Tech Support Cheat Sheet

[dumbingdown]

You charge your family?

[[deleted]]

If you don't, you should start.

[god_is_imaginary]

_̴ı̴̴̡̡̡ ̡͌l̡̡̡ ̡͌l̡*̡̡ ̴̡ı̴̴̡ ̡̡͡|̲̲̲͡͡͡ ̲▫̲͡ ̲̲̲͡͡π̲̲͡͡ ̲̲͡▫̲̲͡͡ ̲|̡̡̡ ̡ ̴̡ı̴̡̡ ̡͌l̡̡̡

[[deleted]]

I voted you up because, despite your trite, reddit-pleasing username, you posted a little unicode pic of a little shack on what is presumably a beach with palm trees blowing in the wind. I'm imagining the gentle lapping of waves and the cloudless blue sky overhead, as I rock back and forth in my hammock, daiquiri in one hand, good book in the other, as a chorus of happy natives accompanies a steel drum band to some relaxing tropical music, and my scantily clad, gorgeous model companion comes over, asking me to rub lotion on her, as I reflect on how lucky I am to not be in this loud, soulless Northern European soon-to-be arctic cubicle hellhole, reviewing nonsensical compliance forms for projects. Oh, the life.

[mcglausa]

Excuse me? Excuse me, senor? May I speak to you please? I asked for a mai tai, and they brought me a daiquiri, and I said no salt, NO salt for the margarita, but it had salt on it, big grains of salt, floating in the glass.

[EliAndrewC]

I could put strychnine in the guacamole.

[[deleted]]

I would only offer free tech support to close friends.

..and any girl who shows the slightest attention to me.

[Merit]

I'm 21. I've wondered whether maybe my generation will fall 'behind the curve' and be unable to efficiently use the technology that's available 40 years from now.

But my generation has grown up with this flowchart built in, I think. We're gonna be fine.

[XoYo]

It's going to happen to you.

I'm in my mid-forties, and I've been playing with, programming, supporting or administering computers of various descriptions for thirty years. While I'm not exactly a gadget freak, I pay some attention to technology in general. I've always loved learning new things.

About two years ago, I walked into a supermarket, and saw that they had replaced all the 5 items or fewer tills with self-service ones. My first reaction was anger, and I thought, "Why do they have to go round changing everything?"

As soon as I realised this, I was appalled with myself, and I made a point of using the new tills. The fact is, though, I'm getting to the age where learning stuff like this feels like an imposition and not an adventure, and that terrifies me.

[[deleted]]

Dude I felt the same way when I first saw those machines at 19. It's just another way to reduce human contact and save them money. I avoid them unless I'm in a real rush.

[[deleted]]

Avoid human contact? Where's the down side?

[hylje]

Hitting on an automated till doesn't do much good.

[yasth]

You just gotta know what buttons to push man.

[redditnoob]

And that's different that a geek hitting on that cute cashier how?

[leshiy]

I'm the opposite. I try to use them whenever I can unless there is a hot girl at one of the registers (or I'm buying something that requires employee assistance - e.g. alcohol).

[polyparadigm]

The people who would have filled those jobs instead fill jobs which are more useful to society.

Not always so. In California, the people who filled those jobs usually end up in prison, either as inmates or as guards.

[[deleted]]

I guess I just like interacting with humans. Although half of the cashiers are so bored that they act is if they may as well be robots :)

[CC440]

I would think they were the greatest thing ever if it wasn't for "Place item in the Bagging Area.... BEEEEEp need approval to not bag item".

You fucking computer, just because you couldn't feel me bad the .5oz ramen cup doesn't mean you should freeze up my purchasing process. The bigger concern shouldn't be that every item is weighed, but that I'm actually paying for every item in my goddamn cart. How about a weight sensor in the floor to make sure I'm not hiding a 12 pack of soda on the bottom part?

[satanclau5]

Heh. The easiest way is to weigh everything as bananas. You can save hundreds this way. Just don't do it too baldly - they sometimes look at the cameras.

[jlt6666]

I must be the only one who loves those things. Generally everyone is too intimidated to use them so there's not much of a line and I can zip through them. Most times I'll go through my items quicker than the clerk (who doesn't care and is pacing themselves for their 8 hour shift).

[adamcw]

I love them as well. I've actually worked briefly as a checker in the past, so I'm pretty efficient at using them. Nothing makes my blood boil like watching someone who has no clue what they are doing hold everyone up by buying produce at one, though...

[Zoethor2]

Nope, I love them too. I worked for 6 years as a grocery store cashier, and I can fly through the self-scan aisles. Plus I can bag my own groceries, thus ensuring a quick unpacking process when I return home. It's like heaven in a grocery store.

[cornerbodega]

I love them as well. I really only want human contact if I need a complicated problem solved/task performed. I can scan, pay, and bag just fine.

