Excel 140k Tech Support |
- Excel 140k
- I got friends in low places...
- "Just remember, another office is getting screwed right now".
- Faculty members vs. MS-DOS
- What do you mean an HDMI doesn't give internet?
- You keep the network share WHERE?
- "Internet isnt working!"
- Computer is slow please help!
- When you mess up but L1 messes up harder
- Ugh at the end of a Monday
- Nobody knows what's missing just that something is missing
- "Shall we try another laptop?"
| Posted: 05 Aug 2019 07:42 AM PDT In the grim, dark future of the 21st millennium, there is only one Excel file. Used as a database for an entire department, without IT's knowledge. It is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from the Dark Age of Technology. Yet even in its deathless state, the Excel file continues its eternal vigilance.
Until one Praise the Omnissiah that our regular backups brought the Excel file back from the brink of death. Of course the lesson hasn't been learned and this department will continue to torture this accursed document. [link] [comments]  |
| I got friends in low places... Posted: 05 Aug 2019 04:03 PM PDT back story- I was in the army as a IT tech. I had to visit a very remote location to service their computer systems at the hangar. The remote location could only reached by air. I flew out on a C-23 Sherpa transport with duffel bag and tool bag in hand. It was a 3 day job with a return flight on the Sherpa. I had spent 2 18 hour days working on the Aviation unit's computers. This happened as I was getting ready to leave. I came back from another part of the installation and was greeted by 30 brand new freshly baked second lieutenants (AKA butter bars) . I had my duffel and tool bag with me. I was a SGT at the time. All 30 pairs of eyes turned to me. One of the group of butter bars asked where I was going. "catching a ride out of here this afternoon". All of those green LT's started laughing. "uh, what's so funny...?". The LT that had asked said "we're lieutenants, you're just a sergeant, do you really think you're getting on that plane?". I replied "yep. I KNOW I'll be on that plane." The gaggle of LT's laughed again. I went to the bathroom and took my time. I came out, all the LT's has sprinted out to the plane to ensure they would get a seat. I walked out of the hanger and across the ramp to the plane, got up to the stairs.. The crew chief yells out "Sorry Sarge, we're full!". The LT's laughed again in unison. Suddenly... Someone comes running from the hangar and up to the plane. "This SGT came out here to work on our computers and network. He has a seat on this plane". The crew chief looks at the closest LT and tells him to get off his plane. The LT is in shock and horror to having to stay behind. "What do you mean?! I'm an officer and he's just an NCO!". Crew chief- "Yep, and he came out here to work on Aviation computer equipment. His seat is guaranteed, you flew stand-by and your seat is not. Now get off my plane". The LT got off, I got on. The crew chief stowed my duffel and tool bag. I sat down in the recently vacated seat, looked over to the LT sitting next to me and smiled. [link] [comments]  |
| "Just remember, another office is getting screwed right now". Posted: 05 Aug 2019 07:59 AM PDT I was one of the lead techs on a military post. Most of our users were in one building, in several units; compartmentalized in offices. We would send "the boys" (junior enlisted) out to do the day-to-day tickets, whereas I was a "janitor", who would go into an office and blanket fix everything in that office and move to the next. I was in the middle of a clean up job when I get a ticket for another unit demanding high-pri assistance. I call the user that put the ticket in and ask that he hold on for 2 more days while I finish up the job I'm working on now. He'd furious! I blow off his attitude and finish up the job I was working on. I showed up to his office, told him to crank out a list of issues (to include the one on the ticket) and I'll make it happen. At first, he was pissed that I did not show up instantly when he put the ticket in. This was a major clean-up and install operation. Several new computers, 20 new printers, 3 flatbed scanners, various user issues. I spent the next 5 days hammering out IP address allocations, system installs, software installs, profile moves, resolving user issues and teaching users how to use their new flat bed scanners. EVERTHING was DONE. (I don't like having to make repeat visits after a clean up, it means I did not do my job correctly) The last day I was there, I went back to Mr. "impatient" with his list. Everything was checked off to include problems that were not on it. He was happier than pie and was showering me with atta boys. After he was done, I said "remember that ticket you put in and wanted it done right now? Then got mad when I asked you to hold off a couple days?" His face went sheepish and started looking at everything but me. "Yeah, I remember." he said in a low voice. "Well.. I just want to remind you that the last 5 days I spent in your office, another office was getting screwed." The light of realization came on in his eyes. You know, I never had another issue with that user when he put in tickets. