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2. *Twitch* Look at my eye. Look at my eye. This morning I was at the desk of one of our fill-in clerks. She was having trouble printing. Of course, that was because she didn't have a printer set up. I set up a printer and told her to log out of our d-base app and log back in since it only picks up printers at login. She logs off and tries to log back in. I watch her type her password and press "login". It prompts her with "Bad username or password". Now, since the username was already filled in from her previous session, it's obvious it's the password right? Right? Wrong!! Fine. The only other possible problem is that the username is wrong since they're the only two fields. You'd have to be a complete moron to think it's anything else, right? I mean, that's what the fracking error said even! Does she retype the password or the username? Oh hell no! I watch as this waste of non-polluted air sucks in her breath and hammers the "login" button two more times and gets the same fracking error two more times! What the frack are you thinking?!? That it's saying your username or password is wrong, so it must be how you're fracking pressing the "login" button?? She looks up at my dumbfounded expression and says; "I don't understand. It let me login before." No fracking shiat you don't understand!! You must have been possessed by the spirit of someone with half a fracking brain cell before. Get off my planet before you spread! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments It's times like this that I wish I could just vanish, so when the user looked up to announce their lack of reading comprehension, they'd have nobody to announce it to and be forced to muddle through it themselves.. -NightSteel scoob... don't say anything to users like this... let Otis speak for you, or a clue by 4, or a Tactical ThermoNuclear LART... whichever is your preference.... -duckhead **WARNING** THERMONUCLEAR LARTS SHOULD NOT BE DETONATED WHILE THE ACTIVATOR IS STILL WITHIN BLAST RADIUS.... </TNL-023mkIV fine print> -ShujinTribble "And you gave me this twitch.." </Magnanimus> -unrenowned *continues reading label* "...Not suitable for children 3 or under. Not for oral use. In case of ingestion, consult a mortician..." -EtherRabbit It's far funnier to just carry a rolled up magazine, a tightly rolled magazine. When they look up, whack them on the nose and enjoy the confused and startled expression that lingers on the excuse for a face. -ChildofCthulhu *reads more of the fine print* "...do not use while operating heavy machinery. Handle with caution--contents may be hot. If symptoms continue, discontinue use and consult your BOFH. Do not taunt Thermonuclear LART." -Frazzled "Look at my eye" Eye? Not eyeS? What happened to the other one? Use it to test the laser? -Stryker One Yup, proper procedure--at least if you're trying to log into Hotmail. Recently I've had a lot of password errors that are fixed by simply hitting the signon button again--the form is being autofilled, it's not a typo in the password and the second time around it works. -Loren

3. I wish it could be done.. There’s a little demon on my desk. It sits there blinking quietly and lulling you into complacency for hours at a time and then, suddenly, it reaches out with its hideous screeching and yanks you from your quiet dreams of conquest. The demon speaks: “Booooooooop! Brrrrrrrrinnnnnnggggggggg!” Me: “AAAARG! Razzzing frazzing piece of crap. What kind of moron calls at 8am in the farking morning? Only a complete as** [Company name] this is Scooby, how can I help you? AH: “Yeah, I’ve got your DSL service and what IP do I have.” (Bzzt wrong sparky, we don’t have DSL service. I bet you’re too farking dumb to know the difference between a big farking antenna on your roof and a phone line into your house.) Scoob’: “Do you have our high-speed wireless service?” AH: “Yeah, that’s it. I work for [doomed company] and the head office needs my IP address.” (Note to self: If they’re hiring nitwits like this, dump any and all stock in the company.) Scoob’: “Okay, I see here that you just received our wireless service. Your IP address is dynamically assigned. If your head office needs to create a VPN, then you will need a static IP. We provide static IP addresses for $15 per IP.” AH: “err…” (Alert, alert! Starfish overload on line 3. . . . I quickly move the phone away from my ear and wait for the loud pop when his head explodes.) AH: “I think I need to call my head office and get back to you on that one.” (Damn! Explosion averted. Reboot apparently worked correctly. Still, all is not lost. He’s at least going to hang up.) {click} Sweet! I hang up the phone and wander off to our consulting group to shoot the sh!t. My mistake. The consulting group has lots of little demons all over the place. And intercom. They have an intercom. (A pox! A *POX* on the entire family of whoever thought up the idea of intercoms.) “Booooooooooop. Scooby. You have a call on line 3. Scooby, a call on line 3.” Farkitall. I momentarily toy with the idea of faking a myocardial infarction, but I hate paperwork and I’m not sure I can force myself to hit the desk hard enough in front of the contractors. Me: “This is Scoob’ how can I help you?” AH: “Yeah, I called my guys at the head office.” (Farknugget remembered my name. Note to self: increase estimation of sparky’s intelligence by a factor of 5.) AH: “Yeah. I called our guys and they say that we need a. . . . . routable. . . . . group. . . . . and 5. . . . Eye. . . . . Peee. . . . . addresses. . . . . and a . . . . . gateway.” (Ooooh! Color me impressed! He’s LITERATE!!! Make that a factor of 10.) Scoob’: “Okay. We provide a seperate rate for IP addresses if you need a routable group. Our wireless network, however, is an open network subnet. We can reserve 5 IP addresses for you and they will route properly without providing you a full /29. If that’s all you need, we may provide a discount." AH: “Ummm…….I……..” (Please,please,pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease actually pop this time.) AH: “What kind of discount.” Me: That decision would be the IT manager’s. If you give me your name and number and the name and number of your home office, we can work it out for you.” AH: “okaythanks” Why do they think that you’re the only person on the planet who can help them if they talk to you once? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments nah, probably given a list of things to say by their IT department. -McSmiley This one is verrrry good at following directions. You gave him clear and concise directions. He loves you! -TieDyedDinosaur cause your a god? -Harm This requires too great of an investment of my valuable time. Please use cliff notes when making future posts of this magnitude. tldr; -ambansire I got trolled!!! Sweet! *Sniff* I'd like to thanks the academy and all my adoring fans. I'd like to thank my IQ for helping me write the screenplay. I'd like to thank eggy for being too stupid to understand my words and I'd like to give a shout out to Gawd!!! -scooby111 Completely familiar with this type of nitwit. Foist them off on the nearest semi-literate, and hide. -namor Seriously, why can a site full of people well versed in computers not get rid of a few bad apples? I'm starting to wonder if this trolling is a joke being perpetrated on us by someone 'important' around here.. -NightSteel well i'm sure if we could get teh IP address hed be toast.. but enh. -Harm They name names and take pets because they found someone who speaks their gibberish and understand their nonissue. -Mushroom Sometimes they ask for you because they think you are only one they ever talked to that sounds like you know wtf you are talking about. -atomicbill awww - "ambansire" can't handle the long stories? Here's a short one then. "Once there was an asshat named Victor Wong. Everyone hated him. He died. And there was much rejoicing (Yaaaay!)" -Divinar I feel your pain Scooby. I deal with insurance agents, a tech illiterate bunch all, and they actually write down information so they know who they talked to and when... I can't tell you how many times I got a call transferred to me when the other tech could have fixed it themselves and didn't bother asking what the call was for... -CivilWarTech

4. I haven’t been around for a bit…. Some of you are probably wondering why I dropped off the face of the earth this go around. Most of you are wondering who the fark I am and why you’re reading this. You’re reading this because I have you trapped. Yes. You are physically incapable of clicking on the next link. Your feeble minds belong to me. You see I’ve discovered that I have the power to influence the wills of other people by merely suggesting that they have no free will. Read on and I’ll elaborate by citing the greatest example of my awesome power..... Not like you have any choice anyway. ** Still here? I thought so. Many years ago, I got married to the strangest woman on the face of the planet. She’s quirky, funny, and ummm…. downright insane. (In a good way.) How’d I get her to marry me? My mind powers, that’s how. A couple of years later, I felt the need to be brutally alone and devoid of female companionship and she divorced me. Again, my powers worked!!! (Pause for dramatic finger steeple-ing.) We went on like this for several years. I changed jobs and moved across the state to be closer to my kids. They visited my house twice a week and every other weekend. Life was good. In fact, it was better than good! I had my kids, half my income was MINE to spend and I was brutally alone!! Mwwwwhahahahaha!!! My evil plan was working!! Then, my hopes and dreams came to a crashing halt. It seems that my powers had failed me. My ex-wife came to me in October and asked me out on a date. WTF? Out of pure shock, I agreed. It seems that, despite my best efforts, we had become pretty good friends. We were now much better friends than when we got married the first time and we had a couple of things in common now. We got baby sitters for our ‘common things’ and went out a few times. Very few… But I was relieved to find out that my powers hadn’t failed. In fact, they had doubled!! Now they worked from my subconscious mind!! Now they were in overdrive. We set a date in the far distant future and we began planning for our marriage. Wow. Time flies when you’re frantically trying to get laid. Those 5 weeks flew by like a month would and we got married on December 3rd. I even got to pay for it all!! Mwwwhahahah! On an unrelated note, my bankruptcy also became final on December 6th. BTW, this is tech related because Shelby (my wife) is now related to a tech. (BFEG) [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments these are not the posts you are looking for *jedi wave* -Jax and congrats.........on the bankrupcy <EG> *wanders of quickly* -Jax *from a distance* and on the wedding -Jax um congrats and stuff........i think ;0) -starfishmagnet Oh, criminey! Oy, Vey! You realize this is a ploy to get the other half of your income as well, right? :D Congrats, I believe.... -Grue Welcome back! and congrats on loosing your freedom and falling victom to the mental powers that actually belong to your wife. (she's used them to convince you that it's your power). Now if you'll excuse me, I have to roll back into the lart shelter, and try to get the taste of my paws out of my mouth again. -wolfprince HA! you cannot catch me! I'm wearing boots of escaping! +5 to awesomeness (wearing my boots as I run for a LART shelter!) -3p0ch Mucho congrats, I hope. Nice to have you back. Sux about the bankruptcy, 'thou. -Dj I'm not sure whether to applaud you, or cry. Seems like a difficult situation either way, but I guess not that much for you. -namor congrats :) hopefully won't have to make use of third time's a charm -NOFXfan Congrats . . . no, wait. I'm sorry for you . . . no wait, congrats! Oh Frak! I can't figure out whether to be happy or sad. Her mind powers have ensnared you and made you believe it was all YOUR idea and that YOUR mind powers came back. On the other hand, you seem to be happy. On the other hand, I have different fingers. Oh wait, that wasn't supposed to go there. My head! My head! There is a womans voice in it telling me to hide in the furthest recesses of my lab! (crawls off sobbing) -ecoli Life is strange... -CyBear I think that it wasn't the 'mind force' as much as the 'lower urges' that are being exercised here! -TieDyedDinosaur Okay ...conga-rats are in order. After what you'd told me about her, I shouldn't be surprised you married her again. (OK, so why did you divorce her in the 1st place?) A case of can't live with her, can't live without her? -lineswine Ummm...... Congrats? I think? And welcome back? -taieena congrats, i think. -rhiannon Well, the good news is that she probably didn't have to change her last name. -Jeckler I remember this cartoon based on the story of the lion and the mouse. You know, the one where the lion catches the mouse and the mouse pleads for his life and says one day he would repay the favor. Well in the cartoon, as soon as the lion lets go of the mouse, the mouse climbs up to the lions ear and whispers "SSSSSUCKERRRRR". -momo Congratulations, bro. I hope it works out better the second time around. :~} -RiffRaff Scooby - welcome back. And hopefully the second try will work mucho better than the 1st one! -NordicPT Congrats, Scoob =) Glad for both you and your wife. -ThreeBucks So, if you divorce again, you'll only have 1/2 of 1/2 to spend right?......... Ouch stop it, quit ... -beatmewithstick We both grew up an incredible amount over the last few years. She became more capable of having a live on her own and I became more capable of letting her live that life. I never stopped loving her and my respect for her grew as I watched her change. Little did I know that she was having the same thoughts towards me. I think things will be much better now. Besides... I've tried the alternative and I don't want to go back. -scooby111 Good for you! I'm tying the knot again on News Years day... -LaserGuru Congratulations... Although I will admit to being confused. Um, to whom do the alimony checks go at this point? -MeanDean Your mind-powers are useless against me! For I am in league with BOB, and have SLACK! G'wan, try your (self-) deceptions, Pink Boy! BWAHAHAHAHA!! -MeanDean congratulations scoob! -smellystudent Congrats Scoob -Rabbitt Getting married once can be put down to an accident, but twice looks like carelessness... (There speaks one who is 30 years into his first marriage) Congrats mate, from both myself and my first wife. <ek9g> -Gromit I haven't remembered to say it in person yet so, congratulations, Scoob. I hope family life brings all of you joy. -NightSteel Congrats -RandalGraves If you've truly both grown as individuals, you will survive as a couple. congratulations on everything. -srteach Be careful what you wish for. :-) -concept14 Dude, Its nice to have you back, congratulations on the marriage, I'm planning on getting hitched too :) -CrystalMare scoob, congrats and its great to hear some of your stories. you're one of the TSC greats. If you ever want to catch a flick let me know. -areatech Dude! We hardly knew ye. (Congrats!) <walks away wishing it were legal for women to have more than one husband:)> -Magenta Magenta, you do realize that you get more guy paying attention to you here, then if they were all living in the same house with you ;) -STJ Congrats! Live well and prosper in your new formation. :) -TechMama You're fuckin' nuts. And you're no Vulcan, so quit steeplin' your friggin' fingers! -TranceGemini

5. How do I do that? Sorry for the length. I was going to shorten it, but hey.. it's only bandwidth. :-p Our IT manager is a smart guy. Okay, let me back up. Our IT staff sometimes reads this page and my IT manager hears about it occasionally. Hi boss, how are ya? (BFEG) My IT manager is now my brother-in law…. Again. It’s a sordid story involving twin readheads, an MCSE-mill and lots of alcohol. Aaaaaanyway, my IT manager is a sharp guy. He’s a computer-science graduate and he’s been an MCSE since nearly the beginning of the program. They guy used to take all the Microsoft Beta tests just for fun... and pass them. He’s smart and experienced, and he knows it. (wink)(wink) In fact, he’s told me before that he’s "a boss who just happens to know a lot more than you do." So, our leadless fear calls me into his office today. He wants to know if I know of any way to add a server into the Terminal services manager snap-in. Wha? The snap-in queries all the local domains and enumerates all the computers running terminal services from that list. There’s no way that I know of to add anything. We putter around for a bit and verify that. Me: "So why not just log on to the server and then manage it using the terminal server manager there?" ITM: "Because it’s exceeded it’s maximum number of connections. That’s why I’m trying to manage it." Me: "Ah. Why not try and log on to the console?" ITM: "It’s Windows 2000. It still only allows 2 connections." Me: "Oh. Then just remotely kill the winlogon process." ITM: "That won’t work. I need to log off a user." Me: "I’m pretty sure it will, but you can always try to log the user off using our manage process script." (He created a simple VB-script a long time ago that allows us to terminate processes on a remote machine or to log a user off.) ITM: (Tries it. It does nothing.) Me: "Hmmm looks like it doesn’t know what session to end and just defaults to the console session." ITM: "And there’s no way to change that." Me: "Hang on." (Goes to my PC and does a google search.) (Sends new script to IT Manager.) "Here’s another script that claims to be able to remotely force a logoff." (I come back to his desk and he’s reading up on the shutdown command. He’s typing the command in.) ITM: (Typing) shutdown -l -t 10 -f -m \\lightspeed Me: (Points to screen) "Umm the –l option can’t be used with the –m option." ITM: "Crap." Me: "Give my script a try." ITM: (Tries it) "It still doesn’t work." Me: "Yep. It looks like it’s having the same problem as the other script." ITM: "I guess there’s no other option but to reboot the server." Me: "Just kill the winlogon process." ITM: (Thinks about it) "Is it the winlogon process? It won’t work." (Kills one instance to humor me.) (He then tries to log on to the server and succeeds.) Me: "Glad I could expand your knowledge." Now, how do I wipe this smug grin off my face? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Cottenelle quilted will do. <bfg> -viennasausage Hehehehaw! I don't think there is a way. -ThreeBucks Just remember that you can not tell this story to just anyone, it will lose all its 'gotcha' appeal too quickly. Savor it! -TieDyedDinosaur You don't. Never mind, it'll gradually fade over the next several days. Use it well, grasshopper.... -Gromit I'm going to remember that trick.. -NightSteel By the way, at least on our WIndows 2000 server, it allows two terminal services connections AND the console to be logged in at once. -Stupendoussteve Err yeah Stupendoussteve. I should have mentioned that the server was remote and we had to connect to it via RDP. Going onsite wans't an option. The 'console' i was referring to was the fact that RDP and MSTSC.exe allows you to connect to the console session but still only allows 2 remote sessions at the same time. (It's a command line option for MSTSC.exe) -scooby111 um.... concentrated lemon juice? BFEG :) -slowANDeasy msTSC? sounds like an oxymoron to me.... -slowANDeasy With a trout... /*smakes scooby111 across the face with a large trout */ I'll be in the lart shelter if needed. /*runs like hell*/ -vrek People who think they know it all really irritate those of us who do. -atomicbill

6. Should I be worried... A couple of months ago, I installed a Sonicwall appliance at our main HQ site. We also purchased the viewpoint software so we could log everything and get pretty graphs emailed to us daily. The graphs and reports encompass virtually everything that is done across the internet from this site so it's become a daily ritual for me to check over the email and see who the top users and top websites, for the previous day were. This morning, I did my normal thing and went down the reports one by one and checked out things like top web users, top bandwidth users, top web users by site.... The top users change from day to day as do the top sites, but we have a small handfull of users who are always in the top 10. Old timers here may remember that I had some.... difficulties.... with a particular user about a year ago. (Don't bother looking it up, the evidence has been deleted.) Things have since settled down, but there has always been a bit of tension. He's one of the handful of users that always appear in the top 10 or so. Meh. No problem really. When you sit in front of a computer all day, you tend to surf more than others. This morning, he was at the top of the list for web users. I checked the websites by user and something jumped out at me... His top websites: www.ruger-firearm... 132(hits) 2.328(MB) www.gunsandammoma... 267(hits) 1.078(MB) www.hatchergun.co... 35(hits) 0.798(MB) Err. Should I be worried? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments That depends. How well can you dodge? -maciarc Yikes scooby, i hope you have a flak jacket. -My Cat Athena Unless he mixes that with a little bit of pr0n, yeah, he's gonna explode. Actually, either way. So yeah, worry. -namor Definitely. Worry. Check with his manager and see if he has a legit reason to visit those sites, but yeah, worry. -chazz You could always start carrying again yourself (referring to your 'the day I got "escorted" out' story). -NightSteel When the time comes, scoob won't have to dodge. -ThreeBucks Unless you hired DD..... -CommanderData Well, there's 2 options: 1) Let him continue to review sites of weapons that kill from a distance, or 2) Have him reprimanded/fired, and start wearing a bullet proof vest. (although, it's probably harmless surfing.) -Bobsentme It *is* probably harmless. It doesn't violate our AUP. I'm not really worried. I live in the country. We're all gun totin' psychopaths down here. Still, just in case, I think I may start carrying again. ;) -scooby111 Maybe suggest a new site for him to visit: Cleaningyourgunwhileloaded.com -TieDyedDinosaur Learn to do The Agent Blur and how to properly taunt him with, "Mister AN-derson!" -ShujinTribble Personally, I wouldn't worry. But then I compete in service-rifle target shooting almost every weekend. I sounds like he's doing some electronic window shopping, checking reviews and articles, and seeing what the manufacturers have to offer. I see no difference in this between firearms and computer hardware. You could break the ice by suggesting to him: "Take a look at SavageArms.com. They have the best our-of-the-box accuracy and at a good price." -Wraith556 Damn typos. Too much blood in my caffeine system. -Wraith556 i wouldn't worry too much - unless he starts talking to himself and really gripping about uppermanagment. -Harm A gun-crazy American? Wow! You don't hear of that every day...oh,wait a minute, yes you do. -lineswine

7. Not Merely EVIL.... Q: How many software developers does it take to change a light bulb? A: No, no, no. That’s a feature that will be included in the next version! Aaaaaarg! I can just imagine it…. {everything gets wavy and fades away} The Micro$haft campus fades into view. We zoom into an open window, down a cubicle-lined hallway to the darkest recesses of the human cesspool…… the corporate meeting room. Here is where 8 sweaty men in white shirts decide the future of the world’s most widespread virus… err… operating system. (Well, actually, 3 of them have bumps on their chest, but the radiation given off by Big Bill’s patented NOSLEEP device humming in the corner renders such distinctions irrelevant. Sex is irrelevant. Resistance is futile… Where was I?) Oh yeah. The “meeting” that is happening in this high-tech room is spoken about in hushed tones. A most fearsome beast resides here. No, it’s not what you think. Rosie O’Donnell is just a children’s story anyway. The animatronics don’t look realistic enough in the harsh glare of Satan.. err…. Fluorescents. This Beast that makes brave men piss themselves and smart men flee is none other than the dreaded committee!! Mr. Moneypants {hereafter referred to as ‘Bill’}: “Windows 2000 is a great success!! We… Um…. I made billions!!! But I’m a little concerned about this Windows XP. What if it works too well? How will I become richer than the government if nobody ever wants to upgrade?” Mr. Baldywhineysycophant {nicknamed ‘Steve’ for brevity}: “Well, we could time bomb it.” Bill: “Hmmm. Interesting, but it would probably open us up for a lawsuit that we couldn’t buy our way out of.” {The room erupts in laughter} {Eventually the room quiets down.} Token Developer: “I know! We could make it susceptible to every virus or worm on the planet! I can even write a routine that would install adware at the drop of a hat!” Bill and Steve: [In awe] “Wow.” Bill: [Smacking Steve upside the head] “You see, why can’t you think up stuff like that? What the hell am I paying you for anyway… don’t answer that. This is on the record remember?” Steve: “But that won’t be enough. History has shown us that we will need to have at least one real feature before people will pay for an upgrade. We’d still have people using windows 95 if we had included networking support in it.” Bill: “Mwwwwwhahahahahahahaaa. I just had an evil thought.” Bill: “Token Developer… What would it take to remove the NO TO ALL option on the file overwrite dialog box?” Token Developer: “Not much…. And it would give someone a reason to want to upgrade.” Bill: “Upgrade? Hell. I just want to hear them scream! Bwwwahhahahahahahahah!!!” Token Developer: “So what do you want me to implement, the time bomb, the security holes, or the adware holes?” Steve: “Why choose?” {Evil laughter echos from the committee room down the halls of Micro$haft} Bill: “I love you Steve.” Steve: “I know Bill. I’ve got the pictures to prove it.” HOW… F*CKING… HARD…. WOULD… IT… BE… Would you like to replace the existing file [Yes] [Yes to All] [No] [No to All] [Cancel] [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments *recommends Scooby get Metal Gear: Billstomper out for some fun* -Warrick Welcome back, Scoob! And that's all I'm gonna say about the matter. The Axis Of Evil dances in the pale moonlight to Vivaldi. -Mushroom actually, shift+[No] = No to all. </da> -Bynar Oh crap!! Okay Scoob, just for that you gotta clean my monitor, keyboard, 2 walls and the carpet. (Looks disgustedly at what used to be a 36oz drink) Oh man! That's gonna leave a stain! (breaks open another 3 bottles of beer and begins pouring) -ecoli Beautiful. Welcome back! -Bobsentme Bynar: Been working with XP since it came out, and I only found this out two weeks ago. After I finish kicking myself, I plan on kicking the closest Microsoft developer. -Geminii Shit - hide the Scotch guys, Scoob's back! Beautiful. Unfortunately I'd just taken a serious sip of Californian Merlot - being a well-bred English gentledog I refrained from spraying my keyboard with it. I just snorted the whole bleedin' lot up my nose. <g> -Gromit You were gone? <confused> Yes, we all have to make our comments. Welcome, and... I did not know that. -namor Back with a vengeance, hey, Scoob? (Watch out, the tallies in the break room are about to be dwarfed again...) Seriously, nice to have you back. -MadJack ROFLMAO! It's nice to be able to laugh at another Windows annoyance instead of planning airstrikes on Redmond for a change. -Tekkie Scooby? Is that you? Man, I heard you'd been kidnapped by aliens who transmorgified your brain. <g> Good to see you posting again, bro. -RiffRaff Scooby is back! Film at eleven. (Outstanding post, btw) -lineswine Sorry, Scoob, your answer to the joke is wrong. It takes 0 software developers to change a light bulb. Changing a light bulb is hardware! -TrainingGod "But, hardware said SOFTWARE takes care of the drivers!" <obligatory> -MadJack

8. Act III ----- Act III, Scene I ----- The windswept hill. [REYNALDO has just finished mounting a new antenna on the pole.] [SCOOB' connects things correctly] BOSS: It seems to be partially working now. I can connect to the AP wirelessly correctly, but I cannot surf. [HORATIO pulls up in his car] SCOOB': It is 7:15. Is there something wrong with the switch? We could substitute my hub? BOSS: In a moment. ----- Scene I, part II ----- The windswept hill. [BOSS is working feverishly on his laptop while SCOOB', REYNALDO and HORATIO look on.] [SCOOB' looks at his watch.] SCOOB': Anything? It is 8pm. Shall we try the hub? BOSS: OK, try the hub. [SCOOB' hooks up the hub.] BOSS: No difference. [HORATIO looks at it with his laptop.] HORATIO: I concur. SCOOB': Horatio brought the new AP, shall we try it? BOSS: The AP is stuck in routing mode and will not bridge the connections. Let me try something else. ----- Scene I, part III ----- The windswept hill. [BOSS is working feverishly on his laptop while SCOOB', REYNALDO and HORATIO look on.] [SCOOB' looks at his watch.] SCOOB': Anything? It is 8:35pm. Shall we try the new AP? BOSS: [sighs] Fine. Try it. [SCOOB' immediately try is and has it quickly hooked up.] HORATIO: [working on his laptop] Eureka! It works! SCOOB': Lets get it put all together and go home. [fade out as everyone drives home in the dark] Total time: 9 hours -- 2 hours swapping parts, 30 minutes testing, 6 hours, 30 minutes waiting for the boss to 'try something else'. Just get the damn thing working and figure out why the bad parts don't work when you get it done! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Thoroughly enjoyable! Aye, Master scooby111 is indeed a Master. A Master Storyteller is he. -FuzzyElf Somehow, I sympathize with the boss. Not that I will spend 9 hours before fixing the thing, but I do like to know “why” is not working. But hey, I’m an Engineer. LART me if you want, I’m used to it... -TheGhost And by the way, that is a classical masterpiece of the Theater of the Absurd. Two tumbs up. -TheGhost Hey nothing wrong with engi's their job is to figure out what caused the problem, to help prevent it or come up with a faster solution next time. it's the job of the (I don't know what to call us, techs? or should I call us fixers?) to just do what it takes to fix the problem, not understand what causes them or how to prevent them in the future. It's a symbiant circle. perfect unity. -drachen I'd half-boss, half-scoob. I've spent way too long trying to diagnose something when a reboot/replace fixes it instantly. -namor Excellent story!!! And the moral of the story is - LISTEN TO SCOOB, DAMMIT! -PTSTech *raises tankard of mead in respect to scooby111* -starfishmagnet Great story, scoob & I so sympathize with ya! -Tekkie Scene 1, yeah i've seen 1 too :) Nice style -Armakuni When it's first staged, I wanna play The Fool! <grin> -CTYankee Nice, Scooby! *glad she managed not to drench her screen, just the floor, from the giggles* I like the play. :) -taieena Awesome! I find that's the toughest thing to get people to listen to: fix it now, figure out what went wrong later. -teivrann you should thank the boss... i assume you got paid for his "trying something else" -putahtek

9. Act III ----- Act II, Scene I ----- The windswept hill. A new car is nearby. [BOSS is working feverishly on his laptop while SCOOB' and REYNALDO look on.] SCOOB': Anything? I have told you that the AP is fried. We must replace it. BOSS: I guess you are right. If I cannot get it to work after trying for an hour, it must be. [The AP is replaced by SCOOB'] BOSS: Ah hell. This AP cannot connect to another AP wirelessly. It does not have the proper software. I can get the clients to work, but they will not be able to surf. Perhaps I can use the other AP over a wire to the new AP and get it to connect. That part was working. SCOOB': It's worth a try. In the meantime, should we have HORATIO bring us the new AP that can do it all so that he is on the way if this does not work? It is now 5:30pm. BOSS: No, not yet. Let us try this. ----- Scene I, part II ----- The windswept hill. [BOSS is working feverishly on his laptop while SCOOB' and REYNALDO look on.] SCOOB': Anything? It is now 6:30. Should we dispatch HORATIO to come with the new AP? BOSS: The new AP will not connect to the old AP. I don't understand it. [SCOOB' opens his phone again] SCOOB: [Into the phone] HORATIO? Do you have any suggestions? [SCOOB' nods for a while then turns to BOSS] SCOOB': Horatio suggests that we go to the local office and use the spare antenna there to link back to the network. Then we will not need the old, broken AP as the antenna connects directly to the switch. BOSS: Make it so. [Exit SCOOB' and REYNALDO while SCOOB' talks into phone.] SCOOB': [quietly] Bring the new AP Horatio. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Crap Typo. Act II. -scooby111

