The Missing Data Conundrum

It's nearly quarter to two in the afternoon. It's been a busy day, but a productive one. A project I have been working on for almost four months has finally come to fruition. After months of working with a software developer, I finally have a working upgrade package for one of our vital systems. The code has been patched, the bugs eradicated and the end is in sight.

I had been given this project for the simple reason that I had heard the name of it sometime in the past. I had no idea what it was, what it did, who used it or why. I had been thrown in the deep end of the data pool. The current version we had was three years out of date, and the new version refused to work in our environment. It was my job to fix it!

To cut a very long and boring story very short. The software developer built us a new package and all was right in the universe. However, one part of it still refused to work, so on this particular Thursday, he had stripped it down once again and finally found the problem. Satisfied with a job well done, I thanked him, put the patched file in a safe place and sat back in my chair, giving myself a silent congratulations.

Then...

Freshly Baked Chaos with a Side of Laptop

Sometimes I wonder why I bother!

It's the first lates of the new year, and nothing and no one prepares me for the evening ahead. And it started off so promising too.

It was all planned out, I had a pile of laptops to fix/image/configure and a phone ready to ring off the hook with stupid questions from idiotic users. Then it all went to hell. For some reason every idiot user chose tonight to show their talents at their very best.

It starts off with the usual innocent job that turns out to be a false alarm. I was asked to fix a faulty projector/computer situation that was magically working perfectly when I got to the room. WHEN I GOT TO THE ROOM!

The Lunacy of Technology

It is an understatement to say that modern technology has come on in leaps and bounds in the last fifteen years or so. When I was at school, I remember marvelling at the release of the brand new Intel Pentium 200 processor. A few years later came the Pentium 2, and the newer AMD chips. Then there were the RAM chips that increased in capacity (and length), and the 80 MB hard drives that became 500 MB, and later to 6.4GB.

"Too big. We'll never fill it" we would say as we looked wide eyed at the wondrous, yet mysterious black box encased in anti-static bags, wrapped in bubble wrap, and hidden behind protective glass. It constantly amazes me now at the total disregard for these precautions, as attitudes towards the delicacy of components has changed. In comparison, the price of technology has reduced, allowing people to care less.

The Problem with being an IT Specialist

After being in the business of IT Support for so many years, I have learnt never to admit to it to people outside of work: Sometimes, not even then.

"Why?" You may ask me.

Well, despite the obvious lull on your social life, once somebody knows that you have superhuman IT skills, you're screwed. Doomed forever to be plagued by never ending computer questions from people who have no idea what they are asking in the first place.

Even worse, when these people discover what you do, they tell others, and before you know it you have an even larger posse contacting you, expecting computer advice, and fixes for free. People you have never even met.

Non Self Service

I have always been amazed at the actions (or lack of)  of people when a problem occurs. They will moan and groan, and blame everyone under the sun, but will do nothing to help themselves. Is it because it happens with a computer in the room? That as soon as a crisis hits, they immediately switch to dumb mode until someone points out a simple solution and forces it upon them.

For instance, when an electrical fault occurs I am always perplexed at the mentality that causes these people to ignore simple safety or logic. There are several examples already posted on here and here is another.

A couple of weeks ago, the late shift upon me again, I get a phone call from a tutor. He informs me that a woman in his class had just received a rather severe electrical shock from a plug socket in one of the new classrooms.

The Id10t Migration Complication

It all started late on a Friday afternoon, as do most big, important projects. With our own move almost complete, it was now time to get the bean counters and the rest of the staff moved into the new building. Simples! Don't count on it!

It took two days hard labour to get every computer, monitor, printer, projector, TV, Sound system etc. disconnected, crated up and labelled. Not very exciting except for the huge battle of fighting through the stacks upon stacks of folder, boxes and other rubbish that the staff had kindly piled up around and on the computers themselves. And of course the game of cat and mouse we had to play in order to steal way the crates we needed to do the job. They were like gold dust and we had to use all our cunning and stealth to get enough containers to get it all done.

Moving Offices

It's an exciting time at the moment. A buzz is in the air, and it's not because of the fly nest in the false ceiling. It's taken years of planning, re-planning and planning again, and now the project is almost complete: A brand spanking new building for the company to move into within next few months.

It's looking very impressive on the outside and even more so on the inside. It's huge, it's one of a kind and state of the art. But this new entity has not come without its shortfalls in certain areas along the way. Areas: namely IT.

Strangely all the way through the project, in an IT based company with almost everything running off of technology, IT was not taken into consideration when designing the new building. Even stranger, when they finally realised that computers will be needed to run the business, and that a full network infrastructure would need to be put in place, they didn't bother to speak to the experts: Us!

The Great Software Installation Debacle

The World's Worst Software Engineer - Part 1

A new day, a new piece of software drifts our way. It will change the way the company works and streamline our procedures. It's state of the art and will save us money, time and man power. Not to mention it looks good and can take our personalised logo.

Wonderful! Another sales pitch full of buzz words that sounds too good to be true (it probably is) from a company no one has ever heard of, and the brainwashed bean counters are sucked in as they marvel at its high-tech excellence. It is overly expensive but before we know it, it is approved, bought and paid for without even consulting IT. On the plus side, it is going to be installed, setup and supported by the supplier. What could possibly go wrong?

Idiot in Training

Through the years we have had many trainees come to work with us. Unfortunately the first few we had were as computer literate as the rest of our users. They were not there for IT Support experience, but for work experience. Not a good combination in an environment such as ours.

