Wifi nonsense part II Tech Support |
- Wifi nonsense part II
- But it has links! It MUST be an IT issue!
- Construction Malfunction
- why I drink in the daytime
- Working 2 Jobs at the same time sometimes isn't that hard
| Posted: 21 Jan 2021 01:46 PM PST The Wifi is Frozen! : talesfromtechsupport (reddit.com) This got pretty popular, so why not another story. Same company, same issue. Due to terrible design choices in the failed attempt to save money, this everything-selling-store needs wifi in it's walk-in fridges and freezers. I was sent on a different workorder to figure out why they didn't have wifi in one of them. Different store, same problem. Well, in this case the wifi making box (Wireless Access Point, WAP, or AP) was actually present, and functional! They didn't tell me which freezer was screwy, but it didn't take long to figure out. This store actually followed my installation guidelines. The WAP's were mounted on top of the freezers, with a hole leading inside where an antenna was mounted on the ceiling. Perfection! Except the one that had no antenna. I rightly assumed this was the problem child. Pop a ladder on the side, climb into the ceiling, sure enough- WAP humming away happy as can be. No antenna, no hole. Wifi's not gonnah reach through a foot of insulation sandwiched between metal walls. Might as well be a bunker. I climb down, inform the manager the installation was never completed properly, and leave very specific instructions. "You must have an antenna mounted inside the freezer. There is to be a hole drilled in the ceiling of the freezer, through which the antenna is to be connected to the WAP." I couldn't do it, because I the humble repair man was paid far much more than a grunt laborer installation tech and god forbid they let someone who knows what they're doing install things. It'd bankrupt this poor multinational franchise. A week later I get a ticket from the same store for the same issue, but the workorder is updated- "Store states antenna was installed but issue was not resolved." Ahah I think, time for proper troubleshooting then. I arrive, step into the freezer- can't find the damn antenna. Grab a ladder, pop the ceiling tile, climb up top- sure enough, they mounted the antenna alright. They mounted it to the steel support holding the roof up. Even further away from the freezer's top, a good four feet above it. The manager is furious when I try to ask why my instructions weren't followed. "It's a good antenna isn't it!? Can't we just turn the power up and get signal through it??" I thought about how to answer this question in a way he could understand. After a moment, I nodded, and said- "Will you please step into the freezer with me?" I had him curious now. Once inside, I turned off the light. Pitch black. "Dark, isn't it." I said. He agreed. Then I asked, in the same outraged tone- "Shouldn't the SUN be bright and powerful enough to shine through this?? How can it be dark if the sun is so powerful??" Then I turned on the switch, and in more than one way- the manager was enlightened. Eventually I had to come back on a third trip. They'd gotten it all wired up, still no wifi. Antenna cables weren't screwed in. Pretty quick turnaround, happy customer. Just think how much money they saved taking all those shortcuts and cutting all those corners. Same moral as last time, do it right, or do it twice. [link] [comments]  |
| But it has links! It MUST be an IT issue! Posted: 21 Jan 2021 05:49 AM PST This just happened a few minutes ago. A little background: I currently work for an outsourced IT company, and I have several companies for clients. I'm a basic Tier 1, Lvl. 1 analyst for most of my clients. I have one main client that I work for the entire time I'm on queue, and they have loads of software that I don't have access to; most software is managed by their IT department, but some custom software is managed by various other departments within their company. Here's what happened: Me: Me, tier 1 desk jockey; IP: Impatient caller; T2: the cool Tier 2 analyst IP: Hi, I'm trying to prepare for a presentation at 9, and I can't access the links from {Custom Software}. I need you to help me. I've logged out of it, logged back in, restarted my computer, and nothing is working. Me: Okay, I'm not familiar with {Custom Software}, but let me take a look and see what articles I have so I can help. (Click click) Okay, so {Custom Software} is not supported by IT, so here are the people you need to contact because they're the ones in charge of the software. IP: BUT IT HAS LINKS! I CAN'T CLICK THE LINK! THIS IS AN IT ISSUE IF IT HAS LINKS! Me: Yes, while they are links, the software itself is not supported by IT and you still need to get in contact with these other people. Here are their-- IP: THERE'S NO ONE IN IT THAT CAN HELP ME? Me: No, not really, but what I can do is escalate your ticket to a Tier 2 analyst and they will likely tell you the same thing. IP: Or, they can help me, instead. 