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Aug 2019 08:01 PM PDT Back in the late '80s, in the pre-Windows days of MS-DOS, I worked PC support at a smaller university. When the office workers called with problems, they were usually just normal, every day hardware or software issues. The faculty, on the other hand, could be much more creative. Two examples: 1) A professor called and said his system wouldn't boot. We went over to his office, and sure enough, it wouldn't boot from the hard drive. We booted it from a floppy and checked out the c:\DOS directory. Instead of the usual list of files, however, we found that the files had been renamed "1", "2", "3", etc. I asked the professor what happened, and he said "Well, I knew those files weren't mine, so I renamed them so it was less messy." He didn't want us to reinstall anything, so we spent the rest of the afternoon figuring out which file was which based on size. 2) A faculty member called and said his hard drive was full, and he couldn't free up any space. When I looked at the root directory, in addition to the usual contents I saw a directory named "BACKUP". I asked him what that was, and he said "Oh, I copy everything there daily so I don't lose any work." I looked in BACKUP, and sure enough, it contained a copy of everything under the root directory... including BACKUP. I looked in \BACKUP\BACKUP, and again, it contained everything in the root directory, including BACKUP. You can probably see the pattern forming here, so I'll just jump to the end; somewhere around 15 or 20 recursive levels deep, DOS just gave up and decided not to touch those files any more. I had to reformat the hard drive to get it cleaned up. [link] [comments]  |
| What do you mean an HDMI doesn't give internet? Posted: 05 Aug 2019 04:14 PM PDT Hi everyone! Context: My friend, lets call him Bill, and I work as tech support representatives in the CCTV industry. Before working with our current company that deals mainly with technicians, we both worked at a different company that was oriented towards end users. Finally, one of the most common issues and calls were about connecting the recorder to a phone. While exchanging stories, Bill told me about this gem: A woman called in asking for help connecting her system to her phone, and Bill was happy to help: He asked her to check that the cables from the system were connected properly and he asked her to follow the Ethernet cable back to her router. According to the customer it was all connected. An hour of troubleshooting every possible option later, the issue remained, and Bill was just about ready to request a warranty replacement, when he had an idea: He asked the woman to describe each cable and tell him where exactly they were connected. By the end of the descriptions Bill had figured it out! Turns out that the woman had the Ethernet cable connected to her smart TV, and she thought that the TV gave internet to the system using the HDMI cable. They connected the recorder to the router and everything worked fine. Moral of the story: Even when you think you're being specific with your probing questions, the customer will probably find a way to prove you wrong. [link] [comments]  |
| You keep the network share WHERE? Posted: 05 Aug 2019 11:09 AM PDT Recent discovery that we are still in the process of figuring out what to do with. background. was working out a ticket to set up a PC for a new hire in a remote office. M = Me U = User First off, when I reached out to the user they were logged into another user's profile, which is already a no-no. In their defense, they hadn't gotten their credentials yet and their manager probably told them it was okay. not in their defense, I sent the manager the new user's credentials days prior; but that's not the subject of this post.
now, I do know that the only drives IT manages or are aware of are a P:/ drive for department shares and a few folks have legacy personal H:/ drives (we're migrating to OneDrive/Teams/Sharepoint for personal network storage).
Proceed to find that the path doesn't point to a network path as I expected (\AMXXXVF01) "North America, Location code, Virtual Fileserver 01". Instead, the path pointed to \<COMPUTERNAME>\J:\PUBLIC_DRIVE At this point, I'm more perplexed than anything.