One day a few years back, a fault comes in from an office that has a computer malfunctioning; nothing was appearing on the screen. This was a legitimate fault that after troubleshooting was pinned down to being a faulty graphics card. The computer was temporarily put out of commission and a replacement graphics card was ordered.

The Exam Apocalypse

It's exam time again and all are panicking. Cue complete chaos and the end of the world as we know it... At least until Friday.

This time of the year almost anything can happen and usually does. It's all hands on deck in our department in order to help quell the oncoming turmoil and horrors of the assessments.

And so it begins... The sky darkens, the rivers run red and as expected the phone rings:

"IT Support."

The Wild Goose Chase

As with every 'good' IT Nightmare it all started with a phone call.

"IT Support" I answer one cold and icy evening.

A tumult rolls over the airwaves in a heavily accented voice. The guy is talking so fast I cannot understand a word he is saying. I wait for the torrent to end, every syllable merging into the next. I ask for him to repeat himself and it takes a good four attempts to figure out that he is having little issue with his speakers. In other words: No sound. I was wishing my phone was having the same problem.

I try to get him do a few small checks, but another heavy incomprehensible sentence, is the clincher. Armed with cables and a heavy heart I head over there in the cold; head down to the wind and nimbly avoiding the black pools of ice. It was going to be a long night. Turns out this is was going to be a walk in the sun compared to what was coming.

The "Hacker"

A long time ago in an IT Office not too far away...

"We've been hacked." Our IT Manager tell us one morning as he stands on a chair to change the bulb in the alert light from green to red.

With the red bulb flashing and the alarm wailing, we all pluck up our ears and our then Senior Server Analyst frowns slightly and calmly asks. "Why? What's been hacked?"

"Oh, everything. Our entire network is compromised" our Manager panics, his glasses slipping down his nose. His thick grey hair seemed bigger than ever and he was clearly in a tizz.

I can't log on and other sign language

"Can't log on." A woman says quietly as she balances the door on the end of her shoe and leans into the room waving her ID at us.

I try to ignore her bobbing about as she tries to hold the door open with her foot and pass her ID to me at the same time. She wobbles slightly, realises that the door can support itself and gives it up. She steps into the room and looks at me expectantly as the door slams.

I check her account out and all seems ok, I reset the password for good measure. I tell her what I have changed it to and that she can setup a new password when she logs in.

Arrrrghhh, My Ears!

The worst type of caller is when someone rings with a simple request, and they have to complicate it, make a drama out of it. They have to complain about everything, tell you their life's woes and make out they are hard done by.

Generally I usually ignore the rants and carry on. But it makes me wonder what I have done to deserve the onslaught.

The phone rings late one morning and I answer.

"IT Support" I say, ready to be helpful.

New Laptop

"I have an appointment" a rather rude woman tells us as she barges through the door, laptop bag hugged to her chest.

There were three of us in the room and that's the first we had heard of it. Still, ever eager to satisfy the masses we all smile and offer our assistance.

"My laptop has loads of viruses" she says. "I spoke to someone yesterday."

We all have blank looks on our faces and we are all thinking the same thing about the "loads of viruses," format c:, die, viruses die!

Personal Security

This is not exactly IT related, but it did happen to a former member of my department. He told me about it many times over the years and I have always found it amusing.

This story involves a woman (mentioned before in previous editions) that I have had many dealings with in the past.

She is one of the worst users of IT equipment in the entire company... ever. Many times we have laughed or groaned over her stupidities and lack of sense. Especially amusing were some of the things she said.

It's a Server!

A few years ago the technology layout of this company was very different. Instead of just having a server room, we had servers doing the hard work scattered in various places.

One such place was a room was in a remote building, where myself and one or another of my colleagues had to cover once a week in case anybody down there needed technical support. We used to call this place "the black hole." It was small, dark, dingy and out of the way.

In this room we had a PC for our use and a huge, tower server that at that time was used for running online exams software. Not an ideal place to keep it, but it did the job well enough for a long time, until...

For several weeks we kept have very strange problems with it. For instance, sometimes we would find that the server had been powered down or would be running mind-numbingly slow due to lack of resources.

Quality of Service

I get an email one morning from a friend who works at another site. She was having issues retrieving an archived email. This was a common problem at the time and just required a quick install of an updated client. We arranged a time when she would have a few minutes to phone and let me connect remotely to the computer.

It's 12:10pm and my friend phones. All I needed to do was connect to her laptop, install the update and check that she could open the archived email. Simples...

I ask her what her "pc name" is. Now we run a program called BGInfo. This pulls information from the computer; including the pc name, ip address, RAM, disk space etc. This updates every time a user logs on and displays it on the desktop beneath our corporate logo.

Yearly Upgrade Gripes

Working in an educational environment I have to occasionally work in teaching rooms. Many of these are populated with a couple of dozen or so computer workstations and a printer.

Every year we spend a couple of months replacing older equipment and upgrading the newer. All have to have their software replaced with a fresh image and usually several other tasks have to be carried out afterwards.

One year we were running a week or two behind schedule and classes were coming in to the rooms on  introductory tours.

What is RAM?

"I am applying for a new job." A guy from another department announced to me one day. "It's for a 'Technical Computer Job' and I was wondering if you would help me with a couple of the questions on the application form?"

"Ok, I'll help you if I can." I agree somewhat taken aback by the new 'Job Title.'

"This is the main question I am having a problem answering." He says pointing to a large box on the application.

"Describe any technical IT experience that you have had?" I read out loud.

"Yes" he says. "What shall I put?"