache posted:Depending on the title it could look great on a resume for a MC Fruit Stripe fucked around with this message at 19:34 on May 8, 2015 |
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May 8, 2015 19:31
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I tell people that I do mobile device management and they just kind shrug, smile politely and move on to other topics.
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May 8, 2015 19:38
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Neito posted:Is there some insane reason people use Pages on Macs, then can't figure out why nobody can open their files? I've had no fewer than two students at the desk today confused about why Word won't open their pages document. Pretty regularly. Or people can't open .DAT files.
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May 8, 2015 19:40
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flosofl posted:People are going to get the same response whether I couch it in niceness or just bluntly say "no". My time is valuable to me. There are times where I may help out with *close* friends and immediate family. But I am not their help desk. Hell, I bought my parents an iMac and my "how do I" and "why can't I" calls have dropped to zero. Why not just say "no"? I'm not even remotely suggesting you help people with their stupid computer problems. But just tell them no instead of finding passive-aggressive "nice" ways. ratbert90 posted:If I tell them " low level Linux firmware programmer" their eyes glaze over and we talk about beer or something else that isn't computers.  Imagine if people in other industries intentionally told you things that made your eyes glaze over instead of just being up-front with you about what they do and don't wanna do with their free time. Basically, don't wanna fix their computers? Great, I don't either. Tell them no. Not because your job is so obscure they don't understand or care what it is, but because you don't want to. What's so hard about this concept?
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May 8, 2015 19:41
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GargleBlaster posted:Depends on the size of the company. 80 staff 50 of which are computer users, 2 of us looking after IT. Escalation on this scale is "hey Tom, any idea on this?" and ticketing systems are considered overkill (I've tried. No one wants to know, users or management alike) I was recommended ZenDesk in another thread by Sickening and a few others. I would recommend it even if you just use it for yourself. I'm in a similar situation now with a small company that hasn't ever had a ticketing system beyond a generic IT email address. I just manually create tickets myself as needed ti help me keep track of things. Its proven useful already just to help me remember some things and I think it will be useful in the future for reporting. You just have to get in the habit of entering in incidents right away or writing them down and doing them in bulk later.
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May 8, 2015 19:43
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MC Fruit Stripe posted:My title is so wildly inflated from what I actually do that it's almost laughable at this point. I am a senior architect. My actual role is probably something akin to consultant - I don't do a lot, I'm basically the person the rest of the team comes to when they can't figure something out. My new senior architect title comes with no official recognition or money, but I'm free to call myself that, so, yay. (The point is, if you've seen my previous posts about title vs compensation, I do not care at all what you call me or what I can call myself, I just want all your money.) I'm an IT Director in title for a 1 person department. (me)
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May 8, 2015 19:55
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m.hache posted:I'm an IT Director in title for a 1 person department. (me) e: In fact, I kid, but this actually happened to me. I was the IT department of 1 at the job I held from 2007 to 2009. In mid 2009 they brought someone in above me. "Exsqueeze me? Baking powder? I thank you for the opportunity and wish this company all the best." e2: It's funny but you almost want to get it in writing - okay, I am the IT department of one. You understand that if you hire anyone else in IT, they work for me, right? MC Fruit Stripe fucked around with this message at 19:59 on May 8, 2015 |
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May 8, 2015 19:57
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MC Fruit Stripe posted:Fast forward 6 months when they decide to hire a second person, but they actually bring them in above you and have to throw a "VP of Data Services" title on him. m.hache be like "srsly?" Haha that's ridiculous. I'm about to  so I doubt I'll be in this situation.
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May 8, 2015 19:59
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Yeah I was pretty apoplectic (god what a word). I was the do everything guy as I mentioned, but it was a pretty small organization. The higher ups decided to grow it into a full IT department, so as a first step they hired an IT manager. I was like, look I know I'm 27 (at the time), but I'm your only IT guy, that makes me the manager. When it turned out I was wrong about that, it was time to move on.