I then proceed to gather more information from the user's supervisor and department head. Turns out, this is a 4TB External HDD connetced via USB to an old Windows 7 desktop that is due to be replaced. And an entire department has this drive mapped to their PC as a J:/ drive. They're all using if for "backup" storage and have ~60GB used so far. I brought this to my IT Director, who then reached out to the Branch Manager to let them know this is completely not okay as it's a huge security risk. Anyone could just walk in, grab the drive and walk out. We're now heavily pushing them to work with us in migrating the data to OneDrive. There's no local IT presence at any other offices, so all work is done remotely. No local IT presence also means that these offices inevitably often turn into the wild west as the managers start treating it like their own little company. Hoping they see the light sooner rather than later. At least we now have it documented that we warned them about the risks. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Aug 2019 07:27 AM PDT I lurk here sometimes i figured i contribute for once. $user - guy with the problem $IT - me phone rings $IT: good morning, $IT speaking how can i help you? $user: goodmorning, the internet is down i cant access my files $IT: when did you notice the problem? (Checking monitoring and see i can still reach the servers) $user: when i got in at work (which is 6 am he called at 11am) $IT: everything seems okay, what do you see on the screen? $user: it asking to enter my password, but the internet is down. (It took me a few minuts to realise he was talking about the windows login screen) $IT: can you push all the cables in the back of your systeem in to see if it all properly attached? (Bit of rumbling) $user: aah! Internet works again. click $IT: you're welcome.... His keyboard wasnt plugged in properly hence why he couldnt type. If i made some typos or formatting mistakes please let me know! Hope you enjoyed it. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Aug 2019 09:20 AM PDT So this just happened a couple of minutes ago. User calls me asking for help because their PC is really slow and programs aren't working right. 9/10 times it is just a single program error which I can run a bat to kill it. Since we are small group I walk over. The computer is dragging and I am trying to close everything to see what's up. Then I feel really hot air on my leg and notice the personal heater is on and guess where it is. You guessed it, right next to the computer. Once I turned it off the computer started to function normally as it cooled down. Told user to stop using heater next to PC and they said "I didn't know it could do that". Problem solved. TL:DR computer was slow cause heater was heating it up. [link] [comments]  |
| When you mess up but L1 messes up harder Posted: 05 Aug 2019 03:49 PM PDT As previously mentioned, fruit-based company as a L2 advisor (although we use T1 and T2). This is another long one. This was over a year ago, about an hour before the end of the work day. I had had a shitty day, full of crap escalations and stupid consults and in comes another one. One thing about our system is that we can see the name, vendor and location of the consulting advisor and others on the case. In this case, this guy was from my site, although we were a floor apart. Now, we generally are confident that our T1's will cover all the bases before escalating, we help with mentoring and supporting them throughout the day, but this was not the case. The issue was what is best known as an iCloud lock on an iPad. This locks a phone/iPad to a specific account, although there is a hint that says the first letter of the email address as well as the domain. About 50% of those cases are resolvable on first contact, others require the customer to send in documentation to unlock the device. The first thing we do in these cases is ask for the serial number of the device. This helps in understanding if what the customer is saying is accurate and if the unit is not marked lost (a deal breaker in these cases). In this case, the escalation was made without a serial number. ________________________________________________ Me: Me. T1: The hapless first-line advisor ________________________________________________ \upon seeing the case notes and logging** Me: Right, where's the serial number? You need to ask for it. T1: The customer couldn't give it to me, but he's absolutely sure it's *this account*. (*this account* does contain an iPad) Me: You know that what they say can't be taken as gospel. Also, it's an iPad, can't they see it on the back of the unit? T1: Oh yeah, but he's really sure of the account, that's why I didn't push for the serial. (Upon hearing this, I smack my desk and mumble a "For fuck's sake".) Me: Fine. If you're that confident, give me the call. But if it's the wrong account, you're getting a negative peer feedback for not logging per procedure. ________________________________________________ I take the call, gather the serial and, guess what, the account linked to the iPad was different. Our system shows what names the users name their devices and the names didn't match. 