'Cause, you know, it's a link issue, not a {Custom Software} issue. Me: [clicking away on my really cool mechanical keyboard. Documentation is key here, and I included the KBA number, plus the instructions for whom to contact in case something like this happens] IP: What is taking so long? Why aren't you transferring me? Me: Because I have to type out your ticket first so that when the Tier 2 sees the ticket, he or she can best help you. IP: Oh, okay. That would be wonderful. Thanks. I politely assured her that she would get the issue resolved "No thanks to me", and transferred her over to Tier 2. A few minutes later I refreshed her ticket on my screen, and it was closed. I looked at T2's notes: T2: Directed her per KB*****. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 21 Jan 2021 11:06 AM PST This takes place in about 2007, working cable internet tech support for one of the big guys. Had the most common of calls, someone's internet isn't working. He says it hasn't worked for a few days, my tools show we haven't been able to get a connection to the cable modem for a few days. Easy first step, right? Reset the modem, check the cables. I do notice he's got an unusually old cable modem registered with us, one of the earliest models possible. Wouldn't surprise me in the least if it had just given up the ghost. Well, he wants to do this without that step. Which is, uh, mostly pointless. Best I can do on my end is verify that his neighborhood doesn't have any outages, his neighbors are running just fine, I can send a reset signal to the modem, but it doesn't seem to do anything (no surprise at all). He complains and complains every time I want him to check the modem, until I finally convince him that it's the only step we've got left. Then he explains why. Apparently, a few years back, he was going a little bit of renovations on the room his pc was in, with a contractor friend doing the work. Somehow together their brains hit upon a great idea. Why have to look at a gaudy modem flashing its lights all the time, when you could just wire them up inside the wall, then wire up a fancy rj45 port to just connect to, like a proper professional office. Yes, this genius had his cable modem literally wired to power and cable inside his wall, then hooked up to a nice clean rj45 jack that he plugged the computer into. (Might have been a router/switch involved. I can't remember and it wouldn't have been my problem) There's probably at least one code violation in there, but not my problem either. And literally no way to get to that modem without at least cutting a piece out of the drywall. So I told him there wasn't a damned thing we were going to be able to do with it like that. He's gonna have to get to that modem. He's now approaching ballistic, we better figure out something, all that jazz. He's not even friends with that contractor buddy anymore so he can't even get in there without smashing his way in or actually hiring somebody. He insists we send someone out to him. Now, obviously that's not a thing our guys do. Best case, is we might hook him up with a fresh modem and leave his old one to be found by future generations. I tell him that, and no, he wants someone out to make it work the way he wants. Whatever, I set him up for a tech, full notes on what's going on, and remind the customer that we charge for a tech if it's something that's not our problem. This is usually the most empty promise ever, because the company policy was to 99.99% never charge for a tech, just to make sure there's no chance of liability or angry customers from it. In 4 years, I think I saw 3 charges? This was one of them. I don't know exactly happened, because I checked in a week later, and the tech had closed the ticket with the code for "not our problem" but nothing else. The customer cancelled later that day. Sometimes I wonder if that modem's still in the wall. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 21 Jan 2021 01:34 AM PST Gather round and I'll tell you a story. I had just finished executing my powershell script to enable an email account after a user had come back to work after taking an extended period of unpaid leave. I am a generous God and decided to help her quickly rather than leaving the ticket to fester in my queue. The commands completed successfully, email account is back up, user is happy. Birds are chirping and the sun is shining. Ding. A teams message from bossman. "Hey, can you help user Marie? Outlook isn't working and neither is Teams for her. her email is *@gmail.com" I drafted an email asking when I can take control of her PC, send it off and go back to my powershell. This time to try to package some .msi files so we can deploy them with SCCM. Just as I am about to edit the .xtml files for the nth time that some arcane packaging system uses for this, I receive her response. "Can we connect in 30 minutes? This problem needs to be resolved ASAP as I can't access my email or Teams and I have a meeting tomorrow that's very important!" "Sure, I'll send you the instructions on how to connect to quick assist in 30 minutes". I then go back to my shell and notepad to package the damned thing. Same error message each time I try to build about R.exe reusing a GUID and they all need separate GUIDs. Even though the program is supposed to auto generate them based on absolute file path. 35 minutes pass, oops. I fire up quick assist, code is generated and valid for the next 10 minutes, send the connection instructions to Marie. And I wait. 3 minutes have passed. I send an email. "Hey marie, I've sent you the connection instructions." And I wait. 6 minutes have passed. And I load up reddit. 