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May 8, 2015 20:03
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MC Fruit Stripe posted:Yeah I was pretty apoplectic (god what a word). I was the do everything guy as I mentioned, but it was a pretty small organization. The higher ups decided to grow it into a full IT department, so as a first step they hired an IT manager. I was like, look I know I'm 27 (at the time), but I'm your only IT guy, that makes me the manager. When it turned out I was wrong about that, it was time to move on. In the end, this is what pisses me off most about the schedule change. New-hire support manager puts me on FNG hours.
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May 8, 2015 20:22
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evol262 posted:Imagine if people in other industries intentionally told you things that made your eyes glaze over instead of just being up-front with you about what they do and don't wanna do with their free time. Other people don't need me to because I'm not an asshat that asks for free help from my mechanic/electrician/plumbing/whatever buddies. If I'm working on something and they come up and offer, loving great, but I never, ever ask (or if I do, its "hey, how much will it cost to get you to do X?") But IT is in a weird spot, where everyone assumes that because you LOVE COMPUTERS you LOVE to fix them. I do work for family. I'll do a bit of work for family friends (for food/beer/a favor/etc.) But thankfully my parents always respected my skillset enough that they didn't pimp me out. Nowadays when I meet people and they ask? I do software support for a cloud-based CRM. If they ask me about fixing something? I give a few vague suggestions and tell the (honest) truth that I haven't done that kind of work for a few years and I'm not comfortable recommending/touching/doing it.
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May 8, 2015 20:23
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MC Fruit Stripe posted:Yeah I was pretty apoplectic (god what a word). I was the do everything guy as I mentioned, but it was a pretty small organization. The higher ups decided to grow it into a full IT department, so as a first step they hired an IT manager. I was like, look I know I'm 27 (at the time), but I'm your only IT guy, that makes me the manager. When it turned out I was wrong about that, it was time to move on. Not to pee in your wheaties or anything, but just because you are the most senior IT guy at a company doesn't make you a manager. This is no reflection on you at all, since I have no idea if you'd make a good manager or not. When I was a consultant, the company of ten people promoted the most senior engineer to be manager of the team (basically promoted to be over a team of me and one junior computer janitor) and while the guy was my best friend, he was an awful manager. He didn't know how to delegate, document, or actually project manager. He tried being a "cool friend manager" but ended up just being awful at it and causing me more work, since I just had to pick up the engineering work he didn't do now that he was promoted.
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May 8, 2015 20:24
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Siochain posted:Other people don't need me to because I'm not an asshat that asks for free help from my mechanic/electrician/plumbing/whatever buddies. If I'm working on something and they come up and offer, loving great, but I never, ever ask (or if I do, its "hey, how much will it cost to get you to do X?") Siochain posted:I do work for family. I'll do a bit of work for family friends (for food/beer/a favor/etc.) But thankfully my parents always respected my skillset enough that they didn't pimp me out. Siochain posted:Nowadays when I meet people and they ask? I do software support for a cloud-based CRM. If they ask me about fixing something? I give a few vague suggestions and tell the (honest) truth that I haven't done that kind of work for a few years and I'm not comfortable recommending/touching/doing it. Yes/no, do you think answers like "I'm a low level Linux firmware engineer", "I'm a database administrator", "I program missile guidance systems" are brush-off answers that everyone knows are brush-off answers? That's kind of the thing. You're still saying no. "I work with computers but I'm so specialized that I can't even relate to your problem and what I actually do is so technical it will bore you to death" is a passive-aggressive, dishonest, self-important answer that has nothing to do with the reality of their problem and why you don't want to fix it.
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May 8, 2015 20:42
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Japanese Dating Sim posted:People argue about the most mundane crap in these threads. It's Friday everyone. im leaving an office job and starting my first IT job on Monday and my coworkers bought me a 12 pack of beer for the weekend I'm gonna miss them 
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May 8, 2015 20:46
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evol262 posted:
Except that I really am a low level Linux firmware programmer, that's what I do; I write kernel code all day long. If somebody is going to ask me what I do, I am going to tell them what I do. indeed.