10. Act I SCOOB' ----- battle-worn hero and tech demi-god BOSS ----- quintessential nerd and reluctant leader HORATIO ----- grizzled friend and coworker REYNALDO ----- servant to our three main characters (Old Man) SCENE ----- A rural township. (Half way to nowhere.) ----- Act I, Scene I----- A typical office setting. [SCOOB' at his post. HORATIO at his post. Backs toward each other. Typing away. Enter BOSS] BOSS: It seems that all is not well. An access point on yon hill in the distant city of Yanos has ceased to function. I have dispatched the old man. One of you must need to go with him. Who wouldst like to accompany him? SCOOB': What is the fault with it? BOSS: I know not. IT appears to be the hardware. The antenna or the line, perhaps. I do know that it is not the AP itself as I can connect to it. HORATIO: I concur. It is not the AP. SCOOB': [valiantly] I shall go. An hour of respite outdoor would do me good. Shall I take an AP with me in case? BOSS: No, it is not the AP. [Exit SCOOB with laptop on shoulder.] ----- Scene II ----- A windswept hill. [REYNALDO is clutching a pole for dear life. SCOOB is peering up at him.] SCOOB': You have the antenna now replaced. That is the last of it. We have all of the hardware replaced. Let us see if this works. [SCOOB' works furiously on his laptop.] SCOOB': No, it is not working still. Come down old man, before you fall to your death. REYNALDO: Verily. Two hours at 40 feet has taken its toll. What shall we do now? SCOOB': We shall call the BOSS and complain. [SCOOB' opens a phone and pushes some buttons] SCOOB': Bossman, all of the equipment has been replaced. It still does not work. Though you insisted it was not, it must be the AP. [SCOOB' nods as he listens to the phone.] SCOOB': The link back to the network at the broken AP is also down. It seems to be a bad amp. I may have fried it when I was testing. [SCOOB' closes the phone and looks at his watch.] SCOOB': It's 4pm, the Boss will be here in a half an hour with a different, used AP. We can replace the link to the network without an amp. It is very close. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story

11. Scoob’ & the phone guy… Book 2, Ch 2 Scoob’ looks up at the assembled techs and his expression betrays his opinion of just how reliable this information is. “The police apparently arrested the ‘Fucktard’ several times over the course of the investigation and he was held overnight for questioning. This of course was presented as evidence of why the subject was so unreliable for several weeks. It seems that spending a night in jail is not conductive to meeting your obligations in a timely manner.” Scoob’ rubs his eyes and continues. “The ‘Fucktard’ also announced that his company was failed. Today was his last day before closing his doors forever. He had lost so much money and so many customers defending himself that he could no longer remain in business. He was going to declare bankruptcy very soon. He also announced that our install was his very last install ever and he was going to start looking for a new job and a new line of work.” Scoob’ grins a little at the thought. “I expressed my condolences and asked him what kind of work he wanted to get into. His reply?” Scoob’ pauses for effect and a wide smile slowly spreads across his face. “Ladies and Gentlemen, he wanted to get into IT.” The room erupts into pandemonium. A lone voice rises above the others and asks in a shaky voice, “Do you mean I’m going to have to deal with this ‘Fucktard’ as a netadmin or something?” “No DD. I was able to dissuade him from it. He is now convinced that he should become an electrician as he already has his low-voltage electrical certification.” The room somehow gasps in unison. Wolfprince cries, “But people could die!” “Yes, yes they could, but there is one job that is along the same lines as an electrician and holds a better hope for mankind if he were to get employment as one.” Scoob’ grins an evil grin and leans forward. “As many of you know, the IFEPS is a non-profit corporation. Since it doesn’t pay well, I also work for a small ISP… a small ISP that is owned by an electrical company and there is one job that there always seems to be openings for.” The looks of understanding begin to filter throughout the room. “But I don’t get it.”, blurts HalfStarfish. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments um.... <feels dense> me neither.... -Shaede You know, I don't either, but maybe that's because I don't know much about power companies. -Veinor That makes three of us - you'll have to give us a clue (NOT x 4!) on this, Scoob. -Gromit Will he be saying something along the lines of "Hello this is Fucktard, how may I help you ?" -Deadagent Want to have a starfish fry, eh? Lineman by chance? -helldesk ZAAAAAAAP! (Cue Queen bassline..dumm, dumm, dumm "Another one bites the dust") -lineswine Oh, I get it now! Lineman! Starfish BBQ! -halfstarfish <raises hand> I know you cannot forget me in the audiance, I'm the subserviant chicken smothered in BBQ sauce. -burrkiss Let me rephrase Burkiss's comment: I'm looking for the subserviant chicken smothered in BBQ sauce..... and a tube of KY. -Jeckler ...and a taco. (How am I today? Don't ask, yet.) -ShujinTribble This is classic... http://www.subserviantchicken.com/ -Jeckler 'Here, hold onto this wire.' 'OK, now what?' 'Be sure not to touch the other one, it apparently is the one carrying 220 VAC' 'How did you know that, they're the same color?' 'Well the one you're holding appears to be neutral!' -TieDyedDinosaur Christ.. that's awful. I can't help but think of it from his standpoint. Some jerk manages to destroy your company just by saying you were his accomplice in setting up a camera in the ladies' room? Damn, man. Even if he is an idiot, I feel sorry for him (provided he wasn't actually in on it). -NightSteel Maybe someone could supply him a supply of bandaids to finish any internal wiring. (see RiffRaff's posts about home remodelling) -Answerboy

12. Scoob’ & the phone guy… Book 2, Ch 1 *Ahem* The noisy lecture hall quickly quiets as professor Scoob’ clears his throat. The assembled techs and professors focus their attention on the lectern as Scoob’ begins to speak. “Esteemed colleagues… and Mr Coyote, today’s lecture is a follow up to yesterday’s and is entitled ‘Test subject 11436 and the excuses’.” Scoob’ shuffles his papers for a few minutes and glances around the audience again. He seems about to speak, then thinks better of it and takes a sip of water. He swishes it around his mo* “Get on with it already! What happened?!?” Interjects CommanderData helpfully. “Err yes. As I told you yesterday, the subject was scheduled to arrive at our second facility at 10am this morning. Knowing that he would be late, I arrived at the remote facility at 10:20am. He was nowhere to be found.” Scoob’ makes a show of appearing surprised. He’s not a good actor, but… well, you get the idea. Scoob’ pushes his glasses up on his nose again and sneers at the audience. “’Fucktard arrived just when expected…. right at 10:45am. We chatted a bit and he decided to confess his sins to me. The tale he wove was a tale of woe and not entirely believable. I gave his confession the weight it deserved, but if there was even a grain of truth to the story, then it has the makings of a good after-school special.” “His story began several months ago when one of his female receptionists discovered a small video device in the ladies restroom at the company he owned.” Scoob’ pauses for dramatic effect. The looks of disgust on the ladies’ faces is only slightly overshadowed by the looks of interest on the males’ faces. Scoob’ nods knowingly and continues his tale. “The police were called and the equipment was quickly traced to another employee working at 11436’s company. It seems that the equipment belonged to the company but was in the loan of one particular phone tech. The tech was arrested and questioned. While being questioned, the employee implicated the owner and another coworker in the video monitoring.” [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments I just can't resist this - "All is known..©" -Gromit

13. Prof. Scoob’ & the phone guy… Chapter 6 “I popped open a session of network monitor and captured traffic. After a few minutes, I discovered the right IP address and configured my PC so it was on the same subnet. Immediately after connecting, I changed the IP address on the phone system and configured the phones to ring properly.” Scoob’ seems to calm down a bit and he picks up his glasses from the floor where they fell during his tirade. “I left another two messages on ‘Fucktard’s voicemail letting him know that there was no longer an emergency. At 10:30am he called me back.” Scoob’ laughs evilly. “I told him that we were all done at our larger remote facility and that we needed to start on the smaller facility and how’s Thursday for him?” “Ladies and gentlemen, tomorrow is Thursday. And bets on whether he will appear. I have a perverse desire to see this to the end.” Scoob’ finishes. “Ummm.. Professor Scoob’” Snowcrash raises her hand. “How are we supposed to eliminate this sort of professional stupidity? It seems like you’re rewarding it.” “That’s a good question Professor ‘Crash. You see, eliminating this particular type of professional is going to take a butt-set, a spool of wire and a 60-amp circuit, but we feel that we should get out money’s worth before executing him.” Scoob’ looks around at the shocked looks of his colleagues. “What? Did you think it’s actually possible to eliminate stupidity? Now *THAT’S* funny!” “BWwwwhahahahahaha. The assembled professors slowly start to smile and nod among themselves… [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Beautifully written! Personally, I'd be getting all the equipment on site, then contracting the ex-employee to install it for you. You haven't paid Fucktard the final 25% have you? That should cover the installation costs nicely. -smellystudent Damn, Scooby... And I thought dealing with our phone constractors were bad with scheduling, but at least they show up and do the job within the time frame! *liking Smelly's idea* What company is it so I know never to use them? -taieena I agree, well written. But I'd be contacting the Better Business Bureau AND find out what company the good tech works for to start new business relations. -kman52000 It's actually a small company our here in the styx called Leacom Telecommunications. I wouldn't worry about using them as I'm pretty sure they won't survive the year. You're right Smelly, we're having him install the second system today and, once it's installed and moderately working, we're severing all ties and getting the good tech back on the job. -scooby111 Nicely-presented story - I think Swedish, DD, and The Coyote have raised the bar for us all, haven't they? And I can't believe it took that long - guess it's good you found out the majority of the story before handing over the rest of the fee. -namor I like it. It's giving me ideas ... <BEFG> -Spyder19 Excellent all the way around scoob. -Rabbitt Wow. - That's unreal. I've noticed the quality of stories increasing around here; this proves it. Awesome tale Scoob! -teivrann Out of curiosity, Scoob, why 11436? Just a random number? -NightSteel Should have cut the story into smaller chunks. . . This guy deserves a Chapter 11 -Zoomer lol...nice...too bad there was a violent bloody ending...I would have cried tears of joy. -The Coyote Great story, scoob! Update us, won't you? -Tekkie Too bad you're so damn far away, or I'd give you a hand on that one. Good luck with the remaining hardware! -Grue Awesome story, Scoob! How you haven't strangled this butt-monkey with a length of cat5 I'll never know... -PTSTech well sir it is the end of the day we are waiting to see if the buttmonkey showed up my entire building has a betting pool on this. -Motient

14. Prof. Scoob’ & the phone guy… Chapter 5 Scoob’ smiles evilly. “At this juncture, I spoke to our senior management and agreed that we would tell the test subject that our second facility that had not yet been started was a much higher priority now and that he must start on it as soon as possible. After it was done, he could then return to the larger remote facility and complete the installation then. The thought was that we would at least be able to get the new equipment that we had already been paid for mounted on the wall at the remote site. Then, if the company went bankrupt, we would still have the equipment in our possession.” “Monday morning, I received a call from 11436. He was at the site and about to finish the install that we had been waiting on for over two weeks! I agreed that he should finish it as long as he would be able to cut over to the new system by 5pm.” Scoob’ rubs his eyes again making his glasses jump up and down. “The next day, I received a call from the remote site. It seems that he set the phone system to night mode and had not told anyone, including me, how to take it out of that mode so the phones could be answered by live people. I made several calls to his cell phone and his company’s voicemail and rushed right over to our remote site.” “When I got there, I quickly figured out how to take the system out of night mode. The receptionist told me that he was there until 6pm the previous night and she had made it clear that he wasn’t to place the phones in night mode as they never use it. When I finally got the phone system into day mode, I discovered that no phone in the remote site was configured to ring on any incoming line. They just blinked, but no sound.” Scoob’ picks up speed and his voice rises a bit. “I rushed to a local computer and installed the phone system configuration software. I then spent several minutes attempting to connect to the phone system. I called ‘Fucktard’s cell phone and company voicemail repeatedly. Nothing seemed to work. The ‘Fucktard’ didn’t give it the IP address that I provided for him.” Eyes narrowed and fist pounding the lectern Scoob’ continues in a loud voice, “When I checked the phone closet I discovered that the phone system wasn’t even connected to our network. There was no cable! I quickly attached a cable and tried connecting again. No dice. A thought occurred to me. The complete ‘Fucktard’ probably left it at the default IP address, but what was it? Searching Google was no help and Toshiba’s website didn’t give out that sort of info. I wasn’t even supposed to have the config software.” [By: scooby111] Comment on Story

15. Prof. Scoob’ & the phone guy… Chapter 4 He clears is throat and continues. “We received no information on that Tuesday, so I called the receptionist and asked for a specific technician that had given us very good support in the past. I actually got through to the dispatch person and I was told that the technician was no longer working at the company. That was very interesting. I was also told that test subject 11436 would be on site that afternoon.” “I received another call from the test subject that day at 3:30pm. He was at our site and projected to have our new phone system installed and configured by 5pm that day. I agreed that he should finish it that day and to call me at 5pm when he was ready to switch over. I also verified with the receptionist at the remote facility that it was okay for him to be there until 5:30pm that day, but no longer.” Scoob’ sighs and takes his glasses off. He rubs the corners of his eyes and looks around. He squints and fumbles around for his glasses before continuing. “Of course, the subject did not finish by 5:30. Our receptionist called me and indicated that she needed to leave and he was still working. I spoke to ‘Fucktard’ and told him to return the following morning to finish the install. He agreed and left the office.” Scoob puts down his papers and glances around the audience chamber. “At this point, I’d like to mention that we had no belief that he was going to comply with my request. As a matter of fact, we at the IFEPS were taking bets as to when his next contact would be. It was 3 to 1 against it being that week.” He smiles weakly. “The following day, we received no call from either him or his company and none of the 12 messages that I left were returned. This was Friday. Now two weeks after the phone system was supposed to be completed. We did, however, receive a call! It was a call from the technician that I was told no longer worked for the company.” Scoob takes a drink of water and leans in close as if about to share a secret with the audience. “The technician had quit the ‘Fucktard’s’ company due to irreconcilable differences. The kind of differences that invariably crop up after not paying an employee for over two weeks. It seems that, over the last several months payroll had become increasingly erratic. Most of the employees had left the company for greener pastures and 11436 was desperately trying to hold on to his customers. The technician went on to say that he held the company van at his home as collateral for his last two weeks worth of paychecks.” [By: scooby111] Comment on Story

16. Prof. Scoob’ & the phone guy… Chapter 3 Scoob’ continues with some effort. “We attempted to schedule the upgrade at our larger remote office immediately, but we were unable to get any response from the test subject. After several weeks of trying, we received a call from ‘Fucktard’ and scheduled the upgrade for that Friday at 10am.” “10am came and went. Finally, at 1pm, the subject arrived at our remote facility and began the upgrade. The plan had been to finish the upgrade by 5pm and switch over to the new phone system just after 5pm. But, by 5:30pm, it became apparent that the phone system would not be completed quickly. ‘Fucktard’ suggested that we leave the phone system as it was and simply complete the installation the following Monday. I agreed.” Scoob’ again shakes his head. This time, in self disgust. “Monday came and went. We made several calls to both the test subject’s cell phone and the company’s main dispatch operator. The operator assured us that ‘Fucktard’ was out on an emergency call and he would call us the following day and complete the upgrade on Tuesday. This explanation didn’t ring true, but we accepted it.” “Tuesday morning came and went. I resolved to not call the test subject and see how the situation evolved. At 4:15pm, I received a call from 11436. He indicated that he was on his way to the remote site and would be there in about 30 minutes.” Scoob’ sadly shakes is head, but a broad grin quickly replaces his forlorn look. “Like hell. I told him to not even bother going there that day. It was too late. I added that he should show up again on Thursday morning and complete the installation that day.” “Sadly, Thursday came and went and there was no information forthcoming from ‘Fucktard’s’ company. I finally called the company again on Friday. The receptionist was not answering and 11436 wasn’t answering his cell phone. I left several curt messages on their voicemail systems.” Scoob’ continues as he pushes up his glasses again. “On Monday, I received another call from the test subject. It seems that his receptionist had not arrived that day. As soon as she arrived, he would dispatch to our site.” “I didn’t believe it.” Scoob’ adds unnecessarily. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story

17. Prof. Scoob’ & the phone guy… Chapter 2 “As you can tell from the drawing,” Scoob’ holds up his hands and makes little quote marks with his fingers. “’Fucktard’ is a phone guy.” “He’s not just any phone guy, he is the owner of a small company that does telephone system installations and maintenance calls.” Scoob’ pushes his glasses back up on his nose again. “We met Test subject 11436 when we had telephone problems with the phone system at our main office. As you may know, the Institute For Eliminating Professional Stupidity doesn’t advertise for test subjects, we simply use those subjects that we encounter in our regular activities.” “Still, it seems that we never run out of test subjects.” Scoob’ laughs at his own joke. Scoob’ looks around and seems to discover that nobody else in the room is laughing with him. “Ahh yes, in any event, we had used Test subject 11436 and his company for emergency maintenance and we were well pleased with the professionalism and skill that his technicians demonstrated. ‘Fucktard’ did no work himself during that episode, but his employees were very impressive. For that reason, we began to use his company exclusively for our phone system needs at all 3 of our facilities. It was a job that they were well suited for.” “After several years of good service, we decided to upgrade the phone systems at our two remote facilities and 11436’s company was contracted to do the work. As usual, we paid 75% of the upgrade costs in advance so that the equipment could be purchased. During this exchange, ‘Fucktard’ made the comment that he would also supply 10 digital phones at no additional charge if we would be able to give him the advance check that day, since he ‘had payroll to make that week’.” “This was to be the first sign that all was not well with the situation.” Scoob’ shakes his head as if remembering something distasteful. “The next sign came when two of his employees visited our offices that very same day to pick up the advance check.” [By: scooby111] Comment on Story

18. Prof. Scoob’ & the phone guy… Chapter 1 A frumpy-loking professor Scoob’ shuffles to the lectern and peers over the top rim of his glasses at the audience. The lecture hall is packed with studied men and women in white lab coats and cheap dinner coats. Scooby scans the audience for a while seemingly looking for a familiar face. Either he finds it or gives up shortly. *Ahem* “First of all, I’d like to thank all of you for coming to this, the first of a series of lectures outlining the results of the IFEPS’s latest double-blind studies.” Scooby pushes his glasses up on his nose and nervously shuffles his papers. “Esteemed learned colleagues, today’s lecture centers around one test subject. In the interests of protecting his identity, we will simply call him ‘Test subject 11436’, or ‘Fucktard’ as we at the institute affectionately call him.” As he says this, Scoob’ swings the freestanding chalkboard next to him completely around and reveals a very detailed chalk drawing of subject 11436. The goofy grin on the chalk drawing immediately grabs attention. The test subject is standing with one foot forward and his weight resting on his back foot. He is slumping a little and somehow has sucked his gut in so his chest hangs over his hips. On those hips hangs a utility belt. Even in the chalk drawing, the viewer can identify the butt-set and tone testing equipment of a telephone installation professional. The figure’s palms are pressed together and hanging straight downward between his bowed legs in a gesture that seems almost lewd. In all, it’s a captivating image. Scoob’ smacks the drawing with his wooden pointer stick. “Ladies and gentlemen, lest you be misled, this is not a caricature. This was drawn from an actual picture and deviates very little from it.” [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments I never knew you could get that much detail in a chalk drawing... *Scrambles for the LART shelter.* -Jonos

19. Lineswine shindig... The movie!! Someone got the bright idea to stress-test their video camera on a bunch of geeks. This is the result: http://users.bentonrea.com/~philb/TSC/movie/Seattleshindig_full.MPG 117MB!!! If you'd like to have it in smaller chunks, download the 31MB parts 1-4 http://users.bentonrea.com/~philb/TSC/movie/ Don't forget to check out the key to the cast and crew. http://users.bentonrea.com/~philb/TSC/movie/Key.JPG (My mad capture and mspaint skillzzz) Did I miss anything? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Dude. That really takes a girl back... :) -snowcrash Wow. For some reason I had Chazz pegged as a much younger person. I don't feel like such an old fart now. <bfeg> -RiffRaff Heh, all of 2 days ago. And I look a bit uhmm.... new to the group. It was a bit like a family reunion with distant relatives that I'd never met. -ThreeBucks Awww, we love ya, ThreeBucks. Even if you do look like Areatech's second cousin or something. :) -snowcrash Quack quack, btw where did you go SC, you disappeared halfway through and never came back? -Armakuni ThreeBucks: "I like to reminisce with strangers; granted, it takes longer." -- Steven Wright -Mushroom Er, well. ^^;; I checked on areatech and lineswine jr., mostly. And brushed my teeth. -snowcrash that's a shame :) -Armakuni Yeah, Riff, I'm an old fart -- at 44, the second oldest there. <grin> First time a lot of people there had seen what I looked like, but I have to give her credit, SC recognized me right away. "You must be my Chazz..." I think only DarthLuke had seen me before, we had a quick video cam chat before the last BBQ. -chazz Snowcrash, You disappeared for a while in that video ... You may want to rephrase that "Takes a girl back" statement ;-) -Necros I don't think I arrived yet, so i wasn't teaching anyone english. But it was a great party and it seems like everyone is family there. Thanks snowcrash for being a great hostess! -areatech You had arrived ^_^. You were just in the other room. I was insinuating that you were LEARNING english from the little bloke. -scooby111 So! Everyone I hadn't already seen from last year's pictures, looks much as I imagined...with one exception. Lineswine, HOW did you ever survive working the flightline in the RAF??? As altitude-challenged (read as: "DAMN, you're short!") as you are, I'm amazed you didn't get picked up and trashed as just another piece of FOD! < Helm, Zoojack Wormgate, EMERGENCY POWER! > -Grue Yes, my flatulent escapades are almost as bad as the famous CD, but I keep a low profile. I want to be known for something other than what comes out of my ass in at least *one* community! -DarthLuke Chazz IS a "younger" guy. It's all about perspective..... -obie099 Hey - Chazz can't help that he looks like George Lucas on vacation, can he? Give 'im a break! < Helm - what's that Zoojack ETA? > -Grue Great movie, I wish time & bandwidth allowed more. Everyone looked great, you'd scarcely know the lot of you are ruthless, LART-prone techs. -temp

20. I hate people. *ring* …. *ring* …. *ring* Me: “<LocalISP> This is Scoo—“<mute> *hack* *cough* *spit* ..--- ---- Note to self: Never answer the phone with a mouth full of sunflower seeds. Festering ball of stupidity: “Yeah, you guys are spamming us and I want it to stop. If it doesn’t, I’ll have to report you to SPEWS.” Me: “Hold on there sparky. Can I get your name and company first?” Annoyance that needs to be swatted: “My name is George and I work for ServerBeach. The IP address of the server is x.x.32.9.” Me: “That is one of our IP addresses, but the server is a webserver that hosts our user webpages.” George: “Well, it’s spamming me. I want you to stop it.” Me: “Since it’s a webserver, the only way that it could be spamming is if someone set up FormMail and is abusing the server. I’ll take a look at it and fix the problem if it’s happening. Please forward one of the emails to abuse@<localISP> and I’ll see if I can make it stop for you.” George: “No problem. I’ll forward the email but I’ll have to report the domain to SPEWS if you keep spamming me.” <click> A few minutes later, I get an email from this moron with a forwarded V1@gRa!! ad. No headers. Just the spam. My Reply: Would you please forward the message headers to me so that I can further trace the message? According to the logs on our servers, we have never sent such a message. Nitwit RE: There were no headers. Your server is spamming. My reply: The headers come from your server. If there were no headers, what makes you thing the message came from us? Ubertechie RE: This – From:jon133@<localISP>.com *blink* *blink* W….T…..F..? My reply: And how did you get the IP address that it was coming from? Hosting weenie RE: <NSlookup info for www.<LocalISP>.com> My reply: I have no response to that. WTF am I supposed to do with that? You look up my webserver’s IP address and tell me that it’s spamming based upon a return address on a Viagra spam email and threaten to report me to SPEWS? Go right ahead. They could probably use the laugh. Take some classes and call me back when you know something about the internet. Please stop wasting my time. While I was at it, I was interested in why he would mention spews, so I looked up ServerBeach’s IP addresses at www.spews.org. It seems that they’re all over the list. Lord save me from admins who think they know what they’re doing. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Sounds like they're trying to fix past mistakes - only they're not doing too well... I only wish I could answer abuse emails like that. -namor Readers Digest version. Spammer doesnt like spam? -burrkiss Wot, no spam? Yeugh!! </MP> Well, someone had to say it. -Gromit Holy crap. This is a perfect example of a little information being a dangerous thing. Please tell me you arranged to have this one tortured, scoob. -teivrann setup an email account that spoofs BillGates@Microsoft.com & send him lots 'o spam. With his mad skillz, he'll be taking on the big guy with the pet lawyers & a vault full of cash in no time. -Tekkie Awww, why didn't you give the whole email addy? I had almost a gig of goat/chewbacca/albino cat/midget pr0n to send him! Uh...I found that on the HD when I bought it, BTW... -mugglemage SPEWS can't be contacted. How is he going to report you to SPEWS? -Gerund

21. I must be a mutant. Mmmmm. The cloying odor of KFC hot wings gently wafts through my house. It’s made even more appealing by the fact that I didn’t have to cook it. I love being lazy. Sinking into my molded couch seat, I grabbed the remote and turned on the TV. Time to watch the NYPD Blue I recorded last night. I just love my DVR. Woo HOO!!! Just as the lieutenant is getting shot, the one-horned demon of interruption begins wailing at me. *grabs the phone* Caller ID says it’s my sister. *sigh* I hate familial responsibility. *Turns off ringer* ------- Then the demon’s little cousin starts screeching. *fark* It must be important. Wrong. She has a computer problem. Her Windows XP machine won’t shut down properly. So, I launch into the gateway of stupidity and ask, “What did you recently install?” “Nothing”, she responds. *sigh* Over the next 45 minutes I walk her through checking the event viewer, and booting into safe mode. All the while, my little niece (8 months) screams into my ear. “Can you call me back when the baby isn’t screaming? I think my brain is bleeding out my ears.”, I plead. “Kasey!!! Come take your sister! I need to do this!!!” – (I swear my cell phone vibrated out of my hand and my ear curled inside itself and refused to keep hearing. Switching the phone to my other ear, “OK, you can shut down from safe mode but not from normal mode. It has to be a device driver or a new software program that’s running at startup.” “Well, I did install a new firewire card last week.” Eureka! “….. that would be one of those device thingies that I asked you about an hour ago.” *sigh* I spent the next 30 minutes walking her through verifying that the device was actually the problem and installing the right drivers and software for it. Why did she need a firewire card, you ask? She just bought a new camcorder and it has a firewire port. ”It doesn’t have a USB port? I’ve never heard of that.”, I comment. “Oh it has both, but I don’t think you can do everything with just the USB port.” ”.... “ “……” *blink* *blink* ”Errrr…. Read the manual. Yes you can.” *click* Maybe I’m adopted. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments .......and WHY did you pick it up when it was going to the answering machine? I'm curious as I dont care about my family. -burrkiss Actually, Scoob, my sister has a DVR video camera that's firewire only. I know because I borrowed it once, and it drove me -nuts- trying to get it working. The manufacturer hid the firewire port on the camera so well that I had to download the manual to find it. -NightSteel ok yeah, you CAN do everything with USB, but given the option Firewire is far better, FW has a much better sustained xfer rate for one thing. Granted for the casual user USB is ok, but for any serious offline editing Firewire is the only practical option. -Digital Dogcow I'm pretty sure that Adobe Premiere only works with FireWire. -LaserGuru Samsung digital camcorders use USB to transfer still pics but to do video you have to have firewire. -Zayda I'm with Zayda on this one. Ditto with the Panasonic digital camcorders I've seen -CTYankee Actually, she is right. I have a Canon and the USB is for stills and the firewire is for video. NO video through the USB! =0( -sajwaite Now WHY would I wanna read the manual when I can just call you? -Spyder19 This is precisely the reason my mother only knows my cellphone number - and any call coming from her number is mysteriously missed by me as it falls through to voicemail. If it's actually important, she'll call one of my brothers and get them to pass on a message. -Geminii

