Friday, April 30, 2010

101 Things that your Tech Support Person Doesn't Like


  1. When you say you have a virus and you don't really have any idea what is wrong, it's just a little slow

  2. Crawling behind disgusting and dirty desks.

  3. Unsnarling wires

  4. Too many icons on the desktop, making it difficult to actually find what they need

  5. Disgusting keyboards and mouses.

  6. When you complain about something and don't first check the cables.

  7. When you lie and say that you've rebooted or checked the cables when you clearly haven't.

  8. When you turn off your antivirus because "it makes the computer too slow". Infected computers grind to a halt, friend

  9. When you ask about how to fix a problem on a home machine

  10. When you ask about how to get your kids games working

  11. When you complain about network speed

  12. When you wax nostalgic about old computers/programs and how great they were. We got stuff to do here.

  13. When you refuse to upgrade to the newest version of a program

  14. How you complain about not being able to use an old program

  15. When you do not apply updates.

  16. Not reporting weird behavior like porn popups.

  17. Not writing down error messages, and then explaining your problem like..."It comes up with an error message, but I just click it away." Sometimes that message is important.

  18. Insisting on doing things the most complicated way possible.

  19. When you post a username/password on your monitor

  20. When you use a horrible and insecure password

  21. Not backing up your data and then acting shocked when it disappears.

  22. Clicking on popups that tell you that you have a virus. This is the internet people! They are preying on you!

  23. When you forward something without checking snopes

  24. When you forward something and ask if "is this real?"

  25. When you get a piece of spam and ask why "they" do this

  26. When you ask how you got infected. I don't watch over your shoulder

  27. This really happened to me. When you are at a funeral and are approached for technical advice

  28. When a hacker gets in and you ask why they do this

  29. When you store sensitive data on your computer, like credit cards or bank accounts or passwords. Does this seem like a good idea to you? Are you asking to get your identity stolen?

  30. When you download and install file sharing utilities

  31. When you have an infected USB and you put it in mutliple computers

  32. When you ask how you can make a web site, without having to learn "anything technical"

  33. When you click without reading

  34. When you are upset because something doesn't work exactly like it used to

  35. When you don't want to learn

  36. When you insist on keeping old equipment alive

  37. When you ask for opinions on new equipment or software that the tech person hasn't ever seen. We can barely keep up on the stuff we WANT to keep track of.

  38. When you want to now how one program is different than the other

  39. When you missuse an acronym.

  40. When you assume something is possible because computers can do anything

  41. When you put your entire hard drive on the server

  42. When you complain about the firewall

  43. When you don't read the instructions

  44. When you don't install the drivers

  45. When you don't change your wireless keyboard/mouse's batteries

  46. When you change your monitor's resolution to something your monitor can't support

  47. When you complain that the "server must be down" for every conceivable network problem

  48. When you don't explain how you did something

  49. When you hide what you did

  50. When you blame someone else

  51. When you expect quick turnaround

  52. When you stop them in the hallway/elevator/outside of work, and mention something you'd like them to fix. Do them a favor, send an email

  53. When you want help in ordering something online

  54. When you want instruction in something like "So, show me everything that is different in Office 2007".

  55. When you want them to do your work in MS Word or Excel for you

  56. When you ask for help doing the same thing over and over again

  57. When you call yourself stupid

  58. When you ask how I learned everything I know

  59. When you assume that I have a comp sci degree

  60. When you throw away equipment that works fine because you don't know how to use it.

  61. When you don't let us know when there is a problem

  62. When you don't mark when a piece of equipment is broken and it continues to try to be used

  63. When you complain about your 500 person mailing list not working, and it is an address that is misspelled, or not working

  64. When you complain about a piece of code you've written and you haven't checked it for spelling or correct punctuation.

  65. When you put games on the server

  66. When you install a server without knowing how to care for it. Everyone can install Ubuntu. Not everyone can sysadmin Ubuntu

  67. When you have silly icons/mouse pointers that make it difficult to concentrate

  68. When you have silly desktop backgrounds/screen savers

  69. When you insist on adding more and more silly backgrounds/screen savers

  70. When you insist on backing up your silly background/screen so you can put it on your new computer

  71. When you insist on a gaming pc when you only go on the internet and write word documents

  72. When you want two monitors because it's cool, not because you need them.

  73. When you want to connect to your computer remotely because you are lazy and don't want to come to work

  74. When you don't want to upgrade your printer and get frustrated when you lose your parallel port on your next computer

  75. When you assume its safe or easy to share printers

  76. When you open illegal shares on your computer without checking with your tech person

  77. When you say "but my computer at home is faster".

  78. When I can't buy something to make your computer better because of the budget.

  79. When I'm asked to install illegal software

  80. When I'm asked to install software without a license

  81. When I'm asked to install software on your personal machine

  82. Cascading Style Sheets

  83. Not being given notice that you need something, something that we could have planned for

  84. Being treated like a peon

  85. Being told that we are wrong

  86. Asking someone else of our assessment, and "is she right"

  87. Being hovered over

  88. Being asked to explain every step

  89. When you are afraid to try

  90. Being asked how to get into this business

  91. Being asked how much I charge for home visits

  92. When you don't accept that I don't do house calls

  93. When you bring in your home computer for me to look at

  94. When you don't accept my advice to wipe the computer clean and start over and insist it can be done without such drastic measures

  95. Wordperfect

  96. Your custom macros

  97. Customized ergonomic mouses and keyboards

  98. Left handed mouses

  99. Carrying heavy computers

  100. Crowded offices without room to move or disassemble a computer.

  101. Having to be inside working on your computer when it's nice outside.