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May 8, 2015 20:53
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evol262 posted:Yes/no, do you think answers like "I'm a low level Linux firmware engineer", "I'm a database administrator", "I program missile guidance systems" are brush-off answers that everyone knows are brush-off answers? That's kind of the thing. You're still saying no. "I work with computers but I'm so specialized that I can't even relate to your problem and what I actually do is so technical it will bore you to death" is a passive-aggressive, dishonest, self-important answer that has nothing to do with the reality of their problem and why you don't want to fix it. If I did anything related to guided missiles you're goddamn right I would tell people my exact title as it related to them.
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May 8, 2015 20:56
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Inspector_666 posted:If I did anything related to guided missiles you're goddamn right I would tell people my exact title as it related to them. ratbert90 posted:Except that I really am a low level Linux firmware programmer, that's what I do; I write kernel code all day long. If somebody is going to ask me what I do, I am going to tell them what I do. I really am a Linux virtualization programmer, and if someone asks me what I do, I'll tell them. I won't tell them if they ask me to fix their computer. I'll just say "no".
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May 8, 2015 20:58
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Inspector_666 posted:If I did anything related to guided missiles you're goddamn right I would tell people my exact title as it related to them. No dude, you are supposed to tell everybody you work with computers and then get into a confrontation when they ask if you can look at a problem, instead of avoiding the situation all together by telling people what you actually do. evol262 posted:I really am a Linux virtualization programmer, and if someone asks me what I do, I'll tell them. I won't tell them if they ask me to fix their computer. I'll just say "no". As would I?  Are you trying to say that when I tell people my title it's bad, but when you tell people your title it's good?
FlapYoJacks fucked around with this message at 21:01 on May 8, 2015 |
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May 8, 2015 20:59
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Eonwe posted:im leaving an office job and starting my first IT job on Monday and my coworkers bought me a 12 pack of beer for the weekend Once you start the IT job best upgrade that to 12 bottles of hard liquor
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May 8, 2015 21:11
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ratbert90 posted:No dude, you are supposed to tell everybody you work with computers and then get into a confrontation when they ask if you can look at a problem, instead of avoiding the situation all together by telling people what you actually do. ratbert90 posted:As would I? Telling people what I do is also bad in context. Telling people what you do is good, in general. Telling people what you actually do in response to them talking about their computer is bad. They don't know what you do, what I do, or what 99% of the people in this thread do, and they don't care. It's context, right? If someone asks what I do, and I say "I do computer stuff, and unless you really want details, I won't elaborate", then they ask for details, telling them is good. If you say "I do computer stuff, and unless you really want details, I won't elaborate", then they start talking about their computer issues and you say "well, I really do this other thing you don't care about and don't understand and..." instead of redirecting the conversation in some other way, like "man, that sucks, have you thought about calling [geek squad|local tech shop|their nephew]" or whatever, it sounds a lot different. Telling people what you do: good. Telling people what you do as a conversational filibuster: bad.
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May 8, 2015 21:25
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evol262 posted:Saying "no" isn't a confrontation. What do you do: I'm a low level Linux firmware programmer, I make the things nobody get's excited about working to work; like the screen on your phone. That's the standard response I give to people.