22. What the HELL was that!?!? *beep* *beep* *beep* Har? Whatzzit? – “Can’t you just let me farking sleep?” I scream at the evil hockey-puck as I fling it against the wall. (The crash could have been more satisfying.) Just as I was snuggling back into my dreams.. *beep* *beep* *beep* (scratch that, not satisfying at all) I somehow managed to ignore it but it was starting to make my dreams a little… twisted. F&!@!! Fine! I’ll get out of bed. Sitting on the edge of my bed and staring at a glowing little screen is a pointless exercise at 2:30 in the morning. It took me at least ten more minutes to figure out that I needed my glasses to read the farking thing. F*ck! Mail server down. Do I really have to go in for a server that nobody uses until 7am? (I know. Dumb question.) If it isn’t up by 6am the boss’ll miss emails and I’ll hear about it. So I did the only rational thing. I went back to sleep for a couple of hours. When I finally got into work at 4:30am, I restarted the server and waited… and waited… and waited… OK, time to go find a computer that I can surf on. I picked one up at the front counter that was a shared computer for our techs. I quickly opened a command prompt and ran a ping against the server and just as quickly launched a web browser. Suddenly, I heard a sound that chilled me to the bone: “*Grragwargrapple wwwarrgggle roooopbm*” It was a deep voice. Raspy. Like a voice that had been exposed to brimstone for countless millennia. It came from right behind me. Again, I did the sensible thing. I leap out of my chair and screamed like a little girl. “WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT!!!! Who’s there? You can’t eat my soul!! I’m too young to die!!!” I listened……. I slowly stalked around the building looking to the telltale red glow. At the slightest glimpse of a floating eyeball I was gonna run“*Grragwargrapple wwwarrgggle roooopbm*” Again from right behind me. I spun around as fast as possible and dropped into a combat stance. Satan was nowhere to be seen. I stealthily whimpered to myself and started a room-by-room peek. The dark father again failed to materialize. Was I imagin.. “*Grragwargrapple wwwarrgggle roooopbm*” Hmm. It seems the great deceiver is trapped somewhere near the front door. It only makes sense. Our customers do linger there the longest. If anywhere could be considered a dark alter, our billing desk would. I creeped closer, ready to smite the evil one if necessary. All the while wondering, “Is it possible to kill beezulbub with a leatherman?” As I neared the receptionist's desk, he spake again. "Grragwar---*" I whirled and smote the mouse with a flying spin-kick and the screen flickered to life. Hmmm. No pea soup. No red glow. But yet, the prince of lies was silenced by my mighty blow. Strange. I checked the obvious first. I launched the screensaver. A peaceful underwater scene blossomed with cute little fishies swimming in their digital bliss. A cute little Dorie-like fishie swam into view. I soon discovered what I should have known all along. Dorie is a mere mortal vessel for the evil one. Her little fishie lips parted and, “*Grragbbgle wargrapple wwwarrgggle roooopbm*" To this day, I still have no idea what the dark father was trying to tell me. I do know that he robbed me of at least one more hour of sleep that night. From: Scooby111 (AKA your netadmin) To: All employees Subject: Downloading and installing unapproved software. Sent: Wed 11/17/2004 5:15 AM [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Oh I love it - great story. You had me wondering what was in there with you. -jard Could it be.... SATAN???? -RiffRaff The lady that flips the switches off found it for the receptionist. I remember them doing it, just didn't know that they didn't ask permission first. I always asked because I feared the wrath of Scooby111 and besides, it just makes good sense and is in the user agreement. -Paisley “Is it possible to kill beezulbub with a leatherman?” Crap, now we'll never know! -Tekkie Reminds me of a similar fish screensaver i had, left it on but was scared shitless i few minutes later when it emitted the following (and i shit you not) "Have you backed up your files today, i hope so" then the hard disk light flicked on. Did nothing but still -Armakuni yes, i remember that screen saver, isn't it a part of the disney collection? -areatech Satanstech should have the translation for you <HEG!> -MadJack Oh, well told indeed! I know too well the eerie feeling of being in a large deserted building in the early hours of the morning. Some of the noises are... unsettling. -LadySharky I can only hope that there weren't any Starfish in the background. Nah. Even the Prince of Darkness would shudder at the visual onslaught posed by a mindless cartoon character matched with a mindless luser. -LinuXtreme Reminds me of the night I was at work late playing DOOM. All the lights were out and I had the sound cranked up. Freaked the shit out of the cleaning lady. -VIPERsssss Johnny Castaway scared the crap out of me one evening. http://web.onetel.net.uk/~gnudawn/johnny/ -LaserGuru Most excellent story telling. And your dont really need to try and kill satan, just grab him by the balls and dare him to move. -burrkiss Sorry, can't translate it for you (I'd have to kill myself) But I will mention that I have Installed it on my StepMother's Computer! -satanstech "Bill is the Dark Lord! All Hail Bill" backwards @ 4.7 Mhz -TechnoScum Nice writing! You're giving SwedishChef and Coyote some competition! -thx1138 LMAO!!! I used to use the Win98 screensaver with fish and it gurgles...scared the hell out my ex boyfriend when he got up in the middle of the night to raid the fridge...Excellent Story! -BlondeGeek ?Is it possible to kill beezulbub with a leatherman?? HAHAHAH! That's hilarious. Makes me wanna redo "Video Killed the Radio Star" as "Leatherman Killed the Morningstar". Heh. I'm cracking myself up today. -Amiga5000 ROFL!!!! Nice one, Scooby! The mind plays such interesting tricks when it's still half asleep, eh? -ShortStuff

23. Why did the chicken cross the road? Deregulation of the chicken's side of the road was threatening its dominant market position. The chicken was faced with significant challenges to create and develop the competencies required for the newly competitive market. Accenture, in a partnering relationship with the client, helped the chicken by rethinking its physical distribution strategy and implementation processes. Using the Poultry Integration Model (PIM), Andersen helped the chicken use its skills, methodologies, knowledge, capital and experiences to align the chicken's people, processes and technology in support of its overall strategy within a Program Management framework. Accenture convened a diverse cross-spectrum of road analysts and best chickens along with Accenture consultants with deep skills in the transportation industry to engage in a two-day itinerary of meetings in order to leverage their personal knowledge management, both tacit and explicit, and to enable them to synergize with each other in order to achieve the implicit goals of delivering and successfully architecting and implementing an enterprise-wide value framework across the continuum of poultry cross-median processes. The meeting was held in a park-like setting, enabling and creating an impactful environment which was strategically based, industry-focused, and built upon a consistent, clear, and unified market message and aligned with the chicken's mission, vision and core values. This was conducive towards the creation of a total business integration solution. Accenture helped the chicken change to become more successful. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Sooo.... this means they screwed your company out of 2 Megabucks, too? -Captain Trips No, I think they held a picnic with the chicken as the center of attraction and then over-billed the head office for the event which they labeled as a meeting. -ecoli Then Accenture cooked him Extra Crispy and ate him with coleslaw, biscuits and a Biggie Coke..... -vacuumtubes Too... many... buzzwords... my head asplode. -Jerbear Why did eggshen cross the road? His dick was stuck in the chicken. -VIPERsssss The chicken's future was also forecasted. "You will soon be surrounded by friends and cranberries." -rokitt I put on my "Corporate double speak BS" sunglasses and your entire post disappeared... -chefque

24. I have no response to that… Dig thru the ditches and burn thru th<briiiinnnng!!> and slam in the <briiiinnnng!!> dragula! Do i<briiiinnnng!!>. Fine. <mute> “ISP this is Scooby111” “Yeah I need to talk to someone about my website.” OK. Are we hosting a commercial website for you or is it a personal website? “It’s my personal website.” OK, you need to talk to our webmaster let me transfer y— “No, it’s the server that’s screwing up. It’s giving an error.” OK. Let’s see. (Still the webmaster’s job but now I’m curious.) What’s your username? “Joeuser11. It’s giving me a 404 error.” Really? <looks up information> I don’t see anything uploaded. There’s no webpage ther— “I know! You guys didn’t do it!” Are you having problems uploading it? “Uploading? What do you mean? You guys are supposed to put it there!!” Wh--? Um? … … …. Errr? Ho--, wha? Ahhh, we just provide the space. You have to make the webpage and upload it. Or you can pay someone to do it. Letmetransferyoutoourwebmaster. <transfer> <unmute> [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Heh, I remember those calls - "Where's my website? You sumbitches charged me $19.95 for intraweb, and you damn well better give me my free website!"... -hkypipe Wow, scoob's having a bad hair day. - Nice avatar *grin* -teivrann Crap. Now I've gotta find a good pic to use. And yeah, I hate those calls, especially as we don't automatically put up some stupid placeholder page. -namor Admit it... You forgot to dispatch the magic elves didn't ya. You know the ones that sneak into your house at night. They upload your diary, photo album, illegal MP3 collection, etc..., and then put it all together into an edgy but visually pleasing web page while you sleep. Or do they make shoes??? I can never remember. -Hellion Thanks scoob. Now my cubicle mate is dead with a mutated bloated body and I'm coughing up electroprobes. Thanks a lot. Jerk. -DracoSuave oddly enougt i was lisening t dragula when i started to read the post :) -Harm

25. Inspired by MDB <cheesy Australian accent> New! Today only you can buy this hoooooommmme memory dump kit. Have you heard of all these computer people talking about "Physical Memory Dumps"? Are you tired of being left out of the digital revolution? Weeellll have we got a surprise for you! <shows axe and vacuum> It's the physical memory dump kit! How much would you expect to pay for a kit like this? $100? $200 More? Special, for today only, you can buy this cutting edge technology not for $200 or even $100. Not even for $50. In fact, call now, within the next 5 minutes and we'll deliver it absolutely FREE! We'll even throw in a technician to install it for you! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Axes are too messy... Use a power drill with a 1/2 inch core bit. :) -EagleEye <grabs magazine and heads for designated dump area> -LaserGuru "Bring out your dead... Bring out your dead" -Wolph There's nothing wrong with messy! I personally like my women the same way I like my coffee.(ground up and in the freezer) -Mathias ... thrown in a sack, tossed onto a donkey and hauled down the mountain by Juan Valdez! -LaserGuru cheesy australian accent?? -melsie By sucking on this wonderful thing, you can glow green and shoot lightning bolts out of your ass. Everyone wants to do that, and you can too! Just order now, the number is 555-5555-1455 but remember folks,you've got to dance on a coffee table and wear a lampshade for no reason. Don't have a lampshade... sucks to be you. From a Flash infomercial piss take about Aloe Vera. -fearmyroot

26. The day I got “Escorted” out. PT2 Soon, internet companies started to fall like the dreams of their investors. Our direct manager moved to greener pastures and we got a new manager from one of the failed companies. The new manager and our intrepid admin were soon at war. It was a war of words. The portly starfish spewed vile rhetoric at every opportunity. It wasn’t intelligent, thought-out rhetoric, it was literally vile. It seems that he was the worst type of Seattle nut-bag. A tree-hugging, violent, hypocritical hippie. I have nothing against those of the liberal persuasion, but he voiced his opinion at every turn. It was loud and how dare you to challenge it. Being of sound mind and libertarian persuasion, I tried to keep my opinions to myself. Alas, it was not to last. Within days, I was singled out as a target of vitriol. Within weeks, the economic ruin of my own company seemed written in stone. The rumors were true. One day, while I was filling in for the night shift, we got the directive that everybody was to be in the building at noon. Regardless of shift. I secured my weapon in my locker and waited patiently for high sun. At 11:30, I got the call to be in a “personal meeting”. When I arrived, the IT director was there and my manager sat across from me with a smug look on his face. It seems that I was one of the quarter of the company that was going to be looking for new employment tomorrow. My manager told me that he would have my personal effects mailed to me in short order. “I fear not sir. It is in fact illegal to do so. I will not suffer your hands to touch them. You may escort me out, but I will retrieve my personal items from my locker first.” We arrived at my locker. The manager stood beside me and eagerly looked at what I was removing. I reached for the lock and smiled an evil little smile. I then calmly opened my locker and removed my firearm. I just as calmly buckled it onto my belt. Silence fell. The only sound was his breathing and his feet striking the carpet as he gave ground a few feet. I could see his pudgy little hands clenching and the sweat on his brow seemed like rivulets. “Relax. It’s just a job.” Funny, he didn’t follow me out of the building. I wonder if he had more important things to do. Is that a brown stain I see? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments <cackle> Oh, to have been there... -namor 2 things: 1) When I started reading this, I thought it was a 'Chef story - very nicely written! 2) DAMN I'd have paid good money to see this asshat's face when you pulled the gun out! -karlata Bwahahaha... -Veinor I shouldn't have read this.....it still hurts a little to laugh. -wolfprince great, great story -rhiannon Well done scoob. Well done. Both the lart and the telling of it. -Rabbitt 'stead of "its just a job" wouldn't it have been fun to say "Make my day punk" -BritishBunny Now did I have two .40 LART slugs in there, or three? The question is: do ya feel lucky? Well...do ya, suit? -T23M HAAHAAHAAA!!! That's great! Bet the PHB had extra laundry to do...HA! -hkypipe And a yellow stain, too. -StarfishArthur For some reason, I can see this "person" trying to mail a firearm though the US Postal Service. ^^;; That would SO not be cool. -snowcrash I like this story. *contemplates requesting lockers at work* -NightSteel Ouch.. sucks you lost the job.. but, at the least that was.. an interesting situation. -Warrick Great story. It's a shame closet Libertarians such as ourselves cannot claim our own state somewhere. Maybe Wyoming? -RiffRaff Wyoming??? fuck that Rif'. We're taking Miami. By Force. Let the SF and the pensioners go live out on the grasslands. Scoob'. Top story. Too funny! :0) -Digital Dogcow Wonderful story Scoob! Note to self: don't piss off Americans - they have weapons. DD is fair game though...*runs like hell* -CommanderData Golden....absolutely golden -tuswole1 HAHA! I would have loved to see that! -ShortStuff

27. The day I got “Escorted” out. PT1 Sit back and relax my friends while I hearken back to the days of yore. When our intrepid necromancer was a mere neophyte playacting the part of network god. Our story begins some yeas ago during the beginning of the dot-com boom. I was elevated from my lowly roots as a helpdesk phone-monkey to the exalted position of NOC babysitter. A fairly new internet company installed my posterior on the night shift in a small room that was dimly lit by the glow of dozens of flickering CRTs. I toiled on the night shift for a paltry $25/hr for several months until I was once again exalted to the rank of “System Administrator”. Quickly did I learn that driving to datacenters at night was much more rewarding than waiting for the hand of doom to flash on a computer monitor. This particular job was in the heart of downtown Seattle. The emerald city. Does it shine like a jewel? Nay. It is called thusly because of the color. Yes, the very color of mold upon the human feces that inhabit the streets and spillways. Downtown Seattle is the armpit of the western world. Merely parking your chariot below the building I toiled in cost upward of $350 per month! Since I slaved in the absence of the sun, parking on the street was a possibility. Now, for a mere $2-3/day, I could have my chariot a mere two blocks away! What does that have to do with the story, you ask? I worked from 10pm to 10am. I was required to frequently travel to one of our two datacenters in the middle of the night to repair, replace, or install a $5000 piece of equipment. To safely facilitate this, I purchased a weapon and obtained a permit to carry it concealed on my person. (an H&K 40cal USP compact to be exact) I told nary a soul that this was the case and I went out of my way to avoid altercations when thusly armed. Soon, It was determined that one systems administrator (there were 5) should be on a semi-permanent day shift to help coordinate between other teams. I was chosen for that dubious honor. In addition to my regular duties, I was to fill in where needed when another admin took ill or needed a day of rest. I gladly hung my weapon at home only to be taken up again when I was temporarily shuffled into the night. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments A "paltry" $25???? Wow man what the hell are you making now! -BritishBunny Hey Scoob - $ 250 / month would be cheap for NYC - it was more like $ 400 when I left last year. I feel your pain, man. -StarfishArthur Interesting, seeing where this goes... -snowcrash

28. Do you like a good mystery? Pt2 It seems that my coworker can send email just fine to the client. Same Exchange servers. WTF?!? <Scratches head> Then he says something that rings a little bell, “I just sent some plain old text to it.” Plain Text!! OK, I try to send plain text…. Still undeliverable. Aaaarg! I have him send HTML. Goes thru. WTF? My messages don’t go thru, but his do? It’s like the remote server is just dropping SMTP connections from me only! <Scratches head> Drops connections? Exchange servers are supposed to send error responses. Not drop connections. Bing! Unless it’s not the Exchange server. I finally track down someone who can log into the client’s firewall. Bing! There are the messages! The firewall’s spam filter has them flagged as spam! WTF? Why just from me and my field tech? That makes no sense. It says that there’s a URL in them? WTF?? So I start checking the source on the HTML messages that I’m sending. There it is. %#*!(*!)(!((** Outlook 2003 will let you use Word as an email editor. The default is to format messages as HTML. In Office 2003, Fscking Microshaft added a hidden XML header that includes the URL: “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40”!! The Farking spam filters that the firewall company pushed down include that URL in it’s block list. Someone needs to die. Why the fark do you need an XML header in an email message? Why the fark would a reputable company add a URL to the block list without farking checking what it’s used for? Oh yeah, BTW. The field tech wasn’t an idiot. He was using Office 2002 (XP) and was not affected when he sent messages directly. Several of the computers at the client site were using the new Office 2003. They could send to us, but he couldn’t respond because the URL was in the header. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments does this help any? ('s all farkin greek to me) http://webservices.xml.com/pub/a/ws/2001/01/31/ccpp.html -Digital Dogcow ok i have to point out the entertainment value of a mystery comming from someone named Scooby. sorry i'm retarded today -rhiannon I'm just waiting for the obligatory "and I woulda got away with it too, if it weren't for those pesky kids" ...ooops! -Digital Dogcow You solved the mystery! You get a scooby snack!!! *runs for lart shelter* -JH Hah. I love figuring out stuff like that. But including a w3c URL in the spam list? Gnah. Are spammers now checking their HTTP for standards compliance? Yarite. -namor I'm really not a starfish, I promise! I probably didn't explain the problem that well, but I was at least vindicated.. -NightSteel Rank Rou Rhiannon! -mugglemage why do I have a sudden craving for anchovy pizza with pickled pinapple, and hot fudge sause? -wolfprince "Hello, World" in BASIC - 1 line. in VB - 1 MB. guess which is an M$ product. -Dj Microsoft? Reputable? -kman52000

29. Do you like a good mystery? Pt1 Good day ladies and gents. I love a good mystery in the morning. This morning, I got an email message from one of our field techs who was having a problem with email. He could receive email from one of our clients, but he couldn’t seem respond. He could send direct email messages, but just couldn’t reply. When he does, he gets a 550 error from our email server saying that it couldn’t connect to the remote server. <Scratches head> OK, let me see. I sent a test message to a test user at the client site. I got the same error message. OK, the field tech’s an idiot. I can’t send messages directly at all. I try several different email accounts and it still doesn’t work. I checked the blacklists to make sure we weren’t on it. I tried sending an email message from my hotmail account. It got thru fine. Then I terminal-serve into our Exchange server and check all the settings. Nope, it should be working fine. From the Exchange server, I try open a telnet session directly to the client exchange server and send a message manually. It works. <Scratches head> OK. It looks like something between our Exchange server and their Exchange server. I terminal-serve into the client’s exchange server and start looking for problems. There aren’t any. OK fine. I turn on message tracking on our Exchange server and resend the test message. The SMTP connection to the remote server is simply dropped. No error, just gone. Hmmm. <Scratches head> OK, time to bring another set of eyes into it and talk it out. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments thwap thwap McFly...hello anybody home? -Starfury

30. Frontpage script-kiddie goodness. Ok, really. I want to know. How hard is it to follow freaking instructions? I work at a local ISP and we offer 10MB of webspace for our dial-up customers. Not many people use it, so we only set up the webspace for those customers that specifically ask. Last week, I was contacted by a customer that “has his own website that he programmed himself” and he wants to set up a personal webpage. He used all the right terms on the phone with me; SSL, FTP, redirects, offsite links, he even threw in some actual code. Great! I set up the FTP account while I was on the phone with him. I gave him his FTP username and password (same as his dialup) and told him how to connect and where to put his website. I even directed him to the step-by-step instructions on how to do it. It sounds like he really does know what he’s doing right? ……….. Wrong. From the actual set-up instructions: FTP to users.isp.com This is the server where your home directory is located. Enter your login name (username). Enter your password (without username and password you will not be able to access your personal directory. Your default directory should be /web The main (default) web page in your directory should be named "index.html" or "index.htm". This will keep the URL for your page shorter. Your personal URL will be http://users.isp.com/~username The index.html or index.htm file will automatically be opened when this URL is requested. <end cut/paste> I get no less than 5 calls from this guy over the next three freakin’ days. First he can’t figure out how to connect. Then he can’t get his website uploaded. Finally, it just doesn’t work. On the last call, I finally FTP’d into his website myself and started fixing stuff. It seemed like it should work. I puttered around for a while before I backed up a level by habit. There it was. The farker had actually renamed his “web” directory “index.html”! The kicker? He’s bills himself out as a farking “Web Developer”! The fscker makes more money than I do to fscking design there things and then needs my help to fscking make them work! Aaaaarg! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Know *exactly* how you feel. We've got rid of the subdirectory requirement for personal webspace, making it easier... too bad we still get the *same* thing from professional web designers and live domains... -namor If that guy earns more than 0.01p more than me, I will kill him DEAD! -Dj I would have slapped this bastard hard and drew down on him with a saber, that's just me. -Warrick How on earth does he manage to earn money for such crap is the great question? -CommanderData I get this about one a week, but usually people add on their username as the upload directory, hence adding a another level to the url. In fact today I had a guy who had made a frontpage web site and called wanting make it live. Only problem he knew nothing of web hosting, domains, or what he was doing. Sen't him to business sales and let them over charge him -MightyMouse i hate people like this, they know nothing, can talk big and impress lower forms are SF then rekly on US to help them get 8X as much as we get payed. -Harm With instructions like that, my eight-year-old who doesn't like following directions could probably do it in about five minutes... -snowcrash "So easy an 8 year old child can do it. GET ME AN 8 YEAR OLD CHILD!" </Groucho> -Captain Trips Lol Captain! -StarfishArthur

31. Charter cable... Monday morning, I left my driveway and noticed a Charter cable truck behind my house. It seems that they were tapping the line for a new install. Uh oh. Oh well. I have such good signal, I’m not worried about it. When I got home Monday evening, my cable was snowy and the sound was cutting in and out. I couldn’t even get the basic channels, only the digital ones. It sounded like a signal level problem to me so I did the typical starfish thing and I started troubleshooting. I plugged a TV directly into the line where it comes into the house and I could get the local channels now, but they were still a little fuzzy. OK. I went back to my main TV and I removed the splitter that I had installed and plugged the TV directly into the wall outlet. Again, I could now get the local channels, but they were fuzzy. It sounded like the signal had now dropped to a point that a single TV was marginal and a second TV was impossible. So, like any good starfish, I called Charter Communications. The guy I talked to was quite knowledgeable and listened to my troubleshooting steps. He accepted that I had done them and he really had nothing else to add, but when I mentioned that a Charter Cable truck was there that morning, he seemed a little concerned that something had happened. OK, no problem. Stuff happens. We scheduled for a tech to come out the next day from 12-2. No problem. Kudos BTW to the first tech I worked with. A+++++++ Would do business with again!!!! Fast-forward to the next day. – I got home for the appointment at 11:59am and waited until 2:02pm for the cable guy who never showed. Understandably, I was a little pissed. When I got back to work, I called Charter again and told them what happened. The lady that I got apologized and offered me a $20 discount on my next bill. WTF? $20 Two hours shot and they do $20? I’d bet their cable installer makes a hell of a lot more than that. I debated demanding more money but I stopped myself before I took it out on the poor tech that had nothing to do with it. She also assured me that she was going to notify his supervisor and he’d be disciplined. OK, whatever, I really don’t care. I declined to schedule another appointment since I don’t know when I’ll be able to take 2 hrs in the middle of the day again. Just before she closed the call, she asked me if I’d be interested in high-speed internet. WTF? So, this goes out to all the cable techs out there and Charter techs specifically. Was she just blowing smoke when she said that she’d notify his supervisor? Is it standard procedure to offer $20 for a missed appointment? Did she really thing that I’d consider internet service when they couldn’t even get me enough signal for one TV, or was she just following the script? Does the burnt umber top go better with my pants than the paisley one? Enquiring minds want to know. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments I like the burnt umber, personally. Ten to one, she was banging her head of her monitor while giving the obligatory for sake of keeping her job sales pitch. Go-go gadget CQA -Dragones Comcast offers $25 if their techs miss the 2 hour window. And if they call and say they'll be late, and are even later than they estimated, it's another $25. -minda Hey scooby, just quit there today. She's blowing smoke most likely. If you are in the Midwest or Great Lakes or LA region, you probably got my call center. Call back and ask for a advocate. This will likely take 30 minutes of your life, but only an advocate can fix this. Do NOT threaten to sue, they will immediately disconnect your call. Just give the first teir people your account info and ask for an ADVOCATE specifically. -Zentar I work for Mediacom, so I cannot say for sure what their policy is. We do offer $20 ontime guarantee, the tech could have gotten fucked on a prev 'easy install' job and took a extra hour (just happened to me) and get behind schedule. I try at least call to tell the customer im running late, but sometimes i just lose all track of time trying to fix the shitfuck that the last guy (probably a #^! contractor) made cause he wanted out 5 minutes early. -burrkiss 1-yes, especially if it was a Charter tech. 2-yes. That requires a KMS form, ask if it's been filled out. 3-QA nazi requirement. Script. 4-Whatever gets you off the phone. ;) I'm so fucking glad I quit. BTW, he probably cut through your line. Prepare for a 3 week wait. Tech will DEFINATELY not show up! -Zentar 1. Unlikely, but may have contacted dispatch to see what happened. 2. Yes, if the customer is mad enough (and yes, we're aware that offering $20 is insulting enough to piss you off even more, we have no choice). 3. Script, hopefully, she's a SF if not. 4. Oh, <insert deity of choice> my eyes, MY EYES! -attilathehen

32. And exactly what am I supposed to do? (Beep!) Sh!t who’s farking paging me now? Scoooooobie? (the dulcet tones of our operator drift into my ears like a rasp drifts into tin can) Yemff? (chew, chew, chew, …gullllp) Ummm. Yes? Line one. Have fuuunnn. (Red alert. All hands to battle stations! This is not a drill!) I shakily reached my had toward the demon of despair. “EvilISP. This is Scooby speaking. How may I help you?” ”What was your name?” “Scooby. How ca-“ ”One of your users is posting pornography online and I want to stop it.” ”Ok. Umm. Can you give me some more details? Where is he posting the pornography? What website?” ”I run a website where people can post advertisements about selling goats. The website is www.goatsforsalesomething.com Your customer posted pornography on my website.” Must… resist… urge… to… comment… about… goats… “Umm. OK. What’s his IP address, what time did post it, and what exactly did he post?” ”The IP address is x.x.x.x and it was Wednesday the 9th.” ”That’s one of our dial-up IP’s. I need an exact time. What did he post?” ”He posted www.pornnation.com/something/somethingdirtysounding at the bottom of his post.” Ok bub, why the fark should I care? “He posted a link? Was it kiddie porn or something?” ”No, it was just some porn. It goes against my site policy to post anything pornographic. I want it stopped.” ”Let me get this right. He posted a link at the bottom of his advertisement that is against your acceptable use policy. You want it stopped. He presumably posted his phone number at least on the advertisement.” ”Yeah. It’s against our website policy.” ”Sir, it is our policy to protect the identity of our customers. The customer in question didn’t post a picture, didn’t post a link to kiddie porn or anything illegal, and didn’t violate our acceptable use policy in any way. It is your responsibility to monitor and police your own website. Why not just block him from posting to your website?” ”To do that I’d have to block your entire range of IP addresses since he has a dynamic IP address.” ”Why not just revoke his user ID? You could also just remove the offending post or filter submissions for objectionable content.” ”We don’t use usernames or logons and I don’t know how to set up a filter like that.” (Rubs hands together evilly.) “Well sir, there’s nothing I can do to help you. Maybe you should call the user in question. It’s possible that they don’t even know that they posted something pornographic. It could be a disgruntled employee or someone trying top besmirch their name.” ”Fine. I’ll give them a call.” (Click) Heeh, heeh, heeh. Log on to website… post my own advertisement. Goatse sounds good for a goat site. (BFEG) [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments What is the URL? -nwqefio C'mon give up the URL <EG> -Hellion Nice. Serves 'em right if they can't even implement some basic security controls. -namor Oh - and any bet he's enough of a Luser to actually filter all of your dynamic space, just to 'spite' you, if he can? -namor It's the new national anthem... "Do it for me!" -teivrann damn scoob, that's just sick! (wanders off smiling at the thought of the site admin when he sees goatse) -wolfprince I thought goatse is down.. -Coward But I'm not going to make sure of that ;) -Coward It's been suspended, but there are several mirrors... (I'll let you do the searching) -scooby111 engh im lazy. thanks for the read tho :D -burrkiss Fine... http://www.greatgoats.com/goat_ads.html -scooby111 OoOOo, he's left pissy messages on his page! What did he expect, when he's got links to "Eating Goat Meat"?! -Tekkie Awwwwww he poutin' "The FREE Goat Ads area has been closed temporarily. Why? Because someone thought it would be fun to post pornography links on my site and I feel obligated to upgrade my software to allow me to filter this crap out. Check back later for a new classifieds area." -BritishBunny mmmm. Eating goat meat. I wonder if my family has any that are handy to butcher. </past hick lifestyle> Sad thing is, there's a very good chance I used to know whoever runs that website. And this attitude is COMPLETELY typical of lots of goat breeders. -nicky My idiot middle-brother hosts an annual GoatRoast in the PacNW for his Drunken Biker Gang & Gormet Cooking Society -satanstech Damn Scoob - you are good! -CommanderData