10 minutes later and with the magic of research and identity verification, the device was unlocked. (the customer knew the password, just not the email) ________________________________________________ A few minutes later, I was finishing my last call when I notice a dude sit next to me. I had seen his face but never spoken to him. When I finish, I ask him what's up, to which he says: T1: "Hey, I was the one you spoke to a while ago. I wanted to apologize for not gathering the serial but I also heard what you said and I will put that in a negative feedback." I should point out that T1 and T2 were in different floors precisely to avoid confrontations regarding escalations (not like this anymore). I took it lightly and told him it was a long day and it sucked to get a poor escalation from someone from the same site. However, I went to my supervisor and asked to listen to the consultation. Sure enough, my muttering was audible on the call. She then asked what the guy wanted. I told him what it was, to which she acts surprised. "He told me he just wanted to talk to you about something unrelated, I thought you knew eachother! He said he got permission from his supervisor downstairs, but he shouldn't. I need to see what happened." I shrugged my shoulders and left. On the elevator down, I stumble upon the T1 supervisor, who happened to be on my team when he got promoted. "So, did you listen to that consult?" - I ask him. "What consult?" When I explained to him what happened, he simply goes: "That god damn moron, he didn't ask for any permission, I would never let him go up! He told that to your supervisor? FFS, we're gonna need to talk to him." The following day I heard he got his ass handed to him by his management and got a disciplinary warning by HR while I got a negative feedback, which has 0 negative impact. Tl;dr: T1 fails to do the basic, I curse him, he confronts me and lies to his supervisors, he gets penalised, I get nothing. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Aug 2019 04:53 PM PDT Just got this one before I was bout to walk out the door. Me: Hello this is j1akey User: Is the server down? Me: Um, which one are you talking about? User: I don't know, you tell me. Me: Well we have about 20 so you're going to have to be more specific. User: Well my email.... Me: OK, email...that tells me something. We don't actually have an email server, it's in the cloud which basically just means it's on Microsoft's server in a datacenter somewhere. User: Well whatever, I just need to send <NAME> an email before I leave. Me: Ok let me see if I can jump on your computer from here and see what's what. Nope, can't connect, I'll just come down to your desk. So I fiddle around with it, she's on a laptop, wifi is off and the docking station is plugged in via USB which is pretty normal and the dock is powered up. Not seeing anything out of the ordinary right away...until I jiggle the USB and notice it's plugged into the NIC. Cue standard chest puffing from customer.... User: "Was it like that ALL DAY?!?! (as if I have even seen this computer in weeks) Me: Um, I don't know but that was the problem. Well time to go home! [link] [comments]  |
| Nobody knows what's missing just that something is missing Posted: 05 Aug 2019 10:25 AM PDT Thursday: I look and they have a number of document interfaces, so I don't know which this mystery document should have come through. If we ever got it. And I can't find any errors on any interface lately anyway. Friday: The contact says he'll find another user. One that knows that the issue is. And we can meet on Monday. Monday: [link] [comments]  |
| "Shall we try another laptop?" Posted: 05 Aug 2019 07:09 AM PDT So, long story short I work in a small-sized company with some older lads who struggle a little with computers which is fine and I've gotten used to giving them a hand but recently I've been trying to make do with our systems and introduced a VPN so they can work remotely (Most of the time they're out of the office). So here's how it goes. Guy with problem = GWP OP = me *GWP sends email* " Hi OP, (Ahoy there!) Just trying to get to the office from the ship, going through phone hotspot as dongle is not behaving. " *Internal pain as the attempts to help him understand that he cannot use this system whilst on the train etc have gone into the hundreds* *Responds* Hi GWP, Something tells me you're not going to be able to get a connection whilst out on the boat GWP. Maybe try when you're back on land. *Sends and questions how the hell he sent the email in the first place* *GWP respnds* "Hey OP, I'm in Iceland now! Left the laptop on charge for you to remote into" *Can't get into the laptop* *Calls GWP* OP: Hey GWP, hope you're having a nice time in Iceland, any chance you could check the Laptop? I can't get into it. GWP: No problem! *Noises of him sitting down and getting laptop open etc* GWP: I still can't get into the office OP! OP: I know, that's why I need you to connect through your hotspot so I can see if I can help. GWP: Nope, still not work! *Crys a little internally* GWP: Here I'll send you a photo of what it says. And this is where the magic happens for me. He sends me a photo of him attempting to connect through the VPN. Comes up with the obvious, can't connect blah blah blah. But its the one little piece of information below that just makes my day because I know he is trying his best to connect and he is the most gentle giant you'd ever meet. *PhonenameHotspot* No Internet, Secured His next comment being: "Shall we try another laptop?" I could of laughed, I could of cried. But it made my day. After spending the next 30 minutes explaining to him that I doubt he's going to be able to get in, let alone why he shouldn't whilst he's on annual leave. It made me chuckle and when telling others in the office we all laughed because we know he has the best intentions. thought this might be worthy of the tales here. TL:DR - Guy at office was on annual leave, tried to connect via VPN to our systems, whilst on a boat and he didn't have internet anyway. Edit: Forgot to add the reason to the title. [link] [comments]  |
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