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May 8, 2015 21:31
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I find the best standard response to tech support questions I get from people are my hourly rates. Frankly, if they willing to pay me that much to run malwarebytes on their computer, it's worth my time to humour them. Granted, my mother and grandmother get work for free, and my friends are usually pretty generous in offering payment before even asking a question, but it really trims down the requests from people I'm not close with. The other plus is sometimes people are willing to pay up, and it's pretty decent money for easy work at times. Orcs and Ostriches fucked around with this message at 21:55 on May 8, 2015 |
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May 8, 2015 21:52
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evol262 posted:Yes/no, do you think answers like "I'm a low level Linux firmware engineer", "I'm a database administrator", "I program missile guidance systems" are brush-off answers that everyone knows are brush-off answers? That's kind of the thing. You're still saying no. "I work with computers but I'm so specialized that I can't even relate to your problem and what I actually do is so technical it will bore you to death" is a passive-aggressive, dishonest, self-important answer that has nothing to do with the reality of their problem and why you don't want to fix it. You're REALLY overstating how self-aware a lot of these people are. As far as they're concerned the computer is a magical box that does poo poo for them, and you're a wizard. And every day you get to touch a computer is like a fun filled magical afternoon at Hogwarts. And they get super mad at you when you tell them "No". "Based on your description of the issue, it will take me 6-8 hours of arguing with this to get it fixed. If you bring the machine by, I can probably get it fixed in a month or so due to my schedule (drinking and loving around after work). If that's not a good timeframe, you can contact Joe Blowe's Computer Repair, he's a good guy and can get it fixed way cheaper than Best Buy could. He fixes my poo poo when it breaks." "I work with Linux at the office, I have no idea how to fix a windows machine, but Joe over at Joe Blowe's computer can, here's his number."
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May 8, 2015 22:02
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I give thanks every day that most of my friends are in IT, and if there's a problem they always call my buddy first - he enjoys tinkering and gets a kick out of helping people. Plus he's like the IT Buddha - nothing can crack his serenity (I've tried, but the fucker pisses me off instead).
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May 8, 2015 22:44
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I avoid this problem altogether, by not having any friends.
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May 8, 2015 23:42
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Methylethylaldehyde posted:"I work with Linux at the office, I have no idea how to fix a windows machine, but Joe over at Joe Blowe's computer can, here's his number." I have a wife and two kids, so I don't have time to CJ peoples stuff, but I have a friend that is single and enjoys doing it, so I just give them his number. Usually they pay him liquor or baked goods so everyone wins.
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May 9, 2015 00:15
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SIR FAT JONY IVES posted:I have a wife and two kids, so I don't have time to CJ peoples stuff, but I have a friend that is single and enjoys doing it, so I just give them his number. Usually they pay him liquor or baked goods so everyone wins. Pretty much this. He's like the me of 10 years ago, before burnout and alcohol-is-delicious were added to my daily vocabulary.
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May 9, 2015 00:18
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Methylethylaldehyde posted:You're REALLY overstating how self-aware a lot of these people are. As far as they're concerned the computer is a magical box that does poo poo for them, and you're a wizard. And every day you get to touch a computer is like a fun filled magical afternoon at Hogwarts. And they get super mad at you when you tell them "No". Methylethylaldehyde posted:"Based on your description of the issue, it will take me 6-8 hours of arguing with this to get it fixed. If you bring the machine by, I can probably get it fixed in a month or so due to my schedule (drinking and loving around after work). If that's not a good timeframe, you can contact Joe Blowe's Computer Repair, he's a good guy and can get it fixed way cheaper than Best Buy could. He fixes my poo poo when it breaks." People in general also have no idea what Linux is. When I meet people who have heard of Linux, they think it's some kind of program that runs on a computer (which is Windows by default, because Windows == computer). It's not worth even trying to tell them why I won't fix it and don't want to hear about it. ratbert90 posted:What do you do: I'm a low level Linux firmware programmer, I make the things nobody get's excited about working to work; like the screen on your phone. I think that's a good response. I just took your first comment about how you don't get those questions  as that being a response to "will you fix my computer", which is what I thought was stupid. My mistake if that's not what you meant.
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May 9, 2015 04:48
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evol262 posted:This will always be relevant, even though it's pretty dated now. sysadmin price list posted:Fixing the "hung" systemby plugging the ethernet transciver back in - $375.00 I kind of want to find an old SPARCbook and an AUI 10Base-T transceiver and bring it in to try and get some work done on now.
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May 9, 2015 05:01
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Daylen Drazzi posted:I give thanks every day that most of my friends are in IT, and if there's a problem they always call my buddy first - he enjoys tinkering and gets a kick out of helping people. Plus he's like the IT Buddha - nothing can crack his serenity (I've tried, but the fucker pisses me off instead). To be fair I do like helping people. There are some people I'll help no problem, I just don't want to make a habit of it. I don't want, say, my landlord, or when I meet new people, to be asking me to fix their computer. Luckily, there's enough nerds out there nowadays that almost everyone knows someone who can fix something.