33. Ok, a link that really pisses me off. Maybe the proper place to post this is in the links section, but it’s easier to invite discussion here. One of our wise and distinguished jurors here in the states has decided to weigh in on an internet issue that he has no clue about. (Surprise!) Currently, it’s only a temporary order, but I foresee more to follow. http://www.merit.edu/mail.archives/nanog/msg05815.html Care for a 10GB routing table anyone? IP shortages? There will be now. I can just imagine the phone calls now trying to explain to a customer what an IP is and why they don’t need to move it. AAAAARRRRGGGGGG! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments OK, so why would some waste of flesh want to take an IP Address w/ them when they leave an ISP????? -duckhead Because everybody KNOWS their IP address!! Duh, it's like a phone number right? /sf thinking. -MamaTech I blame the cell phone companies for making phone numbers portable!! Now the fish think the same should work with IPs, argh! -Tekkie Check the details. This guy's trying to get his ISP company away from a company that is providing the ISP's bandwidth and IP adddresses. The providing company has been trying to buy his company using dodgy business practices (changing payment terms from net 30 to net 5, raising their price 33% while stating refusing to agree will result in a higher price hike in the near future, threatening termination of services, refusing to accept the contract termination notice as provided for in their agreement, etc.). All he wants is time to relocate his customers from the IP range in question, and he's willing to continue to pay for the IP's during the time it takes to move. I'm all for this. -maciarc It still sets a really bad precedent. -Hellion maciarc, where are you finding your details? I'd like to see that myself. -NightSteel sh route...</me>cries -CiscoJones Holy mother of <deity>....clearly they haven't bothered to ask what the implications of this are....and as maciarc said, BAD precedent to have set. -karlata I mean as Hellion said.....too much blood in my caffeine stream. -karlata Link to actual court papers: http://tinyurl.com/3aah7 It makes more sense if you can plow thru the 36 pages of the affidavit (the 1st 20 cover it, the remainer are Exhibits). -Tekkie

34. Webhosting update We responded to the customer and told her our pricing plan and set up her account. This is her response: Thanks for the info, I'd like to sign up immediately, but do you buy the domain name as a part of the startup cost of $125, or, do I have to buy it myself? I am on a comcast DSL line, and, my site is small (only one or two pages). I only need one or two email addresses, so, that isn't an issue for me, so, it seems the 9.95 or 19.95 would work. I'd love to have [lastname]services.com. Sounds like I need to code in Unix friendly language for such things as hit counters, and secured web pages....I've tried to do the .htaccess files for [Client Company](they use Frontpage 2000), and I can't get the three files to upload to the remote site! Notes: We use a Unix server as our web server so Frontpage extensions aren’t enabled. We set up a shell account for all commercial web services and an FTP logon. If you’re a web developer, shouldn’t you know how to use FTP? What exactly is the difference in coding for a Unix-Friendly environment as opposed to a Windows environment. Sure, PHP as opposed to ASP, but it’s not like you can code ASP with frontpage anyway… I foresee many headaches in our webadmin’s future. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments She knows what Unix is? Reeeeeaaaally...... hmmmm... ^.- My mousie-sense is tingling. I suspect she's throwing words around.... :P -mousie Yeah, the girl in Jurassic Park knew what Unix was, too. Or claimed to... -teivrann Didn't some girl in Wayne's World also know UNIX? -ltu1542hvy I see more funny posts coming from this person... -CommanderData No, I don't expect 'web developers' to know FTP, or even HTML. When I start troubleshooting a site, one of the first questions I ask is whether they use FTP or frontpage. If they can't even answer *that*, I default to frontpage-specific responses... -namor The only difference I have seen between Windows and Unix hosting is case-sensitivity. Well, that and the fact that Windows sucks, but we all knew that one...<g> -virtualchoirboy I find it enlightening that those hosting providers have two different fee scales. Linux hosting: $40, $60, $90 per month based on complexity. Windows 2000 hosting: $150, $200, $400/month based on complexity. Sure, I want to pay 3 to 5 times as much for the... privilege... of using Redmond products. -chazz Web developers don't use frontpage. "Web developers" use frontpage. There's a light-year of difference. -TakynRun I used Front Page to do the initial design of gntvmin.org. When I added PHP code to each page, everything got messed up to where Front Page was nothing more than a $149 version of Notepad. Macromedia Dreamweaver, however.... -cecil36 DW rocks! I really loved Symantec Visual Page, but they dropped it. I hate doing tables by hand. -LaserGuru

35. RANT $#@$%%!! When you’re standing in line and interacting with a customer service representative, here’s a helpful hint. Get off the FUCKING phone you stupid BINT!!! Not only is it rude to the person who’s helping you, but it pisses off everybody behind you when you take longer than Moses did to find the promised land. While I’m at it: If you sit next to me and use your oh so cool Nextel phone while I’m eating, you may find yourself unable to use your hands for at least a week. Breeep!! </rant> [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments I'm with you on that one...I HATE those neck-tell phones. Every time I hear one of those things, I want to strangle someone. -leonine (bah-links) .. You'll need to educate me on the specific model.. -Warrick <shamlessly adapted from a Jack Dee standup routine> Snatch the phone out of their hand and say "I want you to take this call....<throw phone as hard as you can>...over there" -Digital Dogcow LOL @ DD! -sassicatz Bucket of water for repeat offenders -CommanderData I'm with Warrick on having never heard of Nextel. However, I'm in COMPLETE agreement BEYOND 100% about the incredible rudeness of chatting on the phone WHILE beind served. It is the HEIGHT of ignorance. IM(not)HO -mousie Technology has progressed so fast that it has outstripped society's rate of adaptability. Combine that with the "do what feels good" school of thought prevalent in the so-called 'developed world' today, and what do you expect? For a funny take on this, check out the start of this Dave Barry column: http://tinyurl.com/3clzy -CTYankee

36. A tale from the days of yore Pt2 Several minutes passed, and I had forgotten the gentleman, when said decrepit wrinkled one stormed back into my presence. A pale, shaky arm threw a half-eaten meal upon the counter. “This is horrible!”, he exclaimed. Knowing full well what complaint would pass his lips, I asked the inevitable. “Is there some defect in your meal?” “The spices burn my tongue! This is neigh poison!” “Sir, I gave you warning that it was hot on the palate and you denied my advise. Would you like a different choice?” He declined my offer and made his demand. “I want my payment returned!” “Sir, I will not return your payment. The food was bartered in good faith and it was delivered in proper condition. That you could not stomach it after being warned, is thy own fault.” “But how was I to know the degree of the spices that were added?”, he said. He leaned over the counter to punctuate his point. “I am a man with many years. My palate is tender. Your offering could have caused an irrecoverable condition in me.” That seemed highly doubtful. I curbed my acidic response and replied. “The picture of the item that you used to make your selection has gouts of FLAME springing from the breaded poultry. The word ‘Spicy’ is prominently displayed in no less than 10 places throughout this establishment when referencing the dish. I personally warned you that it may be unpleasing to your palate. You will NOT have your payment returned!” His fists shook with impotent rage and his lips quivered as he pondered how to convince me of my error. I turned my back and continued about my business. “I will not be back!” [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Good thing you didn't end up like that dude from Fast Times at Ridgemont High! -ltu1542hvy going to a renisance fair anytime soon? -DedSysOp Hm. Same joint that owns Horton's, if I'm not mistaken. Sounds like a true donut to me - he was in the wrong place! -Grue Hey Scoob.. how come you aren't writing instead of doing Tech Support work? <g> hehe.. I liked the style that was done in, well done. -WhiteTiger Yes Tiger, and that old gent's mouth was well done after eating that spicy sandwhich! Oh Scoob of the silver fingers and slobbery tongue, give us more of this excellent prose! -CyBear scoob, you should do medivel stories, that was a wonderful rendition of a modern jackass, told with an old time flavour! Only proves that the villiage idiot has existed throughout the ages! "FETCH ME MY WATER WENCH!" LOL!! -Zentar I like the sound of that - I want a water wench, nowwwwwwwww... -namor *splashes namor with bucket of water, waits for him to turn into another mammal, runs away* -snowcrash Back in the days when I managed a Art House Cinema we showed a film called "Robert Having His Nipple Pierced" and believe me that really was all that film was about (if you ever see it on video get it. The sound track by Roberts GF is hilarious) A family, Mother Father and Daugheter came in and bought tickets. 15 minutes into the screening they appeared at the Box Office demanding their money back as the film was disgusting. "What is the title prominently displayed all about? And what is it you have seen so far ?" No you cannot have a penny piece back. -Zoomer Oh well done sir! Very erudite discourse! <golf clap> -BritishBunny Zoomer- Ever seen "A Boy and His Dog"? -LaserGuru Ah, yes, A Boy and His Dog, a movie that definitely ends in good taste. -Captain Trips Someone call for a water wench? *Turns hose on* -CommanderData **YOU HOSER!!*** </Bob & Doug McKenzie> -CTYankee

37. A tale from the days of yore Pt1 Come with me my gentle Lords and Ladies to a time before the current epoch. A time of darkness and evil that is known as pre-tech. It was a dim and dreary part of my life that I refer to. I had just renounced the warrior’s creed and laid down my weapons of destruction and picked up tools of instruction. My belief was that I was on a wonderful new path toward enlightenment. I was poised on the edge of a new chapter in my life. The opening passages were written in hope and dreams of a lifetime spent learning and creating digital masterpieces and selling them to fuel my worldly aspirations. This institute, this edifice of learning that I aspired to become a part of was, alas, demanded deeper pockets than my measly resources could muster. Thus, I swallowed my pride and turned my evening hours toward manual labor. What manual labor was I to find in the small burg to which my parents had retired? Why, the only thing available of course. I submitted myself to a food-service establishment with a curious picture of a fire-haired girl on the sign. I toiled for several months at the food establishment and, being quick-witted and fast of hand, I was elevated to the position of night manager. This particular establishment had a propensity for introducing new products in order to lure new customers into the establishment. This was not normally a cause for alarm. Not until, that is, certain spices were added to the new products. Some of you may know of what I speak. When certain peppers and spices are mixed into a breading that is then applied to a breast of chicken, a recipe for disaster has been forged. This new food, a noxious brew for some and sweet bliss for others, was quite a financial boon for my betters. Now we come to the point of my tale. One warm summer evening, an elderly gentleman visited our humble establishment. He inquired at the counter and asked if the new chicken dish was palatable. Since the regular clerk was indisposed in the privy, I had the fortune of responding to his inquiry. “It is pleasant to my taste sir, but it has strong flavor due to the peppers and spices that are added. It may not be to your liking. Do you like fiery spices?” He replied that he did, and besides, it should not be very strong as many people do not like spices. This reasoning raised my ire. “Please sir, it is very strong. As I said, it is pleasing to my taste, but I know of many people who cannot stomach the peppers and spices.” “Bah”, said he. He then demanded of me to prepare the very same poultry in question for his consumption. Being only a slave, I acquiesced. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments You are a better man than I, sir. I lasted only one day in the ninth level of hell that is this establishment of which you speak. <shudder> Then it was back to delivering pizzas for me. -RiffRaff I lasted three days at Hardee's. On the third day, with no training and no idea of what the hell the system was, I quit. If I ever have a restaurant of my own, people WILL GET TRAINED ON HOW TO DO THE JOB! *grumble, grumble* -snowcrash I only lasted one night at Hardees. Nearly sliced my finger off after about two hours on the job. -ltu1542hvy Laid down your weapons of destruction? If anything I have picked up MORE of those post-tech. -AceOfShades

38. OK, role call... It's been a while since we've done this. What is the meaning of your handle (AKA: nick) and how did you come up with it? Some of you are obvious (ie RTFM, RiffRaff), but I can't figure out others. Mine is a combination of my son's nickname and my daughter's birthday (Jan 11). [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Ok. I’ll start this off. Was then BF (now hubby) Rabbitt’s birthday. He had a thing about Samantha Fox (Big page 3 girl in England) so I bought him a poster of her, dressed in Playboy Bunny costume and turned up at his birthday party to ask him would he rather have a three-dimensional BritishBunny or a two-dimensional Samantha Fox. We’ve been married a while now, he chose right! -BritishBunny ewspy87 - electronic warfare spy 87 - i was in electronic warfare/military intelligence while in the army and my high school graduation year (1987) holds more meaning than the year i grduated college. -ewspy87 AD&D character name from 20 years ago. -maciarc I was always a big fan of Ogre and GEV from Steve Jackson Games. I'm a tech. I'm also a 6'2", hulking, shaved head, monster. Just "Ogre" or "Tech" would have been dull, so "TechOgre" was born! It's also such a weird name that I have never seen it duplicated... 8-) -TechOgre Well, mine all starts with me trying to find an original hotmail address. One that hadn't been taken several hundred times already. I tried just about every fantasy fiction character I could think of, but to no avail. I finally decided to try flapjackboy because I like to bake flapjack and lo & behold, no-one had gotten there before me... -flapjackboy Derived from the character race I played in an MMORPG called "Asheron's Call 2" -JoeLugian I was nicknamed Bear in my previous occupation. I'm big, used to be bearded, and I growl when pissed off. When I journeyed into Cyberspace, it was a natural jump to CyBear. -CyBear Combination of being an (ex) database admin, a serious ST:TNG fan and liking a name that would confuse people as to my gender. -CommanderData Overworked day, lack of imagination, current job position and I already had the hotmail addy from trying to sell refurbed printers. I also had a lot of Army training on various laser systems. -LaserGuru Leonine is a word meaning "of or like a lion" and was actually pulled from the lyrics of the Elton John version of "I Just Can't Wait to be King". My original handle was Scar (not here, but on some other sites) but after a few years I felt like I needed to shift to something that wasn't quite as dated. -leonine ghetto chicks on the internet. -putahtek Boing but true, my middle name is Montgomery so just shorten that and there you are. -Zoomer Grew up in SE asia on a small island (7th largest island actually) and was friends with lots of the natives. Kelemit is an actual native name, and not a borrowed name from "western" cultural influence of tourists, expat workers, etc. I wanted something different and unique. I was pretty sure it would be on the www. :) -kelemit errr.. wouldN'T... /sigh -kelemit short for tom servo from mst3k dates back to making fun of horribly bad assembliys in highschool -Servo "X" is an unknown, and a "spurt" is a drip under pressure. Describes how I feel at work most days. -xspurt Mine is a blatant rip-off of Tom Lehrer. On one album, he talked about a guy who was such an individualist that he spelled his name Hen3ry...the 3 being silent,you see. I liked it, plagiarized it and Da5ve was born. -M5e -da5ve Warrick is the name of on of my favourite modern character concepts. A quintessential summary of a lot of different things which interest me significantly :) -Warrick Mousie has a long long story behind it. has something to do with an old forum I used to post excessively and roleplay in. It was a nickname bestowed upon me by another member. -mousie Combination of my alter ego/alias as a ring announcer for a local wrestling promotion and my current job. Stylin' Steve Jackson + internet support tech = Stylin' Techie -StylinTechie It's a combination of my nickname (my name's Rob - go figure?) and a year that seemed sufficiently far in the future when I started using it in the mid-'90s. I never changed the year, so as I get older, so will my nick... :) -Robster2001 My original membership subscription here was a gift from my b/f. He asked what user name I wanted. I couldn't come up with a thing, so he named me after Neal Stephenson's book. It fits, somehow, being named after a fictional virus... -snowcrash Started as the fact that I adore H.P. Lovecraft...then I saw the Summer Fun Cthulhu plush..I have that exact outfit and used to wear it to work (Hawaiian shirt, shorts, sandals panama hat) oh, and I am working to further the return of the elder gods to rule the universe. ;) -ChildofCthulhu Last name is long and takes up far too much of a signature block, so I shortened my first name in my standard signature to "Chas" after Chas. Addams, whose New Yorker cartoons were the basis for the Addams Family TV show (and later movie). Somehow, as I wandered around the Internet that became --chas, and that changed to -chazz My name was randomly generated from age of empires online. It made me laugh so hard I was crying, so natually I took it. Plus it's unique, so no need for numbers on the end. -ShiftedBeef I wanted to post something or comment, I forget which, and was totally stumped as to what to put. I just added "I'm a guy"+the model car I was driving, a Toyota Paseo. Stupid, really, 'cause I wrecked it a month or two later... -PaseoGuy Mine's quite simple; I'm usually a SysAdmin so one of the few people with Admin/root access. I tend to be a rather 'old school' BOFH so people fear my retribution for yet again buggering up the production systems... fearmyroot. -fearmyroot I work at a retail where if you've got questions, we have responses. And I didn't feel I had the ego enough to put 'man' on the end of it, so 'Answerboy' it was. (none of my nicknames from other forums really fit this one). -Answerboy <not to self: try to be less boring> -Tekkie GOt my Nick way back playing quake TF ( think 56 k modems as fast and a ping of 255 as average) Played a Heavy weapons under the nick Flanker - after monthes of playing and being on the leaderboard for my defensive capabilities - an inside joke was started. it was a joke not to get into my way ( or anywere within range of my chaingun cannon)and evetually turned into "Harm's Way" - and eventually to take the joke to far i changed my nic to Harm. -Harm well i am in the IT field in the army I am now offically a Sgt(i was lying for a littlebit) and I am from Arkansas -SGTARKyTEK Used to run a freelance thing on the side of my retail job <ugh> Called it <Lastname> Technologies (I know...lame) Made a shortened email address for that purpose, ttech@<domain.net> for customer use, but developed more into a personal email account as my Hotmail was filling up with Junk. -ttech A combination of who I work for and a favorite condiment. -HPsauce Talen is my nickname from my first RPG character and the Toys part is because I buy and sell toys on ebay. Hence Talen's Toys -TalensToys Mine is just my handle for some videogames I play (Morrowind, Achaea [don't play anymore, but will play Listernia, made by same company]). -Veinor If you read David Gemmell you will get mine if not it was a chr from a novel...a Amoral Assassin kinda -Waylander A nickname i Earned when i worked for a food joint and it stuck since. I even have a friends mother that calls me goof(i don't know if she even knows my name :P) -Goofy A nickname i Earned when i worked for a food joint and it stuck since. I even have a friends mother that calls me goof(i don't know if she even knows my name :P) -Goofy Actually, Scoob, I didn't get my nick from RHPS, although I am a fan. My ex wife came from a well-to-do family, while I was the country hick son of two music teachers. Ergo, she was bringing riffraff into the family. It became an inside joke and online screen name for me during my IRC days. I decided to keep it even after my divorce since everyone knew me by that nick. -RiffRaff I'm a Trek fan, and I thought it would be unique. -ThirdOfFive my first name is romana. add a devotion type tie in to dr who. obvious, really:))) -timelady The other service I was on wouldn't let me use any of the character names for the "Taken", so I went with something not related to the "Black Company". I still had to ad 5 s's, though. -VIPERsssss *Obvious* 1. I work in eft/epos h/desk, all the machines we support/service - approx 8 - all have manuals - guess what the s/fish don't read. 2. When first started in this job, 1 naively asked why the E.U's did not read the manuals, basically got laughed at. 3. Usually i find myself flicking through the appropriate manual for a machine, so that i understand what the starfish are *trying* to do to them. -RTFM In high school and college I drank too much, and I had a rep for being verbally aggressive when I got drunk. My friends liked to call be JARD; it used to stand for "Just a Raging Drunk" but now that I have a family, and don’t drink heavily anymore, I would rather it stand for “Just a regular dude” -jard Mine comes from a Grateful Dead song, "Uncle John's Band". There's a line that goes, "What I want to know is are you kind?". The term 'Kind' has a couple of different meanings in the Deadhead community, all of which I'm proud to say fit me :) It's been my nick since I first got online in 1998. -Jenzkind Well, my nick started as a comment that became a D&D charter's name, then a lifestyle (or lifestyle -> comment -> character name) -Oblivious It's a variation on the name of the cattery where one of my cats was born (Sassichatz). -sassicatz One long boring 6 months in the middle of the Persian Gulf myself and several shipmates got on a Wing Commander kick. It was my characters call sign and then I started using it on BBS's and eventually the internet. -Hellion In the Bible, Mathias was the thirteenth disciple; the one choosen by the remaining eleven to replace Judas (and we're not going to get into my fascination with Judas here). There is a school of thought taht says Paul was really the one God choose to replace Judas. Mathias kinda fades into the woodwork. He's the one no one talks about...though that dosen't necessaraly make his ministry any less valid...more of a background player. That seems to be where I do my work...behind the scenes. I'm a supporting player, not the leading man. -Mathias I have had many Nicks, depending where I frequent. In MMORPG's I am Azrael or Carrot. In more FPS and Unreal types I am SgtAtArms or some variant. But here I am BoxOfFrogs. Reason is this. I used to for as a deck hand / bar person on a local pleasure boat. Because I ran around so much I was told I was as Mad as a Box of Frogs. And it stuck. For those that have never seen a box of frogs, the madness is that they "climb the walls" rather than jump out. -BoxOfFrogs My is also simple as scooby111. My name is chaz & my wife's name is donna. Hence... -Chazdonna Young Frankenstein. Changed the 'i' to a 1 make it different. Plus I used it once before on IBM message board but had to yank it off cuz it wasn't a proper business name. I thought it was safer than my first choice - 'Belzebub'. -ab1normalh Rocky= love of rock music and collects rocks Tech=... well you get the rest ;-) -rockytech I got mine bucause as my kids say, I'm really, really old. -geriatric When I started here at C*x I had to pick something as all the possible combinations of my real name were taken. At the time I was staring at a Trinitron monitor, I had just seen part of the movie Tron and I have spent most of my life working with elec-trons and neu-trons so I picked Tron. I have operated 5 nuclear reactors and repaired over 15,000 welding machines and plasma cutters and now after 4 yeares here I have worked over 25,000 SF's puters so Tron is appropriate. -atomicbill Oh, Tron is my nick at work. Here at TSc it is what someone used to call my because of my nuclear background. -atomicbill I needed a nick when ICQ started of, so I started with cyber(space) surfer and then shortend it to C-Surfer with a play on sea and C.... -CSurfer Zentar, AKA QueenZentar, is the name of a character I imagined about 7 or 8 years ago while in high school. I used to write stories about her adventures. Ironically, there's a Wiccan Priestess who wrote a poem about a character with the same name. I emailed her in early 1999 and asked her about the name. So yeah... -Zentar I REALLY like dragons, and at the time, for some reason, it wouldn't let me have Dragoness, so I dropped an s. I also have the mentality of a dragon, (Oh, shiny!) and the temper of one. -Dragones Rednexx-an after sundown party campsite at the country music festival voted in 2002 (by penthouse)as the #3 place in the world to get laid + I did some tech support for the guys that run the campsite - I still go there and i still Tech -rednexxtech Mine is yet another simple one - girl geek *drumroll* - GeekGirl. Of course my other nicks that I don't use here need some explaining, but I'm not going into those :) -GeekGirl Given to me by my first wife. I'd say why but there are children (Veinor) present. ;-) -Rabbitt Combination of the town I live in and the service I was supporting at the time I joined the forum... -hkypipe YoYo from when I Rode rodeo last name is Ayo -YoYo I'm a tech, and I work nights. -TechnoVampire Mine is a word coined by Graham Chapman for Monty Python's 'Twentieth Century Vole' sketch. The definition given for the word was 'I think it's a great idea but possibly not and I'm not being indecisive' -Splunge Mine comes from my favorite villain from BTAS, The Clock King. The fl is for Florida. -clockkingfl My nickname is Chip, from before I was born. The first time I signed up for anything, it was gone, and so was sir_chip, chipster, and so on... Chipsterian is pretty much unique. -Chipsterian Named after a package of assembly language macros for System/370 mainframes. -concept14 Fairly obvious - kiwi is the antional bird of New Zealand and a nick name for NZers both at home and abroad. Simply switch the i for 1. BTW alough in the US kiwi is the fruit, most other places it is kiwifruit in full. Who'd want to put a small flightless bird in a fruit salad? -K1W1 Mine is a CB handle from the 70's. I also am 6' 2" and large and imposing. But I have furry feet and was given the handle when a compatriot saw them. -BionicHobbit Picked random letters when presented with a prompt for an alias on a BBS round about 1988... then realized it was a comic character. Never seen another person with the alias, so it works, most people, online or not, know me by it, even registered the .ca for it and use it as a nick on every system I can at work. -namor The name I usually use (Mongo) is too close to another user's name here, and I didn't want to cause -unnecessary- confusion. :D If folks here don't know what a Grue is / does, you haven't been working with computers long enough. I've historically been known to be a grue when on deployments.... -Grue Sharky was bestowed upon me by my workmates about 10 years ago. Something to do with a week-long work conference, 9 hours of sleep for the entire week, and a pool table (pool shark). On most systems I am just Sharky. There was already a Shaky here - too close so I added the Lady. -LadySharky Teivrann is a name I came up with for my sci-fi writing. It's the name of the character who's actually a role model for me, like an alter ego and an imaginary friend. His name is tattooed on my left arm in the old tribal script of the language I designed for the same writings. I model my philosophies and my approach to life after the way the character has developed. -teivrann I'm a tech and there are times my wife tells me my mood is like a vicious mitt afer a LOOOOONNNNGGGG shift of dealing with the fishies -viciousTech CTYankee comes from Mark Twain (what? No gasps of surprise?) I'm kinda like Hank Morgan in a way: I'm good on the tech issues but have little appetite, patience, or ability for politics. At least there's no Interdiction, anymore <grin> -CTYankee My sister used to say she was the one with common sense and so as a nick cajunized it to Commoncenx. And of course I was full of nonsense or…Noncenx -Noncenx Jenzkind isn't the only Dead Head here. Back in the 60's, Jerry Garcia was nicknamed "Captain Trips" (because of all that he did besides make wonderful music.) After many years of missing him, I decided that, in tribute, I would use that moniker on any board I signed up on where it wasn't already taken. (BTW, the band is going on tour again this summmer, but in their own tribute to Jerry they have renamed themselves to simply "The Dead.") -Captain Trips Mine is another that's fairly simple: Louisiana is the Bayou State, and I've been a tech it seems forever, so.... -BayouTech Hey Scoob, is your mailbox full yet?!?!? -BayouTech Mine is the ancient meanings of my given names. My first name is Celtic for Wolf and middle name is ancient Greek for farmer. And it fit me. Use to be a farmer that likes to be alone. -Wolffarmer I reckon mine is obvious. My #1 main job for 26 years has been MAMA and I am now a TECH. (Even Big Boss at work calls me "mama") But in most other situations/forums, I'm guardianangelof4 or some variation thereof. -MamaTech My nick came from a creature from a card game called "Magic the Gathering". Long live the squirrels! -DerangedHermit Mine comes from the Stepen King novell "The Stand" it was a phrase uttred to trashy by the psychotic kid- it symbolizes managements and the starfishes uni-dimensional focus... -HappyCrappy Mine comes from a school nickname. My brother was always refered to a milloman, and I somehow wound up with millipede. When I first registered on websites, found milliepde taken and prefixed with p_ (first inital) to get p_millipede (p underbar millipede). Joined sites were I wasn't allowed the underbar, so dropped it to just pmillipede. -pmillipede Before I went online, I used to use Shadow whenever a handle was required - mainly because I always wear black. When I started going online, I discovered that this wasn't very original, and I had no desire to be Shadow84725, so I mixed a bit of my Gaelic heritage into it and came up with Shaede (pronounced the same as 'shade' if you're wondering) -Shaede My middle name, which I use when I am not at work, is Drake. Combine that with a love of 80s-90s kitch and a certain latin american rap-one hit wonder, and you have DracoSuave. -DracoSuave Shortened form of nickname, followed by college graduation month/year. -kman52000 Well, since you're asking, my nick has nothing to do with the fact that I like soccer (tho it fits.) I'd been looking at some StrongBad Emails, and in one of them, he addresses someone who'd signed their email HockeyManJsomething as soccerdude, and for some reason it was careening around the inside of my head when I signed up for TSC. -soccerdude I've always admired the dog in the Wallace & Gromit films - says nothing, tolerates Wallace's excesses with fortitude and amusement. BTW, as a Spike Milligan fan I was going to use Eccles (Goon show character) as my nick but I didn't think it would mean much to people outside the UK. -Gromit AreaTech is a spin off from Area Man the frequents names from people in the news articles from theonion.com -areatech Back when I worked at Major's (local fast food place), a co-worker told me that sometimes I was as transparent as a $3 bill, thus the nick was born. -ThreeBucks many moons ago used to run a BBS so i was a SysOp, now the board is dead, if someone official asks it stands for 'DEDicated SYStems OPerator' (that always makes me laugh) -DedSysOp My nic is a character in a Larry Niven book, though I misspelled it. The correct spelling would be phssthpok. -Phssstpok My name is a reference to my RAF days - my place of work was the Flight Line...a dirty, dangerous place to be. Keeping up to shiny clean military standards here was impossible, so the rest of the base personnel referred to us as Line Swine, on account of our relatively scruffy appearance. I've just made it into one word. (More about this on my TSC bio page). -lineswine Mine originated when I started using the internet many moons ago. I couldn't think of an original name so my boss combined my first name "Dennis" + my car at the time "Cadillac" and my gender. Not fancy, but effective. -Dcadiman Mine is from Futurama, Flexo is the "good" brother of Bender. -Flexo

