An article in Wired about the wondrous Linux advent of a better, considerably pleasant, desktop experience for those looking at the alternatives to a Windows-based life of slavery caught my eye.
Linux: It's Not Just for Servers Anymore
The article mentions Ubuntu's distribution, I've thrown a number of people at this OS and they've all had a relatively healthy reaction to it, even though some of them are self-proclaimed technical neophytes. Looking for a change, with some understanding that this is not a Windows OS, this is a viable option.
I use:
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Thursday, June 21, 2007
What to do when you call support (humour)
1. When you call us to have your computer moved, be sure to leave it buried under half a ton of postcards, baby pictures, stuffed animals, dried flowers, bowling trophies and children’s art. We don’t have a life, and we find it deeply moving to catch a fleeting glimpse of yours.
2. Don’t write anything down. Ever. We can play back the error messages from here.
3. When an IT person says he’s coming right over, go for coffee. That way you won’t be there when we need your password. It’s nothing for us to remember 700 screen saver passwords.
4. When you call the help desk, state what you want, not what’s keeping you from getting it. We don’t need to know that you can’t get into your mail because your computer won’t power on at all.
5. When IT support sends you an e-mail with high importance, delete it at once. We’re just testing.
6. When an IT person is eating lunch at his desk, walk right in and spill your guts right out. We exist only to serve.
7. Send urgent e-mail all in uppercase. The mail server picks it up and flags it as a rush delivery.
8. When the photocopier doesn’t work, call computer support. There are electronics in it.
9. When something’s wrong with your home PC, dump it on an IT person’s chair with no name, no phone number and no description of the problem. We love a puzzle.
10. When an IT person tells you that computer screens don’t have cartridges in them, argue. We love a good argument.
11. When an IT person tells you that he’ll be there shortly, reply in a scathing tone of voice: “And just how many weeks do you mean by shortly?” That motivates us.
12. When the printer won’t print, re-send the job at least 20 times. Print jobs frequently get sucked into black holes.
13. When the printer still won’t print after 20 tries, send the job to all 68 printers in the company. One of them is bound to work.
14. Don’t learn the proper term for anything technical. We know exactly what you mean by “My thingy blew up.”
15. Don’t use on-line help. On-line help is for wimps.
2. Don’t write anything down. Ever. We can play back the error messages from here.
3. When an IT person says he’s coming right over, go for coffee. That way you won’t be there when we need your password. It’s nothing for us to remember 700 screen saver passwords.
4. When you call the help desk, state what you want, not what’s keeping you from getting it. We don’t need to know that you can’t get into your mail because your computer won’t power on at all.
5. When IT support sends you an e-mail with high importance, delete it at once. We’re just testing.
6. When an IT person is eating lunch at his desk, walk right in and spill your guts right out. We exist only to serve.
7. Send urgent e-mail all in uppercase. The mail server picks it up and flags it as a rush delivery.
8. When the photocopier doesn’t work, call computer support. There are electronics in it.
9. When something’s wrong with your home PC, dump it on an IT person’s chair with no name, no phone number and no description of the problem. We love a puzzle.
10. When an IT person tells you that computer screens don’t have cartridges in them, argue. We love a good argument.
11. When an IT person tells you that he’ll be there shortly, reply in a scathing tone of voice: “And just how many weeks do you mean by shortly?” That motivates us.
12. When the printer won’t print, re-send the job at least 20 times. Print jobs frequently get sucked into black holes.
13. When the printer still won’t print after 20 tries, send the job to all 68 printers in the company. One of them is bound to work.
14. Don’t learn the proper term for anything technical. We know exactly what you mean by “My thingy blew up.”
15. Don’t use on-line help. On-line help is for wimps.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Hours of Operation and Uptime
When quality might be Job 1, but only if it's convenient...
A friend of mine received the following email:
I presume performing an upgrade from 5-8AM, or 12-3AM was out of the question.
A friend of mine received the following email:
Hi all,
We have scheduled the helpdesk tool update for Thursday June 21st @ 8:30AM. The update it will take approximately 3 hours. I will send another email out when the upgrade has been completed.
I presume performing an upgrade from 5-8AM, or 12-3AM was out of the question.
Friday, June 15, 2007
The PDC is the what?
Apparently there's a "best practice" that needs to be re-thought at this one company. The idea that the Primary Domain Controller (PDC) should serve several roles rather than simply being the backbone it is supposed to be. I mean, after all, there are Backup Domain Controllers all over the place, the PDC isn't that important, it can do more.
Well, This PDC was the main LDAP store, it also seems to have been the key mail server. I'm not sure what other roles it served, but this was apparently enough. The problem came when the DC freaked out, causing mail to stop and hundreds of e-mails went into oblivion.
Hmmm.
Dedicate a few servers... Don't virtualize everything, and use redundancy.
Well, This PDC was the main LDAP store, it also seems to have been the key mail server. I'm not sure what other roles it served, but this was apparently enough. The problem came when the DC freaked out, causing mail to stop and hundreds of e-mails went into oblivion.
Hmmm.
Dedicate a few servers... Don't virtualize everything, and use redundancy.
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Some advice on Vista and AntiVirus Software
From a colleague who is a firm believer in Grisoft's AVG, this web log endeavours to support why he prefers it. It consumes less horsepower and seems to be as effective as any other.
While the author's web log goes on to elude to being "safe" running no anti-virus software, I can assure you that it can be as beneficial to you as well as others to protect yourself. I will readily promote the use of AVG, though the Rogers/Yahoo partnership of my ISP offers me Symantec's products at no additional charge.
While the author's web log goes on to elude to being "safe" running no anti-virus software, I can assure you that it can be as beneficial to you as well as others to protect yourself. I will readily promote the use of AVG, though the Rogers/Yahoo partnership of my ISP offers me Symantec's products at no additional charge.
Friday, February 16, 2007
Where's that Keyboard?
This is NOT a good reason for server downtime!You might think that your network administrator might know enough to have all systems plugged into KVMs or at least ensure they have a BIOS that can be configured to ignore keyboard errors. It becomes troublesome when the responsibility is shifted to the people at the off-site datacentre, but that may have been the case. Frankly, that's the risk of allowing the employees of the datacentre touch your equipment, they don't have the same level of ownership that your own staff do.
Either way, a friend of mine expressed great frustration when a high-priority server rebooted due to a fault and didn't come back because someone had left it detatched from it's keyboard.
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