9 minutes and 30 seconds have passed. No email from marie. timer still counting down. "Hey Marie, the code has expired. Let me know when you want to try again." No reply. I go about my day. Finally managed to package an MSI and inform bossman. "That's great news, but we are going to be using PSADT to push .exes directly to users, no need to package .msi's anymore" Seeing as it's 5 pm, I say fuckit and leave, I'll learn about this new fangled PSADT tomorrow. The next morning Fire up my email. Surprise surprise, email from Marie. At 7PM. "Hey alex, sorry i didn't connect with you this morning. Can we connect now?" Then another at 6AM "Dear Alex, Can we please fix this issue ASAP??? I need it working before 9:30!!!" It's 8:30 by my watch. Still plenty of time to fix her problem before her meeting, so I say what the hell and reply. "Hello Marie, Let me know when would be a good time to connect and I'll send you the quick assist code." Then load up Reddit. Two minutes later, she replies. "NOW!!!" so i generate a code and send to her. tick tock, the timer counts down. While I wait, I watch the lockpicking lawyer on youtube. Timer reaches zero. FFS. send another email to her. "Code has expired, I'm sending you a new one." send new code. 5 minutes later and with 5 minuter on the clock left for that code, she sends me an email,copy pasting the instructions sent with quick assist. " is the start menu the windows icon on the bottom left corner? o start your Quick Assist session, please follow these instructions:
After the steps are completed, please wait while your device connects." Then another: " it's not clear where to find all apps and windows accessories " Then the clock reaches zero. again. It's now 9:15. cuting it close, but I might be able to fix her problem before her meeting. Send her another code. Timer reaches zero. my mind cannot fathom the depths of the idiocy of this user. How? How does she not know what a start menu is? What is unclear about launching an application? How does she manage to sit in front of her computer every day for 8 hours or more and not know how to use it? I poured myself some old number 7. then i loaded up reddit and wrote this story entitled "why I drink in the daytime." [link] [comments]  |
| Working 2 Jobs at the same time sometimes isn't that hard Posted: 21 Jan 2021 12:51 AM PST So, here is a recent story about me being a hero and once more saving the day so I guess I just have to share it with you ;) Background: I'm a social worker but got promoted to local admin last year because apparently I'm good with technology. This one is about the boss of another department at our institution, let's call her Didi. Didi manages our language and integration courses for refugees and other interested people. Due to Covid restrictions most of these courses can't be held in person and must instead be taught online. Unfortunately some students do not have suitable devices to log into these "meetings" and we have to provide them with notebooks or tablets to ensure they can attend the courses. Luckily a couple years ago the department used some state subsidies to buy the latest in oogle-bronzebooks. Of course now in 2021 they are horribly outdated so lately whenever the department wanted to hand out one of them I get an email "bronzebook is not working, can you please take a look and try to fix it so we can hand it out to <student>?" So far I always just charged the battery, updated the OS and everything was fine. This monday though all hell broke loose and Didi is seen frantically running around the building looking for me or anybody else she could find that is tech savvy enough. Turns out as of today there has been a state regulation that requires every student in these courses to be provided with a device by us. This in turn means we need to "fix" every single bronzebook at hand RIGHT NOW. No need to worry though because I have an idea. I set up shop in one of the larger classrooms with lots of sockets and plug in as many bronzebooks as I can. I then talk to some colleagues and show them my setup. Apparently to update a bronzebook from v43 all the way to v84 requires multiple reboots and manually pressing update so I ask my colleagues who regularly walk past this classroom to just take a look sometimes and everybody that presses reboot or update when necessary gets a cookie. Everything goes as planned and aside from 2 devices that needed a little more tinkering I was able to haul stacks and stacks of "fixed" bronzebooks to Didi who was just in awe at how much work I was able to do. TLDR: Impressed boss with lots of fixed devices when all I had to do was give out some cookies to eager coworkers that occasionally pressed a button. [link] [comments]  |
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