39. Loaded question... This should probably be an "End-user Phrase of the day". One of our internal users came into my office and plopped herself down on my desk. EU: "Is there something wrong with the network?" ME: <Must.Control.Fist.OF.Death.><long pause> "Yep, I've got 50 users." Bint: (Incidentally, is Bint a bad word?) "I mean is it something wrong with me, or the network?" Me: "That's a loaded question. <she laughs> The network seems to be working fine. What do you think is wrong?" Blondie: "Well, my computer's just acting strange. You know, slow sometimes, sometimes clodgy." Me: "The first I usually find out about a problem is when someone tells me about it. Of course, it just could be the blond in you showing through." <grin> EU: "OK, if nobody else is having a problem, I'll just let you know if it keeps happening." Me: "OK" <goes back to reading TSC> FYI, I have nothing against this particular user. She's incredibly bright and quite computer saavy. Is it just me, or does "Is something wrong with the network" just irritate you? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments The "Is there a problem with the network" question doesn't bother me much since I hear it a lot. Usually its the user at a different PC and they didn't input their Novell information at log in so it's messed up. Its also a good way for me to find out if there is a problem since I'm the front line helpdesk. -Starfury I think "Bint" means Bitch/Whore/Skankwad. I have heard CD use the term tho, she should know. -burrkiss Their question: "Is something wrong with the internet?"...My Answer: "No."...click...<insert dial tone> -steveO77 Oh. I thought for a while it was like the Arabic equiv of "daughter of", so it was "someone's stupid kid," but google suggests Big INTeger (http://i1.dk/old_source/old/bint/bint.h). :/ -snowcrash *smells savenow, bonzai, gator...* -Gecko Python quote from Holy Grail - "Oh but if I went 'round sayin' I was Emperor, just because some moistened bint lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away." Now, Python CANT be bad, mmm'kay?:) -timelady Are you forgetting this line from "Life of Brian": "How shall we fuck off, oh Lord?" Now there's no question about the so-called "F" word. So Monty Python CAN use dirty words. -OgdenTechGuy No, you're not the only one irritated by this question. "Is your server down?" is possibly the numero uno worst thing you can say to me when calling for support. It indicates that you have automatically assumed whatever your problem is must be our fault; it shows off your incredible lack of technical knowledge even though you think you're using the proper terminology, and it wastes my time because I still don't know what your problem is. Someone on here suggested replying, "Which server? We have several dozen here," is a good response, and I must agree. It stops them dead in their tracks because all of a sudden they realize they have no fucking clue what they're talking about. -RiffRaff Also, in Holy Grail it was 'moistened bink'. -Fuji Well, in any case, if it is a bad word, then I mean it only in the kindest way... -scooby111 Na, it bothered me too. I told my Linux prof once "Well, you already know what's wrong with it. We use Windows!" (he threatened our Net Admin several times about this, and his classes for Unix were a big preach session.) -Zentar Well scoob, if it does mean 'whore' and she is blonde, then you were just trying to get a piece of *BEEP* THIS LINE OF CONVERSATION HAS BEEN TERMINATED BY THE DECENCY NAZI'S. PLEASE REMAIN CALM, AND TALK NICE. -burrkiss What Riff said... -hkypipe Bad word? Depends who you want to offend. Bint is British slang for a woman or girl, but it is always disparaging and offensive and signals the user as lower class and unrefined. It’s also now rather dated - from http://www.quinion.com/words/qa/qa-bin1.htm -K1W1 "Is there something wrong with the network?" is my number one all-time absolute hated question, and 99.9% of the time, the problem is a PEBCAK error and nothing to do with the network. -LadySharky Per Eric Partridge, Dictionary of Slang & Unconventional English, the term "bint" does in fact come from Arabic, via British soldiers in Egypt in 19th century. Saida bint = good-day girl. Since these were soldiers, they did not mean "someone's stupid kid." -concept14 Not really, because around here chances are there _is_ something terribly wrong with the network :p -Coward The one I get all the time: "Is something wrong with email". Standard answer: "Why? Are you getting an error message and that's your way of telling me what it is..." Funny how often I get a rational explanation after that. -virtualchoirboy Show of hands on "Is the internet down?" -MamaTech Bint. orig binti Arabic, wife/daughter of xxxx. As in Hilary binti Bill.Still used thus, perfectly respectably, in the aeast. Brought back (along with much else) by Tommy. Esp Shufti Bint <nudge> <nudge> - Look at (that) woman. Colloq. and O.R. -jedidiahstott Ditto on Riff's response... -Hellion

40. And that's my problem how? Operator: "Scooby, can I transfer a call to you?" Me: "Ummmm, sure. What's it about?" Me: "Hello?" <Phone rings> "Grrrr" Me: "Hello <ISP> this is scooby111, how can I help you?" Cust: "Yeah, I'm from <Company that uses us as ISP> and I'm having problems sending email." Me: "Ooooookay. Is this on all your accounts, or just one?" Cust: "Just one computer actually. I can't get Outlook Express to send email." Me: "Ok, in Outlook Express, what do you have set for the outgoing email server?" Cust: "Ummmmmm. pop.qwest.isp.net" Me: *Blink* <checks server to make sure it resolves by pinging it> "Well, that server responds. What do you want from me?" Cust: "I want you to help me to set it up!" *Blink* Me: "Well, you use us to manage your virtual domain, but you connect to the internet via Qwest and you use their email server to send email, right?" Cust: "Yes! Why can't I connect?" Me: "I have no idea. Maybe the username or password is wrong in your OE settings. You need to call Qwest and they can help you!" Cust: "You're our ISP! You are supposed to help me connect to email!" Me: "You need to call Qwest. They are the only ones that can help you connect to their server." Cust: "But I- Me: "Thank you for calling <ISP>. Please feel free to call us if there is anything that we can help you with." <click> Holy crap. You're a farking admin for a company, how do you expect me to help you connect to somebody else's server? Do you really think I'm gonna hack somebody's server for the lousy $35/month you pay us? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Is this multiple choice or do we just get one guess? I'm guessing they DID think you would... -teivrann Manager from tech the other week, walks up with the cordless batphone - "Can you talk to this guy?" "Uh, okay, who is it?" He hands the phone to me. "I don't know." Great. Next time, can I just blindly give calls to *you*? -namor Your main problem appears to be agreeing to the call transfer *before* finding out what the issue is. The first thing I say when someone asks me for a favour is 'depends the favour'. -Splunge Holy clueless luser Batman! The starfish are everywhere! -Hellion

41. Got spyware? Interesting story. http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,63240,00.html?tw=wn_story_page_prev2 [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments "And when asked whether they would rather give up their morning coffee or their ability to use the Internet at work for personal reasons, 49 percent said they would rather give up their morning coffee. Forty-six percent said they would pass on the Internet access in favor of caffeine." and the remaining 4% (all in the field of Techsupport went into shock while contemplating the answer.) -drachen Not new news, but still good to know. You should see the junk that builds up on my father's IE from his 'normal' surfing habits. I've tried to lock it down somewhat with filters (for activeX and other 'powerful' IE components) so it's a lot better than it used to be. Myself? I use Opera and I get no spyware, none whatsoever. -WildKard Mozilla, Baby. -TechnoVampire Start adding Domains into the Restricted Sites List in the Secutiry Tab in IE's Internet Properties, Where is shows Internet, local intranet, Trusted sites, Restricted Sites webpdp.gator.com, 2o7.net, lop.com, Disables scripts and activeX on those domains -Deadagent

42. Cost of printers You know that printer manufacturers sell printers at a loss to make it up in ink, but you probably didn't know the hard numbers. Here they are: Canon i560 - Printer cost - $231; cost of ownership over 18 months - $1844 Epson C44UX - Printer cost - £87; cost of ownership over 18 months - $2074 HP Deskjet 5150 - Printer cost - $159; cost of ownership over 18 months - $1269 Lexmark z605 - Printer cost - $72; cost of ownership over 18 months - $3182 I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the crappiest printer costs the most. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Oh yeah, that should be $87 not £87. -scooby111 check out www.inksupply.com. I have 2 of their continous flow systems and do NOT buy cartridges any more. A 4 oz. bottle of ink costs $8 and has the same ink as 6 cartridges. -atomicbill My solution - I just don't print. Pissed me off that a friend, during their last move that I *helped* with, tossed a huge laser printer (working) that they didn't want... -namor I have a $3000 color laser printer I bought from work for $50. They threw in a carload of supplies. I had to build a shed to hold them. -LaserGuru At my last job I found about dozen old laserjetIII cartridges in a store room. The company didn't have anymore of the printers and told me to throw them out. Seeing as how I had one at home I didn't buy toner for a long time :) -Hellion I buy the lexmark and HP printers like I buy bic lighters. When it runs out, I replace it. Cheaper than buying a new cartridge -LiQUidICicle

43. Sorry, sucks to be you. I work at an ISP and we also provide website and virtual domain hosting for our customers. I just got a voicemail forwarded from a former customer of ours. She closed her local offices and moved to Los Angeles. Of course, she also disconnected her local account and cancelled her virtual domain with us. We keep the directory on our server for 10 days after a disconnection, but we delete it after that. This lady now wants us to try and retrieve the files that were on her website two weeks after she cancelled her service. <Bzzt: Wrong answer> I am not going back to tape to retrieve a website for a former customer who calls and whines at me. Besides, she didn't leave a contact number on her voicemail and her local number is disconnected... Stay tuned to this bat-channel boys and girls. Call number 2 (The neeping and whining) is sure to come! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Oh the neepage! The neepage! -LaserGuru Suuurrreee.... I can do that, but it's gonna cost ya'.... let's see, 1 expensive dinner 2 more booze than Ted Kennedy can drink in a 24 hour period, then there'd be ***wanders off mubling to self*** -duckhead i'm happy I was able to bring you joy -areatech

44. haplo1024 got me curious so... It's interesting to see how this site has grown just in the last year. I decided to post the member numbers and join dates of some of our (recent) worst offenders. 5949 - satanstech - Mar 2004 5328 - duckhead - Nov 2003 4726 - Tekkie - Jul 2003 3711 - scooby111 - Jan 2003 3240 - RiffRaff - Oct 2002 3111 - postal tech - Sept 2002 3046 - DigitalDogcow - Aug 2002 2771 - TechnoVampire - Jun 2002 2502 - CommanderData - Dec 2002 1845 - chazz - Jan 2002 Most of our earliest members don't post very often except: 564 - Teivrann - Mar 2001 5 - Mushroom - Oct 2000 2 - Hawk -- If hawk is #2, who's #1? The website's been up since Oct 2000 and we've already gotten 6000 users. Over 1000 in the last 7 months! Cool! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Obviously, it's Hawk's alter ego, Eagle, who is #1. ;-) -OgdenTechGuy So I had to go and look to see if there was an Eagle. Sorry, OTG, there isn't. But I am honoured beyond words to be included in the list of worst offenders. <grin> Where is The Coyote in that list? -chazz That does it scoob. no more scooby snacks for you. AND im taking the pan of *special* brownies with me. <walks away trying to "huff" while stuffing *special* brownies in mouth> -burrkiss You are number 6 </prisoner> -Starfury Starfury - 2725 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- OgdenTechGuy - 5583 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- burrkiss - 4292 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Coyote - 2168 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ -scooby111 Wow, I miscalcualted. Oh well. -scooby111 Ok, here have a *special* brownie <offeres big brownie> -burrkiss Neat. Thanks for the breakdown on the numbers, Scoob! -snowcrash How does one know one's number? -Eloewien Darn, Starfury beat me to it. Oh, and it should have been "you are, number 6." Of course, this version wasn't how it was originally scripted, but was how it was meant. In this case, 6=1. -Captain Trips And just what, pray tell, do you mean by "Worst Offenders"? -TechnoVampire 'Member's Area', 'Message Boards', 'Member List' <Covers arteries> Uhh nothing TV. Nothing offensive at all. -scooby111 could it be Administrator? -lancasterjl Yeah I want to see member #1 post something :) "Real wrath of god stuff" </ghostbusters> -fearmyroot "I am not a number. . .I am a free man" Actually got to shout that on the beach at Portmeirion where the show was filmed after my Best Man sprung for our Honeymoon there -Zoomer I guess I don't count since I don't have a star? (who cares?) -billybien 3111 - postal tech - Sept 2002 well actually i joined the site in april 2002 i believe under my oldname tominbangor -postal tech

45. Gotcha! Background: We provide a high-speed wireless internet service that comes with one backup dial-up account for the customer's personal use. We also give users a discount on their next month's bill if they recommend our service to another person and they become a customer. Our wireless service costs about $60/mo and a standard dial-up $20/mo. We signed up a new wireless customer back in December. This new customer was referred by one of our current customers. Fast forward to today... I'm going through the postmaster mailbox and I decide to start checking on a random sample of bounced messages to find out why they bounced and if there's a deeper issue that maybe I can solve. So, I look up an email account that our server simply refused to send for. It belongs to a disconnected account, hmmmm. I do a SQL query against that disconnected account and I find out that he's the one who referred the wireless customer to us. It seems that, one month after referring him, this customer cancelled his account with us. So why's he trying to send email thru us still? Time to look into the radius logs and see who logged in at that time. OK, it seems that the new wireless customer logged into the system minutes before the email was sent. Hmmm... I print out the radius server logs and give the wireless customer a call. He's not there, so I leave a message: "This is scooby111 with <ISP>. I have been reviewing our dial-up logs and I have discovered that your dial-up account has been compromised. It has been accessed numerous times over the last 3 months and, recently, someone has attempted to send email from that account. Please call me back at <phone number> so that we can secure the account accordingly. After about an hour, I got a call back: Customer: I use that account from work too. You're probably seeing my access from work. ME: I understand sir, would your work number be: <phone number accessed from>? Customer: Yes, that's it. ME: That's interesting. That's the same phone number that we have recorded as a residential phone number from one of our previous customers. Do you work from his home? Customer: Um no. That's the umm work phone number. He works here too. I guess he must have put down the wrong phone number on his account. ME: Oh, I guess that explains it. <pause> Can you also explain why it was his old email username and password that tried to access our mail server from your dial-up account? Customer: Ummm. ME: Sir, the terms of your contract stipulate that the free dial-up account is for your personal use only and not to be given out to anybody at all. We have the right to terminate your account if it is abused. Customer: <switching tactics> Well, why can't I give it to somebody else? It's not like you're losing any money on it! It's mine, I can let anybody use it that I want to! ME: No sir, it's not yours. It is a key that you or a member of your household may use to access our system as long as you abide by the terms of our service. As you have clearly not done so, I can cancel your account. Customer: Fine! Come get your antenna! I don't want your service anyway! <Hangs up> So, I cancelled his account. I can't wait until he finds out that he's stuck in a contract for another 7 months at $60/mo for a service he can't even use... [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Sweet, and i love your quote about DOOM -CommanderData Sweeeeeeeeet! -RiffRaff I *wish* I had this much information about users in our system... even a halfway-reliable radius lookup tool, damnit... -namor Bwah ha ha ha!</evil laugh> Nice. -CrazyCanuck Awesome! A LART the size of a small planet :) -teivrann Well, on the DOOM quote - until Evil Dead... which probably was an inspiration for DOOM itself... -technaround }:> -RTFM very nice work. -Ksnarf CD - I do believe that quotation is from Terry Pratchett - a must-read Brit author -K1W1 It is. -scooby111 yes!! Oh, how I would LOVE!!!! to do that.... <evil grin> -AndrewC One of thee best LARTs I've ever read about! <stands up in ovation> -Dr Jerkyl I love the LART.... and the fact that he is still bound contractually is just an added bonus... ok, lets tally this up: Scooby 25 points Starfish -10 points... and are our contestants ready for round 2, well it looks as if the SF has given up, Scooby wins!!! -duckhead

46. I see starfish everywhere. There's a little corner store about a block away from where I work. Of course, I spend a significant amount of my income there. My coworker and I went over there this afternoon to get some lunch. It seems that they just got in a new cash register system that is basically a computer with a cash drawr attached. My coworker and I get to the counter and watch her ring up out purchases. He then hands her a debit card to pay for the purchase. She pushes all the buttons and gets a perplexed look on her face. She hammers the last button again. She hammers it again. She hammers it really hard over and over again. ME: (in my best hick accent) Hit it harder. If it aint busted now, it will be soon. Counter lady: "I's not working. Me: I can see that. Did you try starting over? She starts over and it works fine the second time. I can't escape.... [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments I see a silohoutte of a Fish, Huh uh uh Huh uh uh?. -Warrick I have a friend who works at the NCR call center. They have different divisions to support stuff like that, or ATMs, etc... she has much, much worse stories about some of the people operating those things. -namor Yeeeeeah bitch, mash those buttons, oooooh yeah, oooh thats hot, we're cookin' now baby!.......... I've said for a long time, If EU's are allowed to perform impact recalibration on the hardware, then we're allowed to do likewise to them. -Digital Dogcow I prefer the term "Percussive maintenance", but I agree with DD. -TechnoVampire did cha remembr ta hitch ya thumms in yaw draaas? -burrkiss I've always liked "kinetic adjustment" myself. When asked what that means, I reply "smack the sh*t out of it - exactly what I'm about to do to you if you ask any more questions" -virtualchoirboy TV - You took the words out of my ...keyboard! I thought it, you said it. I'm all for Preventative Percussive Maintenance, however. Hit it when it's working right in the hopes that it won't ever do anything wrong. Put the fear of Root into it... -racermd Dang scooby.... now she'll NEVER forget you, and start asking you troubleshoting questions whenever you show up..... -duckhead Like your .sig... The hallowed Terry Pratchett himself! Good to meet another fan. :) -soccerdude

47. very unsatisfied customer This is actually a customer email, but I'm going to post it here for formatting. Subject: very unsatisfied customer How about you explain to me what the problem is with you server! I try to log on and I am getting error messages that it is wrong user name or password...funny thing is, its the same password that I logged on with right now! It took me 20 minutes to finally log on, one message after anouther...server not responding and all other kinds of crap! If you need more lines get more...OR DON'T ACCEPT ANY NEW CUSTOMERS. You see...the bad thing is that I live in <30 miles from civilization> and do not have any other choice than to deal with this problem that has been getting worse for the last couple of months. Just fix it PLEASE, My reply: It appears that you may be experiencing issues due the the degraded telephones lines in your area. <the outer rim> is known for its spotty telephone service. Or access server will be unable to communicate with your computer if the phone connection falls below a certain quality. As you retry the connection, the telephone company is slightly altering the path and lines it uses to establish the connection. This can result in the unpredictable nature of your connection. <ISP> is committed to resolving all server and ISP-related problems. Our dial-up phone lines in your area have not exceeded the number of lines that are available for many months. A lack of lines is not the problem. Beyond your inital connection problems, I have reviewed the access server logs and determined that you have made several attemps over the last 3 days to log on to our server. In each case, the username you were attempting to use was LastnameFirstinitial. The actual username that will gain you access to our system is FirstinitialLastname,. Please make a note to change this information in your dialup settings. If you need help making the changes, please call tech support and they can walk you thru the procedure. I believe that this will resolve your username and password issues when dialing from <the dark side of jupiter>. RE from customer: It works now. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments That's odd Scoobs, I thought he was calling from the dark side of Uranus. -PsiDOC And if there is a light side to Uranus, I really do not want to know! -LaserGuru I actually always thought Uranus was sort of a pinkish brown?? -mousie mousie--Look at Uranus a lot, do you? Care to share? ;) -dobbin Translation: When calling from just west of infinity on the far edge of nowhere, make sure you have your own settings right before yelling at someone or you'll get dumped right back down the black hole you crawled out of. Now shuddup. -teivrann he should be a satisifed customer, you fixed it. -burrkiss sounds like a book title by one of my favorite authors, Roger Welsch: "It's Not The End Of The Earth, But You Can See It From Here" <grin> -CTYankee Would that really be an error? More like a command directive if you ask me :) -Hellion

48. Wha? We recently ordered a managed internet solution (MARO) from AT&T in one of our branch offices. Since it's a fault-tolerant system, it uses two 1.544 lines to carry data. Usually, we simply order the lines and plug them into our own router, configure them, and we're off. This is something of a departure for us since we don't actually get access to the router. The local provider (Verizon) installs the lines and the router arrives. I go to the remote office and set up the modem and plug the lines in for the AT&T tech to configure. They play around with it for a couple of hours, but they just can't get the one line to come up. No problem. Verizon's installed bad lines before. I call the Verizon tech and tell him that it looks like the line is bad and he takes it down for testing. Monday comes and the Verizon tech tells us that he's tested it every way that he can and it shows good. So I call AT&T again and go out to the remote site again this morning. This particular router comes equipped with WIC cards. A WIC card is a plug-in module that has an ethernet interface that you can plug a T1 or Frame into directly. The TSU/DSU is built-in. The T1 in WIC-0 works fine and the Frame in WIC-1 is the one that's failing. The tech has me swap the the lines between WIC cards. Oops, the Frame in WIC-0 is now working (the line that failed before) and the T1 in WIC-1 is dead. OK, so that means that we've narrowed it down to the slot or the card, right? Next, she has me put the lines back the way they were and swap the WIC cards from between the two slots. OK. I do it and the WIC card in slot -0 works (the card that was failing) and the WIC card in slot-1 is failing. We've narrowed the problem down to the slot, right? Her response? "Verizon must be wrong. That Frame must be bad." ME: Wha? Didn't we just prove that the slot was bad? Tech: "No, the slot can't be bad, it's a new router." No matter how har I argued, she refused to acknowledge that it was the router and not the line. Oh well, I called Verizon back for more testing. I guess I'll let them shout it out. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Verizon versus AT&T! This Thursday, THURSday, THURSDAY! BE THERE! ;) -snowcrash I pitty the fool! -LaserGuru /me roots for a double disqualification. -KickahaOta Talk about needing a reality check. -RiffRaff Actually, I may have "kind of" an explanation... There are two types of frame cards; if you're in at least a semi-rural area such as here in Hickville, Arkansas, you may be too far away from the telco CO for the better type (I forget the product code). The more basic, older cards cannot be tested without actually taking the circuit down and a telco tech come over and test your end. A huge majority of frame copper or fiber customers are in urban areas, where the techs very seldom come across a problem like this. But the telco tech should have checked further into the problem just to make sure. -OzarkBard That explanation offers no explanation to the fact that both the lines and the wic's were traded. The slot on the router is fuxored and/or misconfigured in the run. Period. NEXT. -Gecko do a little percussional (sp?) maintance with a rubber mallet. Sooner or later it will fix your problem. -lancasterjl Should the mallet be applied to the equipment or to the tech? -KickahaOta The "techs", of course. Once the "tech" has been maintained properly, maintenance will begin in earnest on the hardware. ;) -snowcrash Let's see if I summarized it right. Both lines work, both cards work, slot 0 works, slot 1 doesn't. Problem diagnosis: Bad line? Probable cause of diagnosis: Tech has cranial/rectal insertion situation. That about right? -Captain Trips

49. Dental patient This is the kind of person that parts with each morsel of information like it was a vital part of his anatomy. -- IM conversation -- DEVELOPER: I am not able to FTP to the server. ME: What server and what error? DEVELOPER: It's servername. ME: What error? D: I'm trying to get a file off the server and I'm unable to login. ME: 'Unable to login' means what, exactly? D: I need to provide a password and username to access the files on server. ME: I know. ME: And? ME: What error are you getting??!?!? What username are you using??? What FTP client?? D: No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it. ME: And? What username? What FTP client? D: IE ME: And FTP requires a username right??? D: It's username ME: Thanks! Hang on. ME: I reset the session. Try it again. D: It works now. What was wrong? ME: A lack of communication. Connection closed [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Dem muß man die Popel einzeln aus der Nase ziehen! (German saying for this kind of person, literally meaning you have to pull the buggers out of his nose individually). -ltu1542hvy At least they answered all your questions toothfully. -Answerboy Nuthing but the tooth... -RTFM I have a cracked tooth and my dentist can't see me until tomorrow to fix it, and it hadn't been bothering me recently thanks to pain killers and dealing with sf to take my mind off of it. Now I read this and it's hurting again b/c I thought about teeth. Thanks! :-) -JH Dental trouble? Man, that bites! -ltu1542hvy Yes? Somebody wanting a bite? -TechnoVampire Well, I'm looking at it as a mixed blessing. After I get out of the dentists office and come to work with my tooth all fixed, I really doubt I'll be able to talk on the phone. So I guess that means I won't be having to anser the phones either. So all I'll be doing tomorrow is e-mails and such, but no phones! I have a feeling that getting dental work done will be less painful then talking with some of the sf I've spoken to on the phone in the past. -JH

50. The other side of the phone. My CEO is going on a trip and he wants to watch some movies on his laptop while he's on the plane. No problem........OK, problem. I check out the laptop while he's at lunch and the farking thing won't read DVD's. It works fine with CD's but it recognizes that a DVD is in there but no files are ever displayed. Since this is for the CEO, I make sure he's not going to need it that night and I take the laptop home to get the DVD drive RMAed. (Hey, it's the CEO.)I brace myself for long hold times and a non-english speaking tech. I call the 800 number on the website and navigate the auto-attendant. Almost immediately, a tech answers the phone (WTF??) and he speaks english. After giving him my service tag number, we start troubleshooting the system. (On a related note: Why ask the customer to key in the express service code if you're not going to give it to the tech?) OK, I explain the problem and the tech leads me thru some obvious tests to no avail. Just as I think he's about to suggest an RMA, he says, "Hold on just one minute." (Cue cheesy hold music.) "Dell printer support, can have model of printer you calling about this day?" What the FARK! The farking tech cold-transfered me to the FARKING INDIA printer que!!" ME: (It's not this guy's fault.) "I'm sorry, I was transferred to this number, but I do not have a printer. I am calling about a laptop DVD/CDRW." Tech: "I will giving you the right number and transfer you." ME: "Thank you." (Receives the same number that I dialed before.) (Gets transfered into dead air.) So, I wait for a couple of minutes and finally hang up and re-dial the number. Tech: (After 8 min of hold time.) "Dell support, may I have your service tag number?" ME: (Awesome. He's a little easier to understand, but still in India. Whatever.) "Sure, it's." The new tech walked me thru much more troubleshooting but was unable to resolve the situation. He seemed competant, but was certainly following a script. After doing just about everything in the script, he had me update direct x, and reinstall my video drivers. ????? Profit?!? -- Nope. He then suggested that I reinstall the OS. (Sorry guy, ain't gonna happen. I can imagine the conversation with my CEO now...) He tried to explain to me that it couldn't be hardware since it would read CD's. BZZZZZZT! Wrong answer. I explained to him how a combo drive worked and he quickly abandoned that tactic. I finally asked if he could just ship me a new DVD drive so I could eliminate hardware as the problem. He put me on hold again. (FARK. It's been an hour and a half, I'm starting to get frustrated.) After about 10 minutes of hold music he finally comes back and agrees to the RMA. AAAAAAAARG!!!! Now I know why Dell queue times are so long. Disclaimer: I have nothing against techs from India. I simply wish they had more latitude to divert from the farking script! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments I called creative once for an RMA on a sound card, it went like this "I have a faulty unit, can i get an RMA number?" Tech: "Yeah, here you go". End of story. Same with IBM for some laptop parts. -MrThou Scoob: I have nothing against tech's from India either. It's the companies. If I call so I can transfer one of my customers, you are no damn use to me if I can't understand a word you are saying. Everyone here has heard this song and dance before. </rant> -Ticketman Same with a Maxtor drive once. Got the #, shipped, got one back. Still working with the same drive... calling back after their drive software malfunctioned was useless, though. -namor Well I think most of the major companies have an RMA form to fill out on their website. if you have to RMA a device then go through that HELL. they need a farkin HEAVY LART because they don't deserve a TART. -kennz Dell Laptop? Well done for getting the word "Latitude" into your story...was it deliberate, or just an "inspiron"ed guess? <ducks the usual ....> -lineswine Even their rebuttals are on a script. -Bunglehawk069 inspiron 2650 here..took me 3 HOURS to get a RMA number..and then the tech messed up my shipping address -neuman1812 Boss had me order a new PC last year from Hell. Placed order via web, confirmed all address and shipping info. Where do they send it? Boss home address which is where he used to have stuff sent 10 YEARS AGO. Been in current office and receiving a billion catalogs here since '95. Took 4 days to resolve delivery with Airborne. -virtualchoirboy Ahh. Its good to get that initial trouble of RMA requests over with. Work with H and J www.askchip.com and they are pretty good about RMA's. They know we can do things to test for faults and most of the time its simple as a phone call to get things returned. It used to be bad with Western Digital for us. Have to call it in, give serial, etc. Had one tech who didn't believe me when I said the drive was shot (clicking due to bad motor) so he had to TS with me. I understand its due to superiors listening over the phones. Run LifeGuard and even that says its due for a dirt nap. 15 minute call when it could have been 5. Now for the devils advocate, when a tech calls and gets you. He says I'm a tech, like us, and he has done what he knows. So lets face it, we all have our bad days. -MaskedMarauder