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May 9, 2015 05:17
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I always figured it would be better to tell people you are a garbageman because they probably won't ask you to take out the trash.
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May 9, 2015 07:15
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mewse posted:I was going to PM you that clean wipe utility as well, I've used it to remove stubborn SEP installs in the past. Kaspersky support won't have any idea how to deal with it, but did they have you look at the log files for exactly what reg/file it is stuck on? I dunno, good luck. Their "tier 2" people are still looking at the problem. They sent me some .ini files but neglected to tell me what to actually do with them. I ran cleanwipe on a couple machines and it actually does remove SEP to the point where Kaspersky will install without errors. Now I need to see if I can get cleanwipe to run remotely/silently, if I can do that, I'm golden. Thats gonna have to wait though, I'm on vacation til next Friday.
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May 9, 2015 16:10
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Pissing me off today: installing Windows 7 on a computer that has one of those infernal AMD APUs. At this point, I'm convinced that every single update is doing a git pull and compiling from source. Soooooooooo sloooooooooooooooooow.
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May 9, 2015 17:25
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Acid Reflux posted:Pissing me off today: installing Windows 7 on a computer that has one of those infernal AMD APUs. At this point, I'm convinced that every single update is doing a git pull and compiling from source. Soooooooooo sloooooooooooooooooow.
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May 10, 2015 01:58
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Alereon posted:I really wonder what Windows Update is doing that takes so long. You can have the fastest CPU, SSD, and Internet connection money can buy and it will still take forever. I think if it at least downloaded and installed updates in parallel it would take a fraction of the time. It also uses up a huge chuck of RAM when doing the actual install - not such a problem on a modern system but it makes old 2GB machines grind to an absolute halt.
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May 10, 2015 02:06
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Alereon posted:I really wonder what Windows Update is doing that takes so long. You can have the fastest CPU, SSD, and Internet connection money can buy and it will still take forever. I think if it at least downloaded and installed updates in parallel it would take a fraction of the time. Comparing 7 years' worth of thousands of individual dependencies and revisions. All patches and even service packs can be uninstalled by default without having internet access (aka everything is local), which means it needs to check *every patch you've ever installed* to check what installed files are superceding what others belonging to what hotfixes and link them off to the side to keep a backup revision around *and* ensure that none of the new hotfixes are going to install any files that will regress any other previously installed hotfixes. It's far from perfect, but the installer tries to be incredibly pedantically safe (part of why no parallel installs; pre- and post- scripts might conflict across packages). Yeah, sometimes a bad patch makes it out in the wild, but the installer did its job even if the content it installed was bad, and the ease with which you can rollback something like the Schannel patch fiasco is why the installer does what it does. Building a brand-new clean install and patching straight from an offline copy of the latest SP and rollup can make it perform vastly faster versus dragging along a golden image that's had innumerable individual updates applied. There's also a method for marking an SP and possibly a rollup as not-uninstallable which throws away everything before it, freeing up space in WinSxS (the old binaries) and simplifying the update graph -- can't recall it offhand, but definitely look into adding it to your build.
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May 10, 2015 07:28
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I need a database application akin to MS Access where it's easy to create a DB (converted from a bunch of excel sheets) but something a bit less despised as access. Something web based would be good. Something free would be amazing. It's not a large dataset by any means but holy poo poo we can't do this with excel anymore. Pis singe me off: 10 people working on 10 Excel sheets with NFI. Swink fucked around with this message at 23:54 on May 10, 2015 |
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May 10, 2015 23:49
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FileMaker seems to not have a huge amount of hatred.
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May 10, 2015 23:56
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Filemaker would work. It's got pretty decent web support, it's easy to use, and it isn't appallingly expensive.
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May 11, 2015 00:54
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