51. Lawmakers starting to get it finally? Since I'm not going to walk over my own post... http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36~53~1920499,00.html [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Yea, More power to ya ladies!!! -TheSingingTech I like Deanna Hanna!! She should become the ceo of HP. -TekkieGrl To hell with that... Deanna Hanna for President of the US! -RiffRaff That lady deserves a GREAT BIG KISS ON THE LIPS!! :0 Did I say that or were my fingers doing the walking???? -haplo1024 Um... er... that's NOT good... that hurts us Canuck Techies more than it hurts Indian support... we actually DO a decent job and speak the language well... -DracoSuave Did anyone read as far as the quote from guy representing the Colorado Association of Commerce and Industry (a.k.a the bosses union)? He (naturally) says how it is a bad idea & that cutting taxes for companies was the way to go (no surprise there then...), but everyone knows that call centres will take all the tax breaks + incentives available & then re-locate anyway, or at least hold the city to ransom with threats to pull out, shedding jobs if they don't get their own way. Oftentimes the city has invested so much money in attracting "hi-tech" jobs (in the mistaken belief they are high paying positions & will therefore bring prosperity to the area...hah!) to the area that they are shit-scared of losing their investment that they cave in to all the companies demands. (I think this has happened in a couple of places in Oregon, if memory serves). -lineswine yeah, also, to help share the wealth the state should take all the profits and share them equally with all citizens of the state based on the fact that everyone is equal. Yes, that law would prevent a loss of jobs. However, it isn't the job of the state to punish a company for having a policy that doesn't bring the most profit to the state. -Coyotebd It may not be the job of the state to punish, but it has every right to refuse to reward. Why in the world should money derived from the taxes paid by the residents of a given region go to companies that refuse to hire them? -knownuthin Outsourcing does suck, but by the same reason, most of outsourcing began because of unions. The bottom line is that a lot of tech support is not THAT highly skilled of a job. These are the type of jobs that unions got into years ago, and got people paid many times what they were worth to stand on a line and push a button. That mentality has simply followed along. In the city where I live, they recently published an article that the city gets no less than 4 calls a week from companies to locate call centers here. They are told not to, because the existing ones can't meet staffing needs as it is. Too many North American's that refuse to take any job they consider "menial" or doesn't pay a whole lot right away. I agree with trying to legislate not moving jobs out, but they should provide incentives to create new work here. -Ticketman

52. Zzzaaap! Ok, I thought about whether or not I should post this since it's not directly a tech tale. You be the judge. If y'all want me to delete it, no problem. The story takes place about 2 years ago when I was still married. I came home after a particularly long day and collapsed into my chair. My wife sat down on the couch across from me and we started chatting about my day. (marital bliss) Since we had little kids, we had a baby monitor in the living room at the time. Of course, since we had a toddler too, everything he could reach was in disarray, including the baby monitor. It had gotten unplugged and had fallen off the side table onto the floor beside the couch. The power adapter was still plugged into the wall, however, and the business end was still on the table. As we spoke, my wife was playing with the live end. Knowing that she sometimes stuck pens in her mouth, I mentioned to her that the end was still live and she should be careful with it. She just gave me a look that said, "I'm not that stupid." We talked for a while and she started to put the thing up around her mouth. "Don't get that in your mouth, it's live.", I warned again. We kept talking and, sure enough, the cord made it's way to her mouth and then right into it. Her whole body suddenly tensed up and she got a wild look in her eyes and went limp. Thankfully, she was OK. Lesson learned, right? Wrong. Just two days later, we were back in the same positions. She was playing with the business end of the adapter. I figured that she had learned her lesson, but, in case she wasn't thinking about it, I said, "You probably don't want to play with that again." She reached down and unplugged it from the wall. "There, now it's safe." (You see it coming, right?) "No it's not. Those things hold a charge for quite some time. Until they're discharged, they can still give you a nasty shock.", I pointed out. She gave me a look like I was the dumbest person on earth for trying to put one over on her. Sure enough, a couple of minutes later, she shoves the thing in her mouth again. This time, the shock was much less. She went stiff and jumped about 2 feet out of her chair and flung the thing across the room. I couldn't stop laughting for almost 2 minutes. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Not a tech tale, but we ALL have heard fables such as this one over the phone, RIGHT???? -MacDaddy OMFG, thats great -nm Thus explaineth why she's an EX-wife, I guess... (j/k) -RiffRaff Don't care if it's not a tech story..... DEFINATLY worth posting!!! -duckhead And here's your sign. </Jeff Foxworthy> -RedSwingline BUHAAHAHAHAHAHAHA fool me once shame on you, fool me twice and im a fool. (no offence) but scoob, if she likes to but things in her mouth, couldnt you have offered something else???? -burrkiss sorry to be picky red, but that was Bill Engvall not Jeff Foxworthy! -flamacue flamacue - your absolutely right, and I realized that after I posted. <hangs head in shame> -RedSwingline Actually, Gallagher originally came up with that whole 'here's your sign' schtick... -TechZilla Umm... it's a pretty popular schtick then, because Dave Barry ran with it as well. -chazz Wow, what a shocking experiencing! <run's away cackling maniacally> -Hellion Wow, what a shocking experiencing! <run's away cackling maniacally> -Hellion It took me too reads to realize that it was the WIFE and not the Toddler... -DracoSuave Kind of a tach story, you gave an enduser advice and they ignored it. Treated it "I know better" disdain in fact. Great mental pictures as I read the story. -K1W1 Scoob, I'll give you credit if you were only laughing for 2 minutes...I'd probably still be ROFL 10 minutes later. -redevil34 Bill Engvall is in fact the one who orifinally came up with the "Here's Your Sign" concept. He popularized it so well that, like Jeff Foxworthy's "You Might Be A Redneck" it is now a very common theme among comedians. But never forget that Bill Engvall invented it, well over a decade ago (I'm not certain how much over a decade) -OgdenTechGuy

53. Shaken foundation. I just got off the phone with a customer and the foundation for my apathy and cynicism has cracks in it. This guy started off on my bad side. He's a walker. The customer who goes from option to option until he gets a live body. Me: <ISP name> this is Scoob'. How may I help you? Cust: What do I do if I forgot my password? ME: You call tech support and they'll help you. Cust: I tried that, but they weren't there. ME: Leave a message and they'll get back to you. They're clearing up messages from last night. Cust: Ok. I'll try again. ME: <Seized by demons of stupidity> Or, on a one-time only basis, I can help you. <this is gonna hurt> What is the name on the account? Cust: Lastname, Firstname. ME: <Looking up account> OK, there's no secret question, so can I have verify the phone number and address on the acct? Cust: <Rattles off correct phone number and address.> ME: Your password is <password> Cust: Thank you. Have a nice day. <click> ME: .... This guy: Was nice and respectful. Was quite ready and willing to just wait. Told me the right name without a cue-card. Knew his farking phone number and it matched the number on the account. Knew his address. Thanked me politely Hung up without chit-chat so I could get back to surfing. Was young. <Under 25> I guess that makes my next question: Have the seas turned to blood? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments No, but I'm sure I saw a plague of locusts go by earlier. :p -SwedishChef Yeah, and there's a bunch of frogs in our parking lot. -RiffRaff Damn- it's getting dark early. -LaserGuru <runs away with his firstborn son> -Bynar Crap! I guess I really did see Jesus walk by the food court earlier today... -Syowr No, but not from lack of wishing on my part. -TechnoVampire AHHHHH damn locusts! -putahtek Could have been a "secret shopper" from the company making sure the customer gets quality bullsith! -billybien No, but I was just crapped on by a flock of flying pigs. -Hellion Warm skies, sun out, Ice on the ground. Any questions? -0110110 Hope you recorded it for old times. -RTFM !!! what's this ?!?! monkey's flyin' outta by butt?!? -itsnotmyrouter Scoob - here's your answer http://www.headlinehumor.com/signs69.htm -K1W1 Yea, Scoob. They have!!! Last night I had a customer of ours email in with the most obnoxious, pissy-ass attitude you could possible have. And the problem was not even anything internet related. He actually emailed back this afternoon with an apology!!!! -TheSingingTech you actually went out of your way to help a starfish? what is the world coming to!?!?! -Deimios Oi - watch it with the ageist remarks matey! (straps TacLART to zimmer frame & points it towards general direction of Scoob). -lineswine Somebody shake Scoob. He's dreaming again. -robbor

54. Nobody available Isvtec's story about getting his car stolen reminded me of my favorite cop joke. I was going to bed the other night when my neighbor called me and told me that I had left my shed light on. As I looked for myself, I saw that there were people in my shed taking things to their truck. I quickly phoned the Sheriff's Office, but they told me that no one was in this area to help at this time, but they would send someone over as soon as they would be available. A bit miffed, I said OK, hung up, and waited just one minute, Then phoned the Sheriff's Office right back. I said: "Hello. I just called you a minute ago because there were people in my shed stealing from me. Well, you don't have to worry about them now because I've shot every last one of them!" Magically within a very few moments there were half a dozen sheriff cars in my yard, an Armed Response Unit and a Police dog ..... the works! Of course, they caught the burglars red-handed. One of the officers came over to me and said in a gruff and very demeaning manner, "I thought you said that you'd shot them!" I replied with: I THOUGHT YOU SAID... THERE WAS NOBODY AVAILABLE! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments So sad, yet so true. My car was broken into, and I had to drive to the station if I wanted to file a report! They wouldn't even come out! When my apartment was broken into, they came out, but nothing was ever recovered, despite their promises that stuff would be. Lowered my respect for the cops by a couple of notches, that's for sure. -SwedishChef "Respect" and "cops" should never be used together in the same sentence. Hell, they probably don't even belong in the same paragraph. -RiffRaff Theives suck, cops are lazy...Bad Cop! No Donut! -ledhed Awesome. I'm surprised they didn't bust you for filing a false report. -billybien ok since my wife works for the local pd i have to put in my two cents, if you had to deal with women who get beat up and still want the guy around and hundreds of stolen cars every day that you have no hope of finding because your to busy breaking up domestic disputes you would get a little lax on your attitude toward a stolen car, thats what insurance is for. they are usually there when you need them if they aren't being bogged down by some luser who wants to report that his 20 dollar tv got stolen. imagine a hundred users who have forgotten their password in the q and then one with a real problem, the guy with the real problem has to wait until the hundred lusers are taken care of. -ewspy87 Yeah, but cops don't have someone monitoring the FarCK outta every call that comes in. If they did, they couldn't give a lame excuse like "no one's available". I'll bet if your car got stolen, they'd be there in a flash! -billybien When I visited Scotland, I found the police to be incredible. The owner of the house where I stayed told me stories of the police bringing back stolen garden furniature...before she even knew it was missing! Out here they rarely look at small theft like that, let alone find anything. -grahamwboyes

55. Reboot and TRY IT AGAIN!!! Because we have certain applications that don't 'play nice' with others, we have trained our users to reboot their systems before calling IT with a problem. EU: (Walking into my office.) I can't print. Me: Um, did it give you an error message and did you reboot? EU: It gave me some message abount not finding the printer and I did reboot. Me: OK. Let's go. (Walk to his office.) EU: (Tries printing.) It works. I guess the reboot worked. Me: You rebooted, logged on, and came to get me before you tried it again? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments ROFL - You're not surprised are you? -Hellion Well Scooby, you never SAID to try it again, just to reboot</starfish> -duckhead Maybe it's time to reboot the user. :) -clockkingfl Next time this happens (and it will) charge him/her $5. If they ask why tell them it's a 'stupidity charge'. -Starfury

56. WTF? When someone dials an extension where I work, it automatically connects to the intercom at that extension. The person at the other end just hears a beep over the speaker and the dialer's voice comes out of the speakerphone. EU: (On speakerphone) "Scooby111?" Me: (On speakerphone)"Hello" EU: "Are you there?" Me: "No" (WTF? I answered didn't I?) EU: "What do you mean?" Me: "What do you want?" EU: "I need the password to <other user's> voicemail." Me: "I can't give that to you. Why do you want listen to their voicemail?" EU: "Oh, nevermind." <click> [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments eu:"I want to listen to their voice mail cuz im a pervert, the kind they wrote about in the bible." -CyberGrandma I had a co-worker try to get another's vmail passcode from me. Seems she left a vmail for the other woman & said "Bitch" before she actually released the call. She wanted to erase the message before anyone heard it. -Tekkie Doesn't this come right out of a company security briefing workbook? When someone you don't know asks you to break security protocol, what do you do? -Momgeek545

57. Finally hit rock bottom. I had the unfortunate priveledge of attending a training class tonight. No, I didn’t get to learn anything new. The class was for our customers and I was required to attend as a ‘Technical backup’. We got 12 of our stupidest customers together, found a conference room, set them all up with laptops and tried to teach them computer security basics. I’ll never know whether or not we got the 12 stupidest customers possible or not, but the average person had about an 80 IQ. Of course, we had one lady who was definitely bringing the average way down. I not only got to listen to an extremely basic lecture and the most inane questions from the *ahem* students, I got to do it for three whole hours! The über-starfishie in question started the night by loudly exclaiming how she couldn’t connect to the internet. I bought this computer a couple of months ago and then I moved here from Arizona and I can’t get it to connect. All I get is a busy signal. I bought your service and I haven’t been able to connect for almost two months. I don’t understand why it won’t work. I didn’t change anything! This farking waste of nutrients didn’t even change her farking dial-up number from the number she was using in Arizona! How the FARK can anyone be so stupid. Is the farking purpose of this lady’s existence on this planet is to provide carbon-dioxide for the flora? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Yes. -Calydor Perhaps you should stick her feet into a planter pot and water her twice a day. -Wraith556 Customer Training Class = Ultimate Bitch Session. Whose fucking bright idea was this, anyway? -RiffRaff Remembering once I had a group that needed "computer education". My worst mistake was to show them the 'Send' command line... "Hey Susy, did you get my msg?" "Yes, and I sent Bob one too - Did you get it" - Cackel-Cackel-Cackel-Cackel... That was the end of the lesson! -Dr Jerkyl back in my sales days, we had a Microsoft rep come into our job and give a crash course on routers/hubs. The computer staff were morons about it. I don't think any of them really grasped the concept of a router. -Bunglehawk069 Was it such a good idea to draw that many vacancies in one room? They could have formed a black hole and sucked all light and life out of the area... -Mushroom Many sympathanies for your distress -RTFM Aww man, that doesn't sound like a plesant experience. -Warrick

58. Micro$haft...the annoying little twits. Background: My company is a Microsoft Certified Partner. We pay M$ a bunch of money and we get a bunch of software to use in-house and for testing. Being a Micro$hit Certified Partner also gives us a MSDN (Microsoft Developer Network) Universal subscription. Anyway, I was trying to log on to the MSDN website and download some software, but I was unable to register. Micro$hitty requires you to enter your MSDN number in order to log on to the site for the first time and they never gave us an actual MSDN subscription number. They sent us a Partner number. They sent us the MSDN software, but no MSDN number. I know because I'm the administrator for our company and I have a giant file with everything they have ever sent us in relation to the their partner program. So, I do what any lazy person would do, I look on the web for a number to call and get it fixed. I look on the Micro$tupid Partner website. And I look... and I look... and I look. I can find a number to call on the MSDN website, but I know that they are handled by two different divisions and the MSDN folks can't help me. Finally, I found the Online Concierge. I click the button, install the software, and get a nice warm greeting: Blah, blah, blah the average wait time is 5min 44seconds. It seems the Online Concierge is a little browser-based chat program. Six minutes go by. Seven. Nine. Eleven. Nice program a$$hats. Fifteen. Is my browser broken. Doesn't seem to be. Twenty. Ureka! It starts working. I tell the Concierge my problem and ask him how to fix it. his response: The technical administrator for the program can provide you with that info. Me: Is that someone at M$ or someone here? Concierge: That is the person at your organization that as access to your Business Profile Online. That would be me, but we never received a MSDN number. Concierge: You should be able to find it on the website in your Business Profile. ME: OK, where's it at? I looked but I might be blind. Concierge: ............... I can't find it either. You can call the Microsoft Certified Partner program and they can help you. Me: OK, what's the number? Concierge: You can find it on the Partner website. Me: Where? I looked and I can't find it. Concierge: ............ I can't find it either. It's 1-800-xxx-xxxx. Me: Thanks. So, I call the number. Phone: Blah, blah, blah, blah. How can I help. Me: Yes, My name is Scooby111 and I work at <Workplace> and I am looking for my MSDN number. My Partner ID is #######. Phone:...long pause..... OH! you think you're calling Microsoft! We get that all the time. You have the wrong number. Me: Thanks. The whole process took almost 2 hours. Can I sue to get that two hours of my life back? (No you can't sue me to get your time back for reading this.) [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments they dont care about you. They have your companies money thats all that matters to them. -Servo Bah... calls like that annoy me, too. Even more when I do it... like when I point people at a website that they changed overnight without me knowing. Serves me right for not checking first *each*and*every*time* I guess, but... -namor Precious: "Look Here.... oh, I don't see it either, here's the info you need." -Mushroom

59. Wireless networking fun! Background: I work for a small ISP in rural Washington State. We provide dial-up access for about 6000 customers spread across half of the state. Recently, we started providing high-speed internet via a wireless 2.4 Ghz antenna. My coworker recently installed an antenna at his house so that he could 'monitor the system' from home and test connectivity to our newest access point. Of course, the 4 megabit connection to the internet is merely a side benefit. (ahem!) Anyway, he called me up on Friday slightly alarmed. It seems that his internet connection went down entirely. He wanted to know if I had done something on the wireless system that may be effecting him. Since we are the only two that can really make any changes, I was his first call. Me: "No, I haven't changed anything. Let me VPN in and check the system." (It's supposed to page us, but sometimes it takes a little while before we get the first page.) "Nope. It's all up and working fine. Customer 1/2 mile away is up and surfing right now. It must be a local problem with you." Tech: "Well, then let's see. I'm putting my antenna in scan mode. Maybe somebody else is on the channel. ... ... ... Do we have an AP called Linksys anywhere?" Me (laughing): "No, If he left the name the same, I bet he didn't change the password." Tech: "How about that. I just logged on to his AP and he's using channel six just like us. It's probably my neighbor. (click)(click) OK, I just set him to channel four and restarted his AP. ... ... ... And I'm surfing again!" Me (rolling on the floor): "And the bonus is that he'll never know, but his AP will actually start working now." I wonder how many people have their wireless network suddenly start working because an annoyed tech fixes their crap for them. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments the guy should pay the tech.. lolz -kennz Well, I can personally account for 2... -Spyder19 <off topic> Hw coe I started to sneeze a lot reading this </off topic> -Dr Jerkyl <spellchecker> Wonder why my spelling is up the walls </rekcehclleps> -Dr Jerkyl I really need to start wardriving again. . . . i have an OC3 on campus but still -nm

60. white/orange, orange... white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, (sigh), .......... white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, test, (sigh), .......... white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, (sigh), .......... white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, test, (sigh), .......... white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, (sigh), .......... I don't get it. My salary: $22(ish) per hour Cable ends: $.80 per cable Cable: $.08/foot My time to make one 3-foot cable: 5 Minutes Total Cost for me to make a 3 -foot cable: $2.87 Total cost to buy a 3-foot pre-made cable: $1.65 And I'm doing this to save the company money. Hmm? Oh well, white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, (sigh), .......... white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, test, (sigh), .......... white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, (sigh), .......... white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, test, (sigh), .......... [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments YAAAY -Warrick sounds like fun.. I like doing that stuff, rather than to talk to starfish all day .. -kennz ANYTHING not to talk to starfish.. at least when you're making cables you can see the progress you're making.. -EvilOtto white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, (sigh), .......... white/orange, orange, white/green, blue, white/blue, green, white/brown, brown, cut, put into end, crimp, test, GOD DAMN IT! I'd rather talk to starfishes than make Cat5 up, I loath it, I can't abide it, I always get other people to do it... or buy it in as Scoob pointed out, it's usually cheaper. -fearmyroot Well....I dont make the 3-footers. The only ones I make myself are the ones they string 100 feet though the shop before I put the ends on. -Brf Implicit VS Explicit costs. Bean counter only looks at the cost of pre-made cables and the cost of bulk supplies. Figures that if cables are made by employees = cost saving to company. Bean counter forgets to add cost of employees time which results in net loss. Remember, accountancy is the art of financial camouflage. -Wraith556 My first job out of school was at a local PC dealer. I spend the first week making serial cables. And the second week, the third week... After a month, I could make the damn things blindfolded! -psychotech For the B variety it is:- W+O,O,W+G,Bl,W+Bl,G,W+Br,Br (Just like snooker - a white then a colour!) If youn need a x-over it is:- W+G,G,W+O,Bl,W+Bl,O,W+Br,Br. The first few hundred are the tricky ones, it becomes automatic after that. -lineswine Did I mention to waggle the cable when sliding on the RJ45 end until the individual cores butt up to the end on the connector channel? (Look at the flat end of the connector - you should be able so see the cores & copper conductors clearly. -lineswine $.80 for a pair of RJ45 ends? eeeek! I pay about 7 UK pence each (inc. V.A.T.) from www.redstore.com...that is about 11 US cents each. -lineswine Scoob - you missed the orange/white one <ducks LART> :B. Seriously. how often do you miss so that you have to redo it? You didn't take that into account... -Dr Jerkyl I thought it was orange/white, orange, green/white, blue, blue/white, green, brown/white, brown :) -Hellion Scoob, I feel you. My company decided that its best if I take my work home with me. Now when I need to make cables or adapters, They give me the box to take home and bring back Monday. I'm salary, I'm screwed either way. -CelticSkyhawk Scoob, I make my own cables as well & don't enjoy it very much. Can I feel you too? ;-) -Tekkie

61. What's that beeping sound... Ok, I do all the tech support for our core company on the side. (read: in addition to my ISP/contracting duties) This morning, king fishie himself calls me into his office. He's not a starfish because he's clueless about computers. Actually he's quite competent. (If you're reading this, please don't fire me.) He just misses important observations. Head piranah: "Something is wrong with the computer or something. It keeps beeping from time to time and it's driving me mad trying to find it." He's got his computer dragged out from under his desk in a vain attempt to find the offending sound. Me: "Well, what does it sound like?" School Leader: "It's a single high-pitched beep. It only beeps about once every 5 minutes. It even happens when the computer's turned off!" Me: "Um... The only things around the computer that might beep would be the PC speaker, the actual speaker, or the UPS. If you had the computer off, then the only possiblity is the UPS." Watery Monarch: "No, I know what a UPS beep sounds like, that wasn't it. It was a short, high-pitched beep. Like some device trying to get my attention." Me: "Like a cell phone with a low battery?" Crowned Cod: (leaps from his chair) "Yes!". He then pulls his cell phone off of the window sill and plugs it in. "And the battery was low too." Sometimes it's fun just to play along. (BFG) [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Christ, I hope he doesn't have a pacemaker on rechargable batteries -billybien Once had an intermittent bleep in the server room, once every 5 mins a very short Blip - so it took me about 2 hours to locate - Smoke Alarm needed new battery ! -Wonko The Sane Don't have any mysterious beeps happen to me, but if I had a dollar for everytime I lost my glasses on my head, well would not be doing TS. -Zero Co-worker coming to me today, "What do you know about Pavilion PCs?" Turns out he got a laptop to fix from some client on the side... had like 8 fast LED flashes on the front when you tried to power it up... prognosis: PLUG THE DAMNED THING IN TO CHARGE... he was just asking for fun, thank god, but that woman... -namor I got tired of my PC speaker beeping when I was concentrating on something else (read 'watching TV') so I wired to turbo button (I know, old case) to turn it off when I wanted. -Splunge

62. Interesting email sig. Microsoft: Where do you want to go today? Linux: Where do you want to go tomorrow? FreeBSD: Are you guys coming or what? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Oh yeah, MAC: What was the question? -scooby111 SCO: Where are you going with our code? -teivrann DOS: Hey, where'd everybody go? -Gecko HTML: <b>Wherever</b> you go tomorrow, make <i>sure</i> you use cool <blink>blink tags</blink>. -RiffRaff TECH: Who cares...let me drive! -Karman Win95: a 32 bit shell for a 16 bit extension to an 8 bit operationg system, originally designed for a 4 bit micro processor by a 2 bit company that can't stand 1 bit of competition! -Popmaster OS/2: Helloooo? (echoes Helloooo, helloo, heloo, helo...) -TheSingingTech MS Word XML:<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?> <Document> <DocumentProperties> <BuiltInProperties> <Property/> </BuiltInProperties> <CustomProperties> <Property/> </CustomProperties> </DocumentProperties> <DocumentStyles> <Style/> </DocumentStyles> <DocumentBody> <Paragraph> <Text/> <StyledText/> <InlineShape/> <Shape/> <Table> <Row> <Cell> <Paragraph> <Text/> <StyledText/> <Table/> </Paragraph> </Cell> </Row> </Table> <List/> </Paragraph> </DocumentBody> </Document> Please don't kill me! -mhesseltine BEOS: It will be so cool if we ever get there! -concept14 Sega megadrive: "All your bases are belong to us" -lineswine MSX: Where did I go? -LaserGuru ADAM: Where did your magnetic data go? (it was funny in the 80s... I swear!) -WildKard LUSER: "That's the seventh time today I've seen that purple ape" -WildKard SAP: <heavy german accent> You will go where think it is best for you to go. </heavy german accent> -K1W1

63. You can run, but you can't hide... It's been a fairly busy day here. I've been franticly instant messaging 'potential clients' and 'researching' on the web. Anyway, I decided to saunter off to Subway for some food since I was too busy 'working' to go to lunch. I patiently wait thru the line and make my way to the register. Wouldn't you know it, I didn't have any cash, so I had to use my debit card as a CC. Easy right? Hell no. The farking starfish behind the counter ran my credit card and no farking printout came up. SO I asked her, "Did the transaction go thru?" Starfishie: (runs card thru again) "It says 'transaction printing." Me: "Well that means that it's gone thru, but the printer's not working for some reason." (I look at the printer and see a solid red light on it.) SF: "It's done this before. I'll just turn off the register and turn it back on. Then I can run it again." Me: "No, if you do that then I'll get charged twice. Just because it didn't print doesn't mean the charge didn't go thru." SF: (reaching for the powerstrip) "It's happened a couple of times already today. All I have to do is turn this off and back on. It sucks because it takes so long for it to restart." Me: "Stop! Hang on." (I reach over and turn the printer off and back on.) "Look, it's printing." SF: "How did you know to do that?" Me: "I'm a computer geek. Please just shut the printer off and turn it back on again if it happens again. All those other times, it double charged your customers." Aaarg! If you don't understand it, call someone that does before you screw it up! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments And all those people they double charged won't even notice it. This is what happens when the fast food industry makes working for them so unappealing that only those people who can't be employed anywhere else apply there. -RiffRaff You poor thing...having to tech Subway's printer. :( Scoob, I don't know how much free time you have, but I'd recommend the book "Fast Food Nation" by Eric Schlosser. -snowcrash

64. I need some ideas. Many of you know that I work at a small ISP. One of the services that we provide is some limited spam filtering. We use several dynamic internet-based blacklists to help reduce the amount of spam that our customers receive. We also use a custom filter that identifies certain email as possible spam so that a (l)user can ID it without having to read it. We also block virtually everything from Asia. If someone tries to send an email from a blacklisted IP, it gets rejected by our mail server. Part of the rejection message indicates why it was rejected and how the server can get removed from the list. It also indicates what blacklist(s) the server is on. Since the day that we started doing this, we have had customers who whine and complain that they can't get email's from certain friends or whatever. They don't want to get spam, but can't we just let that (l)user through. We tested a couple of different products that would let us whitelist a certain email address, but nothing has worked right. OK, enough background. We have a couple of very vocal (l)users that have repeatedly called virtually everyone in the company to complain even though it was explained to them that they can use a free hotmail account to send or receive the email without a problem. One lady actually came into my office and screamed at me for over an hour about how we let 'one guy out on the internet' decide what email she can receive. These chronic neepers have finally gotten their way. We were told to set up a way for these people to receive email that wasn't filtered or blacklisted. (sigh) We did it. We enabled mail on one of our other servers and gave the two whole people who asked for it an email address on that server that forwards to their regular mailbox and is thus not scanned or blocked. I'm usually against spam in any form , but these two a**hats deserve to reap what they sow. So I am now soliciting ideas on how to punish them. I want them to get so much spam email that they have to spend hours sifting thru it all day. Any ideas? I want things that I can actually do that will work. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments are you honestly soliciting ideas for non-spam solutions?? thanks. :) cuts down my work. ;) -mousie oh. retract that comment. i read the last line. am disappointed.. -mousie There was some posts ago a link to a subscription site. Non-asian, but... -Dr Jerkyl Scoob - I think registering with their addy's at each of the following should have them into the thousands in no time. Pornsite, Debt consolidation, Online pharmaceuticals, Casino and Lottery. -Hellion Mousie - Please don't use any of these ideas on me :) -Hellion oh.... so NOOOOWWWW you fear me.. LOL! too late. ;) *kisskiss*. and scoob.. email me. I got a very very interesting email that i am sure you could have fun with...... -mousie IMHO, It should be upto the Eu to filter out their own spam not the isp who is likely to end up getting some of it wrong for some users, *looks over in the direction of AOL in an annoyed way... -Popmaster Ohhhh, I faint, I swoon... -Hellion The opposite has happened to us today. None of our business clients with domain addy's and in-house mail servers are getting bounces when sending to Roadrunner addresses. -techskier SpamAssassin has been working great for us. Each user has the option of enabling it or not, and then configuring it to their own specifications. If they get too much spam or legitimate e-mail can't get through, it's on *them* to re-configure their spam filter settings, not us (although with the proper attitude we'll usually help the women if they sound cute <g>). -RiffRaff Scooby, I'm running a Slcakware Linux distro for the ISP I maintain. We use a program called mailscanner to filter the emails. It can be set up to use any of the blacklists out there, but instead of rejecting, it flags the mail and sends it on to the recipient. It has a VERY easy to setup and maintain whitelist, which is nothing more than a text file. If you are using any Linux distro for your mail systems, I'd look into it. -DataSolutions Gads, I cannot spell today. That should have read Slackware. Sorry. -DataSolutions I'm running BSD 4.7 and your suggestion sounds good but we want to reject them. The suits here decided that we didn't want the clients to even get the messages. We had a product here that did something similar, but we had to stop using it because of licensing issues and customer complaints. -scooby111 re 'DataSolutions' solution- I think this is the best way for an ISP to handle spam- don't delete it, just mark it spam by adding 'SPAM' to the beginning of the subject line and then let the user filter or not as they wish. User-kept white/black-lists that override the marking are doable, too. -FredKlein Yes, I would second the use of Spamassassin. It works wonderfully right out of the box, or with a little tweaking, you can really nail the spam. Also, each user can have certain addresses whitelisted/blacklisted. http://www.spamassassin.org for more info. -mhesseltine Well, the best thing I can think of is to get a Yahoo account and then find pron sites to submit the Yahoo address to (about 3 should do it) along with a few shady websites for "work at home" and "cheap viagra" (google for sites), then whe that baby starts getting loads of spam, start hitting the "unsubscribe" links and putting in their e-mail addresses when asked what e-mail addy you wanna unsub...guaranteed to generate MEGS of spam every day! -GargoyleTS send me there email address at benG913@msn.com i will do my share to make sure they get spammed -falco886 I think someone needs to make a plain text webpage with a plaintext listing of "offending" email addresses. Create metatags such as list, directory, email, e-mail, contacts, ect. See just how long it takes for these to get harvested. Yeah and I'd proxy in and set it up on a free hosting provider of course... -Phssstpok

65. Sounds like a bad joke, or cartoon... So, Jimmy the marketing guy walks in my office at 4pm yesterday and says, "I'm having some technical difficulties with my presentation for the board. Can you help?" (I probably can, but...) "What exactly is the problem?", I ask. Jimmy flashes his $1,000,000 grin and says, "Well, I've got this laptop hooked up to the projector and I can't get the projector to work." (Alert! Alert! Pet peeve in progress!) "OK, what exactly is wrong with the laptop?", I ask, knowing that my equipment is working fine. "Nothing. The laptop's fine, I just can't get the projector to work." My evil grin starts tugging at the corners of my mouth, "And how does your projector not working relate to networking and computer's? You just said that the computer works fine." Imagine, if you will, a little flying smiley face with a sword swooping down for a 'Wal-mart rollback' on his smile. (It's now worth about $.05. "Um, I guess nothing, but you guys are so good at that stuff and---" "Would you like me to fix the coffee maker, or the stapler while I'm at it?" Jimmy: "But...." "No problem, I'll take a look at it, but I'm not a projector repair man. I make no guarantees." (You can feel the evil in my voice.) Cha-ching! The smile's back. "Thank you.", says Jimmy. (Don't thank me yet buddy. I've got a screwdriver and if it aint broken now...) "I aim to please.", I say as I try to decide if I want to be really evil or do I want him oweing me a favor... [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Just plug the projector into the power and get it over with. -burrkiss That depends on what he can do for you. -Bobsentme People owing me favours is usually better in my book, but it depends on whether or not you feel he'll allow you to cash in said favour. Either way, let him sweat for a bit. >:-) -SwedishChef If it's a Dell Laptop, they only run the external port, if they can 'see' a monitor/projector at boot.... -Wonko The Sane pop 2 keys off the laptop and rearrange them -postal tech Let me guess... He didn't hit Function F7. (Or some variation thereof) -Hellion

66. He chose poorly.. Ok, when a (l)user calls our main number, they are presented with several options: 1) Tech Support 2) New Accounts 3) Billing 4) Special Circuits (Scoob') So I get a call: "Special Circuits, this is scoob'." Moron: "Yes, I'd like to set up automatic BILLING for my account." Me: "OK, I'll transfer you to BILLING." I end up transferring 80% of my calls. Why do these farking idiots like to mash the '4' button? Do they just like big numbers?? I can just imagine... Press 7 to have someone drive to your house and slap you. Press 8 if you would like to be violated by 20 inmates named 'Bubba'. (l)user presses 8. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Sounds like me. But unfortunately we're referred to as the Help Desk and not Technical Support. What I hate the most is that they get all the way to the Operator option, choose it, get us, and then say, "Yes, I need Enrollment." To which I start getting snippy and say, "Okay, you need option TWO, let me put you back in the queue." At the end of the day, I get ruthless. -techiegoddess I get that - I work in business internet, 90% of those customers are on some term of contract. A lot of (l)users see the "Contract Internet" number on the bill and call us, end up being transferred. I've started asking, in a sarcastically sweet voice, "You don't really have a contract with us, do you?" Most get it. Some just go, "Huh?" Bah. -namor Scoob, I didn't know you were guarding the Grail! -K1W1

67. FARKING lazy a$$ programmers. I get to support some of the in-house apps that we use in our parent company from time to time. Our parent company includes electrical engineers that use a program called Autodesk Map 5. I've ranted about this particular piece of software before. It requires administrator priveleges in order to run as it updates about 50 registry keys during initialization. In my book, this is lazy programming. In any case, I am installing the piece of brilliantly coded software on a remote machine. Since it's a huge install, I went to lunch while it was installing. When I got back, the system had gone into a suspend mode. (*crap*) OK, no problem. Bring it back up and there is a message indicating that an error has occurred and I need to restart the installation. Fine. I kick off the installation again. The initial setup then detects a failed installation and presents me with a dialog box. The box is titled "Resuming the Autodesk Map 5 Installation Wizard" and asks "Are you ready to complete your suspended installation?" Hurrah! Right? Nope. The only button available is "Cancel". LOL. To top it all off, if you click 'Cancel' you get a popup warning you that you are stopping the installation and you can restart it by clicking on the setup program again. Rinse, repeat. FARKING lazy a$$ programmers. This bundle of spaghetti code costs $3000 per license. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Anytime I find that a particular program needs Admin privileges in order to run, I track down the specific registry key that it's trying to access and change the permissions on that key. It usually works, but yeah, I hate that too. -Ant Autodesk's latest efforts really do suck. We have run into the same crap over and over again and having to hack the registry is a major PITA. hmmmm a software award for the biggest PITA factor. well AOL would win hands down, but second place is wide open :) -DMenscha <.homer simpson> Mmm, pita...</.homer simpson> -snowcrash

68. I like people who yell. Ok, I'm sitting in my little office reading TSC and other important network stuff when something undefinable perks my ears up. I stop to listen. The unmistakable sounds of a deep voice yelling float to my ears thru the door to our offices. As said door opens directly to the front counter of our little ISP, I deduce that it is an angry customer. I can't quite make out what he's saying, but it's not really relevant to me. We have a really nice and dimimuative lady who works at out counter. Like a flash, I open the door and step out. There is a very large and irate man yelling at our billing clerk (a 5'4" guy) from a couple of feet away. "What's the problem?", I smoothly interject. "EVERY TIME I TRY TO DOWNLOAD SOMETHING ON THE NET, THE STUPID THING GETS PART WAY AND ASKS ME IF I WANT TO STAY CONNECTED!!!!!", he yells at me. I ask him sweetly, "Have you tried calling tech support?" "I AM HERE NOW!!!" "Sir, there is nothing we can do for you unless you are in front of your computer.", I point out. "HOW CAN I GET MY HANDS ON THEIR THORAT OVER THE..."(I step forward.) (It should be pointed out that I'm 6'4" and 230+ LBS.) (Gloves are now off) "This is a problem with your computer's configuration. If you call tech support while in front of your computer, they will be able to fix this for you, but do not yell at them and do not threaten them." "Um...It happens on both my computer and laptop." "You could also bring your laptop in and we could fix it for you and then explain how to fix your home computer." "Grumble, Grumble...I'm going to go home and call tech support." I then disabled his account and made sure that the tech he gets will know the entire sordid history. I sincerely hope he comes back in to yell. I'll be quite happy to call the cops on him next time. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Fuck next time, scoob. I would have kicked his ass right then and there. (RiffRaff does not respond to threats very well.) -RiffRaff if it were me, I would have gone straight to the boss and had his account terminated. There is no call to threaten reception or phone support staff for a problem, if they think we are stonewalling them, by all means ask for a manager, but if you have a problem with services offered by our company, yelling and threats will not get the problem fixed. </rant> sorry, this one really pisses me off, I'll even go to town on my father when he gets nasty on the phone to a call center peon.. -Mephiston I am with riffraf sorry it just would be funny as hell to see in a post -micko210 I'm pretty sure he's already met Mr. Dial-tone, now is the time for you to get intimately acquainted with my good friend B.F.LART! -lineswine

69. I almost cried... I went into Costco today to buy some camping gear that I was missing for the weekend of the 4th and the guy in front of me was buying an E-machine. I had to bite my tongue in order to not say anything. To make matters worse, he tried to buy it with his Visa. Costco only accepts American Express. Just as I thought he was going to give up and not buy it, he decides that he can use his Debit card. I figured that this waste-of-space deserved what he was getting. Later as I was driving out of the parking lot, I watched him and his son trying to jam the box into the back of a GEO metro. (Big box, tiny car.) I just had to laugh. Then I started thinking......He probably uses us as his ISP. Waaaahhhahahaa. *sob* *Sniff*. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments you totaly just invoked murphys law on that one. -pound9 *shoulda* said something. I know I sound like an ass when I speak up over the salesman in the computer store to a bewildered couple, at least it might save them a minute or two of trouble. -namor Actually, a buddy of mine has two fairly new e-Machines. One that his parents bought him and one that they gave him that they didnt want anymore. I gotta say, they arent the greatest, but they sure have come a long way from what they used to be. I'd rate them as above average among the available OEMs. Meaning that I'd buy an e-Machine before I bought a Compaq or an HP. -firebird2k2 I disagree on that one. I'd get a HPaq Evo (not Presario or Pavillion) before I got an eMachine. By the way, is anyone else here disturbed that "eMachines" has taken the name of what was a perfectly good (before they went bust) Mac accessory company? eMachines gets eaten by SuperMac. SuperMac gets eaten by Radius. Radius upchucks SuperMac in the direction of Umax. Aah, memories. -Xiphiplastron

70. Spam Rules Rule #1: Spam is theft. Angel’s Commentary: Spammers believe it’s okay to steal a little bit from each person on the Internet with each spam sent. Rule #2: Spammers lie. Kruegar’s Corollary: Spammer lies are really stupid. Pickett’s Commentary: Spammer lies are boring. Rule #3: If a spammer seems to be telling the truth, refer to Rule#1. Lexical Contradiction: Spammer will redefine any term in order to disguise their abuse of Internet resources. Sharp’s Corollary: Spammers attempt to re-define “spamming” as that which they do not do. Finnell’s corollary: Spammers define “remove” as “validate”. Crissman’s Corollary: A spammer, when caught, blames his victims. Rule#4: Regardless of actual IQ, spammers are stupid. Russell’s Corollary: Never under estimate the stupidity of spammers. Spinosa’s Corollary: Spammers assume everybody is more stupid than themselves. Spammer’s Standard of Discourse: Threats and intimidation trump facts and logic. Rule #5: The natural Course of a spamming business is to go bankrupt. Russell’s Admonition: Always assume that there is a measurable probability that the entity you are dealing with is a spammer. Rules-Keeper Shaffer’s Refrain: Spammers routinely prove the Rules of Spam are valid. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments what did spammer do today? ;) -mousie Reminds me of the Bernard Shifman fiasco of ages past. -cecil36 I thought all those emails were real! -bentm99 Does this mean I won't be getting that herbal viagra? -nm on the plus side of spamming, I think I'm now a speed reader, since I can now sort out the spam from the legit with a single glance -Splunge The girl in the cubical next to me thought she got one from a divorce lawyer. It promised her she would soon have a penis 3 inches longer. -Brf

71. LART, LART, LART The USB forum has changed the naming for all those USB devices. WTF? As if it wasn't confusing ENOUGH to starfish. Now we have a bunch of (l)users defining our terms! LART, LART, LART, LART http://www.bangkokpost.com/Database/18Jun2003_datacol61.html [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Be patient, it was also posted on slashdot... -scooby111 Details: USB 1.1 was renamed USB 2.0. USB 2.0 was renamed USB 2.0. (No, that's not a typo.) To eliminate confusion, teh USB 2.0 that was USB 1.1 is now called USB 2.0 Full Speed, where the USB 2.0 that was USB 2.0 will now be called USB 2.0 High Speed. Clear as mud? -chazz From the horse's mouth: http://www.usb.org/developers/packaging/ Read the first paragraph. It's real, people. The only obvious distinction is the picture. -TechnoVampire And just for amusement value, here's the direct quote from the aforementioned web site: "Because the USB 2.0 Specification encompasses all USB data transfer speeds, low (1.5Mb/s), full (12Mb/s) and high (480Mb/s), it is important that vendors clearly communicate the type of product on packaging and in marketing and advertising materials. Inconsistent use of terminology in combination with the existing general misconception that USB 2.0 is synonymous with Hi-Speed USB and/or failure to display the Certified USB logo on qualified products creates confusion in the marketplace. The correct nomenclature for high-speed USB products is "Hi-Speed USB." The correct nomenclature for low or full-speed USB products is simply "USB." -TechnoVampire It all sounds like a bunch of UBS to me... -RiffRaff Anyone who supports a USB product has just been handed a lifetime full employment pass... because no starfish will understand the difference between USB 1.0, USB 2.0 High, and USB 2.0 Full (are those the right names?)... -Robster2001 Yeah I read about the new USB naming issue a couple of months ago... and I knew this was gonig to be a HUGE problem. Customer WILL call in saying "hey I just bought a USB 2.0 whatever but it's running at USB 1.1 speeds". Not to mention the marketing gimmicks that are going to be arising.. advertising "USB 2.0" products, customers will be thinking they are buying the fast version. *sigh* WTF are these people thinking?! Hell, where can I get a job making 6 figures a year just to confuse the entire industry!??! -OzarkBard [dons Business Advisor/legal hat] If the public makes a big enough stink about this, there could be class action suits and money to be had for all. ;) -mousie It sounds to me like whoever thought this up is under pressure to sell a bunch of USB 1.1 devices that nobody wants. :P -WildKard

72. FrogPad ships one-handed keyboard. Oh, the possibilities. Note to all my customers: "I will NOT clean one of these for you." http://theregister.co.uk/content/54/31168.html [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments <ponders usefulness of device> hmmm...I think I could be pursuaded to buy one. ;) -mousie oh god no...that's gonna fuck up young kids when it comes to typing classes..."But the A key was right there on the frogpad..." BLAH! Guess i'm just gettin' old, and not wantin' to change...silly me... -testing123 I hear a decent 2-handed male-female interface works wonders Mousie ;-) -MacDaddy when it comes to 1 handed computing, I usually only need the tab, enter and backspace keys in IE... -garwain

73. Out of scope. PT2 At this point, I'm very curious, so I keep talking to him. He brought the disk and just wants to know if I can get them off the camera for him and onto a disk. And could I please take a look at it and see why the pictures are a little blurry. "Let me see the camera and the manual.", I said. He hands them to me, and the disk, and the cable. (My head is spinning from the shock.) "I'll be right back.", I say as I retreat into my office. Since I have XP, I leave the disk on my desk and connect the camera to my PC. I wait for the install to finish while I thumb thru the manual. The XP wizard pops up and I copy the pics to my desktop and reach for a CD. I pop open a pic to take a look at it and, sure enough, they are a little blurry. (Aw well, not really my job to teach him photography and I'm in this farther than I wanted to be anyway.) OK. I pop in a CD and start burning. I find the HP support phone number and put a sticky note on it so the guy can call them about the blurry photos and setting it up on his home PC. I'm done and just about to go back out to him. I grab the camera and glance at the lense... There's a thin film of slightly cloudy protective plastic over the lense. I pull it off and Voila! It takes crystal-clear pics! When will I learn to just pass these prople off. At least he was grateful. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments One major difference between this story and so many others is that is sounds like this guy really appreciates your help and doesn't mind letting you know it. You can get a lot of mileage out of good old-fashioned common courtesy. At least you have a chance to walk away and feel good about it. -angler I don't mind helping 'prople' like that. -DragonXIII The users intelligence is directly proportional to the amount of help they recieve. -MacDaddy yes I work for an ISP as well, but we also provide CATV service as well. customers cant seen to understand that the tech support option is for out Broadband customers only. But being the most intelligent creatures in the world I do spent some Saturday night fighting with a drunk who wants to order a movie or doesn't know to change the batteries on his remote. -youpeople Wow. You are fairly lucky. Who knows what foulness you could have discovered in those pictures. -firebird2k2 This is kindness... and you will be rewarded as such (have a pile of karma!); however it should not be EXPECTED. The ones that forget such are of course the mortal enemies of this website. -WildKard Bravo!!, Scoob. Nice work. Sometimes they just suprise the hell outta ya and makes you want to beleive there's hope for the rest. -obie099 And, not all techs are intelligent! -misterallno I had an 88 year old man once and he new his way around a computer like a tech. Even installed his own HDD, memory, etc. Had a valid error on his screen. Twlight Zone here I come -Darkpawn

74. Out of scope. PT1 Nice elderly gentleman comes in to our ISP today. He's one of our dial-up customers that's been around for a long time. He's very polite and nice, but clueless when it comes to any form of technology. He heard about how much easier (and potentially cheaper) a digital camera was and decided to buy one. Now, instead of calling our tech support number, he decides to come in to the office *with the camera*. Our receptionist hears the word 'digital' and decides to direct him to me. Now, I do some internal tech support, but I'm really the Network and Internet administrator. I make sure the entire ISP physically keeps running. Our receptionist asks so nicely that I decide to at least talk to the guy. As it turns out, he has been taking pictures with this new camera for about a week and he can't figure out how to get them on his computer. It also takes pictures that are kind of blurry. At this point, I'm thinking: "What does this have to do with our internet service and why would he come here?" Just out of curiosity, I ask, "What operating system do you have on your computer?" "Windows 98", he replies. (Shocked he knows what his OS is.) I ask, "Does your computer have a USB port in the back that fits your camera cable?" "Yes", he replies. (Again, Shocked) [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Not all the customers are dumb! -misterallno They are too. Quit spredding rumours. -obie099

75. Yeah, it's a link but... Sorry. Yes, it's a link and yes, it's not directly tech-related, but you have to admit that you feel like doing it sometimes. http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36~26430~1449927,00.html? - Sue me. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments First Rule of civil Litigation: You only sue people with MONEY. You work tech support. Ergo, you have no money. However, a couple of my goons will drop by soon to break your kneecaps. It's the next best thing. <g> -RiffRaff I like it... Although, I'd have assumed the charge would be a little more serious than harrasment. Also liked the last sentence, "We also are going to (contact) the FBI to see if some type of federal regulation has been broken by using a telecommunications device crossing state lines." If there is then a lot of telcom providers are going to be out of business. -Hellion The customer is not always right, but they are still the customer. As representatives of our company (and the human race) we should never be rude, cobative or threatening towards our customers. Sometimes a firm manner is needed to control the issue (they need my help, I'm in control). I'm a professional and I will act in the proper manner. </2¢> -LaserGuru I do find a bit of humor always helps. I have good relationships with many of my customers- EU's, techs and sales. -LaserGuru Yeowch! Bad enough that telemarketers exist, they don't have to be threatening too! -MacDaddy I don't see why the guy who was calling was complaining. Telemarketers are MEANT to be hung up on! :P -Wiser There are federal laws governing what can be said and what can't, AND when during the call they have to be said, for telemarketers... You know when the feds get involved, the industry was in pretty bad shape... -obie099

76. Noooooooo! I'm a (l)user. I have been installing a new Exchange 2000 server in our corporate network and it is not working right. I had to email Microshaft technical support and start a trouble ticket. I used their online tool to submit the ticket and I explained the situation to them and was told that a rep would get back to me within 24 hours. (Not an urgent issue as our current server is working fine right now.) Fast forward 24 hours. The rep emails me and requests some more information. He also asks for me to turn on maximum logging on each server and send him about 2 hours worth of logs. Now, as SOP, we limit the size of our logfiles to 20MB and set them to overwrite as needed. The new server had about 600kb of data in the app log. (Not doing much yet.) The old server had a full logfile (20MB). I composed my email to the rep and attached the logfiles. As I was about to send the email, I casually remarked to my coworker, "Man, I hope this doesn't take too long to send." Coworker: "why?" Me: "Well it's a 20MB email. It's going to take a while. I hope there's no size limit at his end." Coworker: "What are you sending?" Me: "Some logfiles from our exchange servers." Coworker: "Aren't those just text?" Me: "Yep" Coworker: "Why don't you just zip them up?" Me: "D'oh" (Sheepish grin) "Don't talk to me!" (It was 700KB zipped) [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments To err is human; to really screw things up takes a computer. Go forth and sin no more, my son. <g> -RiffRaff compression. The lubricant of the Internet pipelines (don't think to hard about that one :) -WildKard When you admit your sins you shall receive Absolution... or at least we'll all have a good laugh :] -Hellion On the other hand, the rep probably won't know how to unzip the file at the other end, and complain that you didn't send what he asked for -Splunge

77. More freeloaders We just spent the better part of the day deleting email addresses from disconnected accounts. We usually give 90 days grace period to see if a user will pay their account so that we can reconnect their email. When we delete the email address, it deletes all of the email and the email box. We are having some 'issues' at the moment, so we have to do it by hand and check the call notes on each account to make sure we can delete it. We keep running into users that have signed up for the service, received several notices and finally were disconnected. This is normal. Some of these people call back in and set up another account under a different name and do it all over again! They don't even bother to fake their home address. They just keep calling in until they find a tech that doesn't bother to check to see if they had another account before. The worst one had 5 different accounts to the tune of almost $150 dollars total. We only charge $19.95 per month. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Thus, the clear advantage of having customers pre-pay for each month of service. Theoretically, they should never get to a point where they owe the company money, although it has happened on rare occasions due to a kink in the system they managed to exploit. -RiffRaff i think that they should have depters prision. -youpeople Youpeople - the only problem with that theory is that not everyone who is way behind in payments on something is doing it intentionally. -firebird2k2 Just wanted to add on a disclaimer to that last comment: <disclaimer>The previous comment is not intended to flame or enrage anyone. It's sole intention was for the purpose of point/counterpoint regarding a suggestion. All implied flame war intentions are a figment of your imagination.</disclaimer> -firebird2k2 ill one up you, telephone connected directly to the nid through a second story window -tuswole1 Just proves the proverb correct "those who fail to study history are doomed to repeat it" Hows does debtors prison help? Do we pay the prisoners, thus allowing them to get out of debt? Without an income, how exactly are you supposed to pay anyone off? Do prisons cost anything? "Debtors prison" came and went many many years ago. Didn't work except to appease the wealthys need for revenge, and they got tired of the expense after awhile. -obie099 prepaying each month for the service helps but only a little. the great satan i work for gives people 4 months grae period before disconnecting them. we still have people who let the service terminate and then start a whole new account. good news though recently our collections department has become staffed with wonderful group of evil bastards and are currently going thru termed accounts and billing for old termed accounts if the lusers have a current active account... had real sweetheart of a guy calling in cursing like a sailor because we had just colected 4 years worth of monthly service from previous termed accounts all in one shot. and being that we are the most expensive dial up service around it was a hefty charge.($1147.20) -GefahrMaus

78. Vague....or was it vacant I just got a call from an internal client. Client: I tried to log on this morning and got some kind of failure. Me: Um what kind of failure? Client: Ummm, press F1 or F6 or something. Me: Ok, I think I got it. Are you at a black screen with some writing on it? Client: No it's blue. It's says 'Log on to windows'. Me: And when you type in your username and password and press 'OK' Client: I can't get in. Me: What does it say? Client: That I can't get in. Me: You are getting an error message, what does the error message say? (Must control Fist of death) Client: It says that I can't get in. Me: (red haze coming over eyes) And are you sure you're typing the password in correctly? Is your caps-lock on? Client: Well no. This is a coworker's computer and she didn't give me her password. WTF?? Why did it have to take 10 minutes to get to this point and why would they try to log on using the coworker's name?? AAARG. Me: (definate green tint to skin) Stay right there, I'm going to drive down there and show you exactly how to 'log into' the desktop. (I wish. Computer, meet skull...) [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments "Sir, I'm just going to hang up now and pretend you didn't call, unless you'd rather I conference you manager to find out why you are not only trying to login to the system with a co-workers username/pw, but actually called tech support for help with it?) -obie099 So what was he trying to use as a password???? I've worked some places where the (L)users gave out their passwords as if they were a polite form of greeting. <"Hello, you're new here right? Well it's nice to meet you, and oh by the way... if you ever need to use my PC here's my ID and password."> -Hellion That is a typical day for me..... Glad to see I'm not alone -ZEN35 and I've been on a computer system where there were different usernames, but everyone was assigned the same password so that there wouldn't be any confusion. -WildKard

79. DigitalDogcow's leaving I know that most of you have no idea what's been happening with DD. I was in the dark too. I posted a comment on his whiteboard and got an email response from him that isn't recorded here. Some of it is relevant so I'm going to post it. - - - “Basically I'm just sick of the way TSC is going these days. Seems like u can hardly go a day now without some dickhead posting irrelevant off-topic crap. Non of this bollocks has anything to do with tech support & it certainly aint comedy!.” - - - “PPL can be as dim witted about politics as they like - There's a plethora of appropriate forums where ppl can post whatever they wish. IMHO, TSC isnt one of 'em, & I really cant be arsed sticking around to endure it. its not what I went there for.” - - - "You & I may "look at the world thru different filters" but at least you can be relied upon to put your point across in a lucid, intelligent & above all * civil * manner, that I can respect." - - - The most telling line was: "AFIK TSC was supposed to be a fun place, somewhere a bunch of techs could go to unwind & share a few funny stories with ppl about the (l)users we have in common. But when u turn up & find ur being slated for making reasonable & rational replies to extremist views posted by others then the fun's kinda gone. I dont need that kind of aggravation from something I am supposed to visit in order to unwind." - - - There isn't a damn word that I disagree with. We can change it back pretty easily. All we have to do is #1) Think a little before we post. #2) Don't flame anyone. #3) No personal comments #4) Stay away from 'forbidden subjects' #5) Keep a thick skin about comments made to you. #6) Aplogize if you offend another member. #7) REMEMBER THIS SITE IS ABOUT COMEDY. - - - BTW, DD, I hope you don't mind my posting part of your email here. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Okay, how about a link to the post where this whole mess started? -Calydor Not really a 'started' just the final straw, I think. http://www.techcomedy.com/single/new_stories.php?content_number=16132 -scooby111 *nod* Whatever DD's decision, I believe what he's doing is in his own best interest. That's *definitely* a good thing. I respect DD very much and will miss his stories. -snowcrash I Agree. TSC is a great outlet for venting steam and taking a bit of stress out of a day spent dealing with id10ts and (l)users. There is no need to get personal, and there is no need for off topic postings and/or replies. Ignore the trolls, and put out the flames. -TechnoVampire I think apologies go a long way in situations like this. I'm big enough to apologize if I fly off on a tangent (e.g. my little tirade on scooby yesterday), and I'm also big enough to accept an apology from someone else if they've pissed me off. Just a humble suggestion for all parties involved. -RiffRaff I just found TSC last week and enjoy it immensely. I also plan on becoming a star member as soon as I can free up a little of the balance on my credit card. I too felt that the post referenced was "off" and purposely didn't post my opinions because I could see it was getting heated. Anyway DD I enjoyed your comments and hope your really not gone. You made a few of my day's a little more bearable... <Ramblings from a FNG> -Hellion I would to extend my apologies if I offend anyone. As via personal comments, I comment person on DD stories and Rif and Scooby and Snow, because I enjoy them and I am personal trying to make friends here on TSC, because I only joined a few months back... I think, but from now on TECH to the heart so we can no have a repeat of DD gone missing the digital world. Hope DD does cam back thou he had some nice posts -LowLevelFormat DD - please come home!!! -tlpervert DD, I can honestly say that yours are among the stories and comments I most enjoy and look foreward to during my long days of cruel and unusual levels of stupidity exposure -KuroTaka Dogcows stories were some of the best here. It's a shame that a few bad apples spoiled the funny posts that DD has provided. -MacDaddy I find my self just skipping the rest of the post if I see some flaming. There's enough strife out there with out us adding into it. DD I hope you don't go. -tarax DD I just signed up to TSC today, I have been reading the site for the last month or so and I really like your posts. They are extremely funny and I hope you continue to post on the website. You need to do what you think is best but I hope you stay. -Johan I think that since the war, tempers regarding all things political have become shorter. I've seen this type of thing on all manner of message boards, including several where political discourse was supposed to be verboten. Can't speak for the other sites, but TSC has done more to stay above the fray than the other sites I visit. DD, I really hope that you reconsider your departure. You are a part of an elite group; your postings are in a class with the all-time greats (who shall go nameless here for fear of missing one; old-timers know of whom I speak). I ask you to do one thing for me: Take a little time, a week, a couple, whatever. Then come back. I think when everyone cools off a tad (HINT, HINT!!!), we'll ALL remember why we we joined the site. With utmost respect... -hkypipe Okay, I guess some apology is needed for my post. I had no idea anybody would respond in the way that they did. I just wanted to see how others here thought the guy should be punished. After all, with all the talk (wheter joking or not) about wanting to hurt people over something that is actually quite trivial in the long run, I thought there would be some good suggestions for punishment regarding something exremely serious. If I had even the first hunch that people would take it the wrong way, I never would have posted it, regardless of my viewpoint or how much the incidents affected my community. Please accept my humble apology and I promise to never again post anything political. -kman52000 I am not into the off-topic stuff either, but come on... I think we should all pitch in to buy DD a mouse with a scrollwheel. -ShutUpAndHangUp an apology is one thing and yes a thick skin is something that helps but... Flaming someone to no end because of there personal beliefs is wrong. Whats worse is when members are like well I am sorry DD for example because I was being an ignorant fuckwad you couldn't possibly have thought about what I was typing before sticking my boot in my mouth so in short DD for example I am sorry. So yes apologies are good but hey rather then having to apologize for actions just don't act. Most of all don't react with omg DD please come back please oh please oh please, but by this point no response so pleading didn't work lets try guilt well DD for example has dealt with irate EU's before so taking abuse from fellow Members should be nothing so please DD for example you have a thick skin come back. This goes on for a while a few other attempts at bringing him. Then just like clockwork with all other techs that have left, we call it like the time of death only in this case one member will devote an entire post to wish the well missed party "Good Luck in there Future Endeavours" and to revisit just why that person left. In short stop FLAMING just STOP. Also Hawk if you are reading this site has turned into Anarchy. Because there is no solution to these reoccuring little mini flame wars. Just do what they did in the Matrix Reloaded Destroy and rebuild. As for anyone who has comments you know where to find my whiteboard. But nothing I have said isn't true. End Transmission -alexcorvice

80. Gota love 'Cutting Edge' Hardware. This probably belongs on the soapbox, but it’ll have to wait until I can scrape up enough bones for a star. - <Rant> Why the FARK do companies make a piece of ‘cutting-edge’ hardware and provide obsolete software for it? I’ve run into this more than once in the past 6 months. As part of my job, I have to help test and evaluate new hardware for our sister-company. We just got this new piece of hardware that represents a ‘new technology’ in equipment testing. A technician can now go out in the field and test the customer’s hardware with the new unit and show the customer that it’s working properly on-site whereas before, they had to retrieve the equipment and test it in the lab. Great. We got the new hardware in today and the software that came with it. The rub is that the software is on 4 FLOPPY disks and will only run on windows 98. WTF?? Why the FARK would you design the software to only run on an obsolete OS in the first place. I called the company and found out that they plan on having a new version out that will run on Windows 2000 in about a year! “What about XP?”, you ask. “No plans to test it on that platform.” Arrrrg. The really bad part is that the field guys really like the technology and I’m going to have to make it work. </Rant> [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments As a driver developer, I know why they do this... Testing stuff, you certainly have custom hardware in there that needs special drivers. Win9x drivers are relatively simple, and in fact you can write an old DOS driver and expect it to work under Win98. When you start talking about NT / W2K / XP, then you get into the heavy multithreading with things like spinlocks and serious thread awareness. It's hard to write a kernel-mode driver for NT variants. But damnitall, that should have been their starting target. Unless it has taken them 5 years to write the software for this... -chazz I always find it funny that at the big-name I work for, the important users get Win98 on their laptops. Those that are "upgraded" to Win2K seem unhappy with it, though. *shrug* Corporations... -snowcrash Not too long ago I worked for a large oil company that did testing of customer samples. These were multi-million dollar contracts. The testing used propriatory hardware that also cost millions of dollars. However, the software they used was created years ago by a company that's no, longer in business, and they had no documentation. So we had all of these old PC's running WIN3.11 and 95 that everyone was afraid to stare at too long in case they crapped out. The kicker is that they resided in an oil testing facility where everything literally gets coated with oil. I had one crash once and it was fairly easy to scrounge together a replacement PC. The bad part, <read as beating your head againts the desk and cursing>, was that it took me 3 days of trial and error to get the software re-installed with the proper settings. -Hellion

81. *&%* Software <rant> AAAAAAARG!!! I am SICK and TIRED of lazy software developers who design software so that it HAS to run under an administrator account. Stupid software updates some registry key every time it launches and there is no documentation of which one it modifies. The software support people at <company name> couldn't tell me which key it was updating. It took me over 2 hours to find it and allow all users to update it. The kicker is the software company just recommends that I give all users administrative rights to the computer. </rant> No, this is not a rant against all software developers, just the lazy ones. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Ya know this post would look really good up on the soapbox! -Digital Dogcow That wouldn't happen to be an M$ product would it? All the ones I have dealt with that were "home" user programs have issues on 2k/XP with limited users. -DarthLuke can I post this on the soap box for you? I agree with DD it needs to be there. -virusjtg Post away. And yes DD, any day now, I'll have that star. ;) BTW, no, it was AUTOCAD. -scooby111 I'm convinced a lot of companies are just programming "with Admin rights" and assuming that those rights need to be there; whether they could actually be solved by other methods (registry keys for normal users) or not. As it is, I'm really pissed off when some simple *game* such as The Sims needs an Admin account to run properly. -WildKard Argh, yes! As a Computer Science major who frequents the computer labs but doesn't have admin access to the systems, I know this frustration all too well. -codeman38 Me, too. I made my kids' logons Limited @ home so that they couldn't accidentally destroy the XP Pro install by accident, but they should be able to play games, right? Sure. CivIII, SimCity 3K, and a host of others will not work for my son. GRRR!! -PaseoGuy West Law software also has this fine feature. When I complained to them about it, they just said we will let the developers know. cmon fer chrissake, it can't be any more than 10 lines of code to fix. -DMenscha All I can say is: That's farked up. When the company that writes the farkware doesn't know diddly-sh(t about where their program writes to the registry, stick a fork in 'em, they're done. -MadJack Just wanted to mention as an aside that setting your "limited accounts" to a Power Users groups seems to help in many cases for games under XP. It's not quite admin access, but certainly enough to be dangerous. And you'll need to go to COMPUTER MANAGEMENT > USERS to actually set up this type of account. -WildKard I actually support a piece of software for handheldsyncing. It needs local read/write rights.....I am getting sick and tired of explaining why and how they have to set that up for the user....Come on, you are the admin, you should know know how to do that, and if a user can't write to his harddisk, how is it going to update his databases???? -Kharny I just paid $35 for a Linux program. It installed in my home directory, so I moved it under /usr/local. It said "I can't write my log files." <scream> Added to which this Java program has a 44K shell script to start it. -rurwin

82. I love lazy techs. I just got sent to some training and I got put up in a fairly nice hotel. Now this hotel has a nice little box for connecting to the Internet. It’s got a USB connection, an Ethernet connection and a modem connection. When you plug into either of the high-speed connections and open your browser, it takes you to a page where you can chose what kind of connection you want. Kinda nifty. Of course, the high-speed access costs $9.95 per day! The nice thing is that they have a “free” service that just allows you to surf the local hotel intranet. I did some snooping and it turns out that they don’t block the PPTP or the Terminal services ports. I love incompetent techs. So needless to say, being a poor tech, I just VPN to my home network and surf the web from my home server. I love technology. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Well done. Gotta love it when you can outsmart the other guy. :~} -RiffRaff ROFL, good job :) You'd think if they're going to charge outrageous prices like that, they could hire someone who could do a decent job of it though -karlata Must have been a cheap hotel. Last couple I was in recently had internet included in the room rate. No proxy setup or anything. Just plug in and surf porn cheaper than SpectraVision. -Xiphiplastron I didn't know my network admins were moonlighting :) -DMenscha You can turn this situation to your advantage: *tap tap* Bill Erased *tap tap* Credit Card #'s copied -Coward Scooby, Maybe the tech *did* know what he was doing. The hotel's office computers may be behind the same firewall to keep the desk staff from browsing porn on the job. What hotel manager is going to know how to check whether you're only filtering ports 80, 25, and 110? -Antacid

83. SPAMMERS suck This guy called our ISP the other day. "Every time I try to send an email to one of your users, it doesn't get to them." I tried to get him to send it to me, but it never got thru. I finally had him send it to my home account as an attachment. Of course, the subject: "You can now buy discounted Viagra over the internet." So I respond: "We automatically reject SPAM messages based upon content of the message. Stop spamming us and you will be able to send to our customers again." I just can't believe that the guy had the gall to call tech support for it. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Considering that you know all about him now... http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/edcams/spam/index.html <eg> -Wiser Fuck that - Post his info here for all of us to see. We'll handle it *our* way. <cracks knuckles> -RiffRaff LOL RiffRaff! -Wiser Please post it. My screen name is well earned, please post his info -virusjtg Send 'em over here and fuggetaboutit... -rockytech

84. How may different ways... Can you ask a (l)user what email client are you using? 1.) Are you using outlook or outlook Express? 2.) Are you running Windows? 3.) When you want to check your email, what program do you click on? 3.) If I were to send you an email, and you wanted to read it, what program would you launch? 4.) When you check your emails, how do you do it? 5.) How do you know your email is broken?, What tells you that? 6.) Are you using webmail, ie. do you use the internet to get your email? 6.) I just sent, you an email, please read it and explain to me each step you did in order to read it. 7.) ARRRGH, What farking picture do you click on when you want to read email you idiot!!!!!!! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments you forgot to ask them if they are just trying to put www.theiremail@isp.com in IE's URL -punkgoddess Knowing the history, I just skip to #7. -ShutUpAndHangUp Ok. Close everything, and go to the blank screen. Click on the thing-a-ma-jig to check your email, and tell me what you see. -garwain I'll never ask #6 - to a (l)user, EVERYTHING is the farking Internet. -JavaBean I never ask anymore. I just open OE and set that up for them. If they use something else, SOL! -techskier You have two #3 and #6. -Calydor The point is that I tried all of them (I reworded #7) and the guy still couldn't tell me. I finally figured out that he was using a webmail client. -scooby111 JavaBean: actually, I think #6 has its merits...to most of the EUs I deal with, Internet Explorer *is* the Internet. OE isn't, Netscape isn't. "So the Internet's broken, but you can still look at porn?" "Oh, I don't use the Internet for that, I use Netscape" For some people, this is MS's fault. Who remembers Win95a, and the icon for IE called "The Internet"? -karlata I always tell me to open whatever it is they use to check their email, then read what it says at the VERY top of the screen. And if they can't figure that out, go to Help, then About. -e1eveN Me:- What do you use to read your email? User: My spectacles -stegzy

85. Update: How many different ways... As it turns out this waste of oxygen was using our webmail to check his email. Now he wants to test his website that we host. He has a link to an email address on the website (mailto:idiot@whatever.com). EU: "Every time I click on the email, I get an error. There's something wrong with the website." ME: "What's the error?" (Knowing full well what he's going to tell me.) EU: "Something about a default email client." ME: "That is a configuration issue on the desktop that you are using. When you click on the link, Windows tries to launch an email client. You need to configure Outlook Express." EU: "But I never had to before!!" ME: "That's because it was already set up before!" ARRG, <Bangs head against desk> Just farking do what I tell you to and it will work. Don't ask me why. NO, people who visit your webpage have more intellegence than you do and they will be able to do it just fine. (I know, that's assuming a lot, but this guy is the bottom of the barrel.) I can't wait until the majority of people are on webmail. (D@mn you MSN). [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments I still don't understand why they did that...IE doesn't have a way to change its default (I could be wrong) and I don't think MSN catches it either. (stupid non-standard standards) Baka! Its like selling someone a car with square tires...It'll go, but the ride SUX! -GargoyleTS To change E-mail program in IE: Tools/Internet Options/Programs/E-mail -TechnoVampire Yeah you can change it. It is on the Programs page of the IExplore options. -Brf no kidding how hard can it be to set OE as default mail client through internet options -alexcorvice Can't think of a single reason I'd ever want to use Outlook/OE tho... -WildKard

86. If only it were possible. http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=19980429&mode=classic [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Hehe, few years back I had a temp job at an advertising agency, used their ISDN line to suck down files from Hotline 24/7 (back in those dim, dark days I only had dial up at home). The boss there was farkin clueless, he would have prolly bought that quake excuse as well. -Digital Dogcow now thats funny. -virusjtg

87. Email hell... I got a call a few minutes ago. L- I'd like to set a domain and have you host it for me. M- Sure. We'll register it for you and host the DNS. What domain name would you like? L- www.saintlooserscatholicshoolacademy.com M- Is this your main domain? Are you actually going to receive email there? L- Yes, why? The committee came up with it. M- Figures, just don't ever expect me to email you. :) [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments my sister once tried to set up a domain for a website. after trying several variations/combinations on her real name and screen names, she ended up with one that my dad used to call her when she was little. it was 28 characters long (without the 'www' and '.com'). she never put anything in it, and cancelled it after about a week. :P -mousie

88. Why couldn’t you restore my data? I work at a small ISP. At 8pm Saturday night, we had a hard drive failure on the web server that hosts our commercial customers’ web sites. Fried, gone, no more boot. Our UNIX guru and I came in at 8pm and worked on getting it restored all night and into the morning. At 10am I finally went home and he stayed to wait for the final restore to finish. He ended up staying until 8pm that night. (Making it a full 24 hours for him.) Monday morning, our manager gets a call from an irate customer that was unable to update his website all weekend and now it’s up but the data is 2 weeks old. (We back up the server monthly). He lost all of his updates for the last two weeks. The customer calls back on Tuesday morning and gets (guess who) our UNIX guy. This guy tells him, “Read your f&%*ing contract. You are responsible for backups. You’re lucky we restored ANY of your data. Besides, we’re giving you web space for free and doing the DNS for free, don’t complain.” Our manager called him back to work out a credit for him and he was VERY subdued. This guy's my hero. He actually told the customer: 'Fark off'. I guess lack of sleep gives you some guts. [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments no unix gave him guts -snaggle

89. What’s wrong with your Internet connecti Part of our business is reselling Internet connections on a fibre-optic network to customer’s houses. We do this in an area that is 2-hours away from our core business. At our core business, all we sell is dial-up and DSL. We guarantee a 1MB connection to a customer’s house, however, the fibre provider doesn’t actually limit the speeds. I just got a call from a new customer that wanted to know why he could only get 5MB when his (cheap) router was connected and 20MB when it wasn’t. ME: “Sir, we only guarantee 1MB speeds and our gateway only has a 100MB NIC in it. 5MB is very fast.” Him: “But why is it so much faster when I disconnect the router?” ME: “Because you bought a cheap router that can’t handle the speed while doing NAT” HIM: “But I bought the router from you!” ME: “But we only guarantee 1MB, you’re 5x that fast even with the router.” HIM: “But there is something wrong with the router.” ME: “Sir, the router that you bought is designed to work with cable-modems and DSL. They only go up to about 3MB.” HIM: “Well, if you don’t want to help me…” ME: “Sir, I am paying $100 for my 512KB DSL connection to my house. It’s hard for me to sympathize with you when you are paying $49 for a 1MB connection and getting 5MB out of it. Besides, WE ONLY GUARANTEE 1MB TO YOUR HOUSE!! Call NetGear if you think the router is malfunctioning.” AGGHHH. We have 5 T-1’s at our main office for all the dial-up accounts. That’s only 7.5MB for all 6000 customers and he wants to complain!! [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments <sluuuuurp> . . . oops, don't mind me --just drooling at the thought of a 5MB home connection . . . -Big Bad Mojo There's that GOSUB loop again!. -Digital Dogcow No kidding, imagine all the porn you could downl....I mean all the useful things you could do with 5MB. -Bioguy Hey where is this place, i think i'm moving.. Heaven Here I Come!!! -eldorel Washington state near Hanford... -scooby111 My home cable provider only guarantees 512K, but I usually get 2-3Meg download. Depending on the site I am downloading from, I can get up to 1-meg/3-secs. -Brf *Drool...Drool...* Ooooh. No lag connection, man. Me wanna. -Tmax And here I sit and use a teeny tiney little 14.4k wireless connection at home. Gotta love life on the road in an RV with almost no money. -Technomancer COMPLAINED??????? about 5MB?????? Does someone have a hammer I could borrow to knock some......DECENCY into this guy? good gawd!!!!!!! {cries over parents who still believe dial-up will "do just fine"} -mousie At work we have OC-12 (albeit shared with about 30,000 people, but still...)with 100 MB Ethernet to the desktop. We have one satallite office that is not on the campus network, so we installed a T-1 line out there, and that line is shared by four computers and one printer. You should hear the amount of neeping and whining I get from those ungrateful, spoilt rotten (l)users, because that T-1 isn't as fast as the campus network and thus is too slow for anything they try. Those farkers just need to spend one day in an office in the real world, where you can have hundreds of people sharing a T-1 who are even GRATEFUL for it. -ltu1542hvy I just checked my speed and my downstream from my wireless laptop is 2585.34KBps...on my desktop it averages 3575KBps...I'm doing ok<grins savagely> -rokitt *drools on keyboard* BZZZZZZZT! -Wiser I used to live around there, scooby111. -ab1normalh can you get me that fiber out in yakima -nagothrond Just explain that connectivity speed is directly related to the number of reactors that are on-line times the speed of the wind blowing through the 200 Areas. ("It's too late to go, when your teeth start to glow!") -deltree/y Sorry, Fibre in Yakima is a little out of reach for now. It's coming in thru the Tri-cities. However, Microwave is coming to West-Richland and Prosser. Yakima will probably be 5-10 years. -scooby111

90. Conspiracy Theory An EU came into our front desk this morning. (Yes we fix computers on-site as well as over the phone.) She bought a P-4 Gateway computer with Windows ME installed. She was sure that her computer has a virus on it. To prove it, she started opening files to find the ‘virus’. Now this is a little clueless, but not so bad, yet… Since some files have no program associated with them (like dll’s), she simply chose ‘Adobe Acrobat Reader’ as the program to open them with. (I’m assuming that it was first in the list.) She actually came across a dll that had some text that she could read. (It doesn’t matter which.) Since she had associated nearly every file type with Adobe Acrobat Reader, her computer didn’t run properly anymore. This (l)user printed up the dll file and took notes about what each line of text must mean. (It should be noted that some dll’s also mention certain manufacturers in the text who helped develop the dll.) This lady is convinced that HP and several other manufacturers have formed a conspiracy to install the ‘virus’ on her computer. The kicker is that the last page is almost blank with the letters ‘WG’ prominently displayed near the bottom. This of course means ‘George Washington’ backward and proves that the office of homeland security is ultimately responsible. <sigh>. What do you say to someone like that when they’re face-to-face with you? [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments You say, "Excuse me a moment, Ma'am," and pick up a phone, pretending to dial a number. Then, softly, but still loudly enough for her to hear, say "Code 47 at the front desk. She's on to us." Then sit back and watch the fun. :) -RiffRaff i can take any number, and make it 666. in fact, i can take most words and make them 666 as well. -damiensmith OK.....Make ShoNuff -> 666..... -ShoNuff I'm George Washington and u know too much (act like u're going for a gun). If all works out, u'll have yourself a brand new p-4. -CyberGrandma Land of the free? Ha! That's what we wanted you to think! *flurry of MIBs apprehend the woman* -WildKard Assuming A-Z equals 1-26, then ShoNuff equals 278. 278 times 2.39568345323741007194244604316547 equals 666. -Kurgan My previous comment was making fun of a Simpsons episode ("I thought communism was dead") and was NOT a polticial statement. Just thought I'd clarify sooner rather than later. -WildKard Play along with her & get her to talk into your shoe...if she believes DLL's are viruses, she'll believe your shoe is a telephone with a direct link to NSA headquarters! It won't fix her problem (only some SPECIAL pills will do that), but at least you'll be able to have a good laugh at her expense! -lineswine

91. Not really a story but... Want some serious computing power. How about putting this in your house... http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3400031048&category=1247 [By: scooby111] Comment on Story Comments Number of Bids = 0. (No farkin shit!) -Digital Dogcow Im planning on building a mofo like that -damiensmith Hmmm. A Cray from '93. I could take that $3000 and build me a bitchin' system using today's components and run circles around it. -Xiphiplastron Not only did he get no bids the first time, but he relisted it for even more - $3500! -Froggy Now that makes a lot of sense! If you can't sell it for a given price, maybe if you ask MORE for it, people might think it's WORTH more and maybe pay it. Yeah, right! -ltu1542hvy I could use that case. Ill pay 20 bucks (cnd) for it -damiensmith I dunno, there's gotta be some historic value to that unit, I don't know how practical it would be, but imagine the geek-envy you could generate by simply letting your friends know you sent them this email from your CRAY SUPERCOMPTUER! -SpinyFrog And the auction has closed and its 'going, going, NO SALE!!!!" -MadJack I used to work 2 buildings down from the Cray main office, and had friends that lived just over a hill from the Cray plant. That was back when Cray's were hot items. -TechnoVampire HEY - Anyone want an ENIAC or a UNIVAC. All for $100,000,000,000 Buyer pays shipping $0.50 -RavenDarkwing I'm so weirded out...I don't like mainframes...maybe cause most of them are older than me... -Vertigo Mainframes are the most unforgiving pieces of shyte there are. The only thing they're good for is keeping you legacy applications up and running when somebody DDoSes you with the Slammer. -MadJack

Customer Misconceptions

Tech Rules

2. yes = I have no farking idea why that matters so I'm just gonna pretend and pull something out of my a$$. Often spoken as a response to a question that a tech will ask. Such as: "Is everybody else able to print to that same printer?" [2004-08-18]

3. I HATE it when people plead innocent on an error message! Here’s a news flash for all you leeeetle starfishies out there: I don’t give a flying FCUK if you caused it or not. I am NOT here to fcuking place blame or berate you over your inability to understand a fisher-price OS like Windows. I am here to fcuking fix the problem. I don’t need you to fcuking waste my time, your time, and everybody else on hold’s time by trying to shift the blame to your fcuking kid, your cat, your SO, or mysterious fcuking space-gnomes from the planet X! No matter how hard you try to convince me of your fcuking intelligence, I’m going to think you’re a fcuking barnyard-dwelling pig-raping assclown when I hang up. Do you really care what some anonymous tech thinks of you? I know I couldn’t care less if you get your skin flailed from you by a freak hailstorm seconds after you hang up with me as long as you get off my fcuking phone!! [2004-07-01]

4. It is by caffine alone that I set my mind in motion. It is by the beans of java that my thoughts aquire speed. The hands aquire shakes, the shakes become a warning. It is by caffine alone that I set my mind in motion. [2004-02-27]

5. No matter how authoritatively you state the answer, (l)users will think you are guessing. - - - eg. Me: "Your new password is 'password'. Please type it in the password field." - (L)user: "Oh! I think I remember my old password now. I'll try it!" - Me: "It won't work. Your new password is 'password'." - (L)user: "It doesn't work!" [2004-01-12]

6. If you do not know how to configure a pop3 account in MS outlook, you do not have the FARKING right to call yourself a network administrator! Take your farking hillbilly a$$ back to your farking desk and answer the farking phones! (No offense intended to hillbillies or secretaries.) [2004-01-06]

7. A (l)user will always wait until 5 minutes before your shift ends to present you with a difficult issue. This is doubly true on Fridays or any day when you have something urgent planned after work. 90% of the time, it will be something that just can't wait and has been happening for days... [2003-04-15]

8. A server will always crash 10 minutes before your weekend is supposed to begin. [2003-04-15]

Customer Types

2. It was better before. "My computer is too slow now. It was working fine before you had me <insert irrelevant set here>." I changed this guy's logon and password. I had him log on to his (XP) computer and generate a new profile. This was weeks ago. Now he claims that his computer is taking too long to bring up a word document. Ahhh. Maybe if you didn't have three sessions of AUTOCAD running at once! Wow! If you close your memory hogging programs down, word launches instantly! The rub is that the guy has the fastest computer in the company. Am I ranting? [2003-01-21]

Co-Worker Types

2. I don't trust you to do it... This is the co-worker that sends you a nice email asking you for help and then CC's your co-worker, your boss, and everybody else who's in the chain of command. Grrrr. Maybe he's just making sure that somebody reads it, but I don't need 5 people asking me if I got it done!!! [2004-04-19]

3. Thinks he's sly Nice to your face, but then proceeds to tell EVERYONE how incompetent, lazy, or dumb you are in an effort to undermine your authority or to get you fired. Honestly, don’t they think that you have ANY friends at all? It always gets back to you. [2003-01-17]

Customer E-mails

2. Subject: speed I recently bought a new computer, and it connects at a maximum speed of 46.6 mbps. My laptop and other desktop, which also run windows XP all get connection speeds of 50-52 mbps. I have called tech support for the computer and they pointed me in your direction. Is there a setting I should look at changing to increase my speed on my new desktop? Thanks, (clueless leettle SF) [2004-07-09]

3. Subject: Web Hosting Dear [ISP] Staff: I own a small web development company and I am interested in having [ISP] host my web site. Is it possible to get [lastname].com or [lastname]services.com or [lastname]Web.com (it sounds like you assist in the domain registration process). -- My company: [lastname] Web Services -- Needs: Web hosting for a small site, doman name of [lastname].com or [lastname]Web.com. One or two email address matching my domain name...@[lastname].com or @[lastname]Web.com. -- How do I become a customer? Must I pay in advance or be billed? -- Thanks for any info! I am using Frontpage (just bought the '03 version) for web development and I noticed that your server doesn't support the Front Page extensions? I wondered why, as this could affect my web development tools and my need to use HTML code more frequently. -- -susan [lastname] ---- Holy crap lady, I don't even know where to begin... [2004-06-24]

4. Subject: Count me OUT. We just upgraded our homepage from a cheesy red and white style to a new, much cooler format. We have one customer that's been looking for an excuse to get out of his wireless contract. ($60/mo) -- Subject: YOUR NEW HOMEPAGE. -- Body: Your old home page was very simple. Not difficult to maneuver around. Was great to get me where I need to be. What are you thinking making it more difficult? To be honest this sucks. It is more difficult to get to where I need to go, and am thinking now of switching access providers. If you want to continue in this direction COUNT ME OUT. Eric ---- My reply: I apologize for the inconvience that we have caused. Our new homepage is designed with our customers in mind so that they may more easiely navigate the interface. If you look, you will find that the basic layout is nearly identical to the previous design. The new design was based upon our customer requests and we have had good feedback regarding the new design. It should load much faster than the old page. If it does not suit your personal needs, technical support will be able to help you change your homepage to any internet webpage that you would like displayed. Again, we apologize for the inconvienence. If you still feel this is cause to switch access providers, we can facilitate that as well. As you have 7 more months before the terms of your wireless contract is fulfilled, we cannot cancel the account at this time. In leiu of the 7 month period will accept a payment of $419.65 to satisy the terms of your contract. Upon receipt of this payment, we will schedule a mutually convienent time to retrieve the wireless antenna. [2004-02-12]

5. Subject: I'll get right on it. I used to be able to dial up at 52 Kbps.......now I'm lucky if I can dial up at 48 Kbps. I would like to resolve this situation so that I won't be forced to find a new dial up provider; I'm sure you can understand how frustrating this is. Please advise as to when I can expect this service to return to normal. ---- Right. Kay. I'll make it my primary action item... [2003-08-12]

6. Subject: We don't run no stinkin' popus you moron Howdy: I hated pop-ups when they were just minor annoyances several years ago. I also thought the website was a safe harbour from much of the pop-up growth.Now I discover that I can't even reach your homepage without swatting at least seven pop-ups out of my way.Why have you allowed your website to become so infested and how do I get rid of them? Is part of the problem EZN? If so, then how how I get rid of EZN? You just about had a laptop airmailed through your front door when I sign-on this afternoon! Thx for your help. ---- Yes Pat, I'd like to buy a clue... [2003-08-12]

7. Subject: It isn't a myth. It happened to me. A customer calls in and wants to transfer her website to our webserver. No problem. I give her detailed instructions on how it should be done to avoid downtime. The first step is for her to email the website backup to us so that we can get it on our server and test it. I even gave her detailed instructions on how to get a copy of it. Fast-forward 1 weekend. We arrive this morning and there is an email from her with, you guessed it; All LINKS and no actual files. She also pasted the webpages into the email as a secondary plan. No FARKING way am I going to go thru the email and recreate her webpages from scratch. I know my instructions were very clear on how to copy the website. I even told her how to make sure she wasn't sending just links. [2003-06-23]

8. Subject: Just Clueless Hello! Please let me know why the sentence structure is so messed up when I send a message that has been typed orderly, also why do a lot of fwd's have the same problem along with all these >>>>> ? Thanks for your kind assistance.---This is the actual email. [2003-04-24]

EUPOTD (End User Phrase of the Day)

2. "So...uh do you know any techs who want a job?" Spoken to me by my boss about 5 minutes ago after he just almost doubled our workload by adding a huge client. Are there any techs out there in the Yakima Valley (Washington) or nearby why want a good job? http://www.techcomedy.com/members/message_board/viewtopic.php?t=3162&start=60 Help!! [2006-11-30]

3. "Does the B-channel have to be connected for it to work?" -- Lord save me from "IT Guys" that don't know how ISDN works. [2004-08-23]

4. "Oh, it's a birthmark? How long have you had that?" [2003-10-10]

5. I don't know what my username is. I never have to type it in. It's always just there. [2003-10-02]

6. Your hair looks longer today. Did you get a haircut? [2003-08-04]

7. I've got an ignorant message for you. ME: That's OK, we're used to them. (She actually had a sense of humor) [2003-07-01]

8. I thought that wireless was the same thing as DSL. [2003-06-12]