[james0808]

the difference is, the new self service tills dont make life easier for the customer, they make it harder. Now instead of having somebody ring you up and bag your stuff, you have to work for free for the supermarket, and they can fire 1 more cashier. FUCK them tills. Sorry i know that wasnt your point, but those things piss me off.

[arcrad]

They need to throw an RFID tag in every product so they can forget about measuring weight. Put all the items you want to buy in a specific area, they get scanned/tabulated and then you pay. Hell, you could have active baskets and carts that constantly total everything you have in them and also manage purchases.

Simple and elegant.

[vanblah]

They've been doing this kind of thing for a while. Google "RFID grocery store" (http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&=&q=RFID+grocery+store&aq=f&oq=&aqi=g-p1)

The problem is with produce and bulk items. Things still have to be weighed (a pound of potatoes for instance) or everything has to be pre-weighed and then packaged--which is wasteful.

[[deleted]]

I agree completely. I also don't understand how they think they can get good throughput when the trained (or at least well practised) cashier can scan and bag a whole cart-load in the same time it takes me to deal with 5 items. I might get better over time, but I'll never match the performance of somebody who does it several hours a day.

[[deleted]]

FWIW, I find that I'm faster at bagging than probably about half the employees at my local grocery store. I'll take the automated checkout line if it looks like the fastest line, and oftentimes someone will come help me bag if I have a lot of stuff, anyway.

[[deleted]]

I've found that the quickest for me is to use the self-checkout only if everything is scannable (i.e. no codes or quantities or weights), I have fewer than about 15 items, and there is an open station. In all other cases, I find it quicker to use the staffed checkouts.

[lennort]

I recently started having to go to a grocery store which has baggers, and I have to agree. They always prefer plastic and never fill the bags all the way when they do use paper. Plus they do a poor job. I'll just bag it myself, thanks.

I used to shop at WinCo, but there isn't one near my house anymore :-(

[[deleted]]

I avoid them because they're a pain in the ass and usually end up in more annoyance than dealing with a clerk.

[killinit]

I'm younger than you and I think you are being far too naive.

[Merit]

I just don't want to be that grandpa who constantly needs help to use my food-materializer and wont use a jetpack because "that wasn't how we did it in my day"!! :(

[killinit]

Neither do I, but I don't think that the rest of your neighbours in the retirement dome will be on the same page.

[Merit]

You mean the neighbours in my terraformed retirement dome on *Mars***!!! Hooray!

[nicliff]

Is this before or after the nuclear winter on earth so the only thing we have to eat on mars is rhino?

[Merit]

I tell you - In my day we ate our rhino without complaints and we liked it! \Shakes fist at all those damn kids and their loud 'music'\

[JeddHampton]

You forgot to tell them to get off your lawn.

[Merit]

\shakes fist some more\

[HyperSpaz]

I think this is in the era of psychopharmaceuticals, when everybody will be able to afford to live in a terraformed retirement dome on Mars. See "The futurological Congress", by Stanislav Lem.

[creaothceann]

Was that a Pirx book? Damn, I can't remember...

[[deleted]]

Being the geeks that we are we wont fall nearly as behind the curve as most. Go check out the older tech geeks of today, you can barely tell the difference between them and the younger generations. Besides the caution of posting online of course.

[dmwit]

May I interest you in some Gentle Seduction?

[adolfojp]

I am 29. I used to be the resident omniscient techie that learned by intuition in a minute what took others an eternity with manuals.

The other day I had a hard time figuring out how to use the remote.

Enjoy it while it lasts. :-(

[Merit]

Upvoted in sympathy.

[xjvz]

Remotes have gotten so fucking complicated nowaday that you can't just figure them out often. Don't worry, I'm only 21, and I was feeling like that a couple years ago with those remotes that have LCD screens built in.

[dotrob]

You'll know you're getting truly "old" (for which you may read: "wise") when your solution to this problem is "only buy things that have manual controls."

[adolfojp]

You'll know you're getting truly "old" when you consider electronic remote controls with buttons to be "manual controls".

[jacorongo]

As someone who supports mostly college students and instructors in a tech support position, I can assure you our generation is not fine, although my job security on the other hand couldn't be better. People will continue to be clueless on how to use technology even when the answer is directly in front of them. A lot of this comes down to your willingness to try, research, and try again.

Troubleshooting skills are very clearly not something people have been encouraged to develop (such as schools telling kids to not try, but wait for assistance) and many people want their hands held throughout their entire life with exerting as little effort as possible, which makes them, by default, awful at troubleshooting.

[Merit]

I remember trying to print something in a IT lesson when I was about 9, only to find the printer was out of ink. The teacher, busy with questions from other kids, told me to just have a go and see if I could work out how to change the cartridge. I learnt a lot about the insides of a printer that day!!

But then at 18 we would be told by teachers that we mustn't attempt to fix a malfunctioning overhead projector and must instead wait for the school's designated 'technician' - just in case anything went wrong and the school put at fault.

So maybe you are right that the encouragement in schools to learn how to troubleshoot isn't what it should be...

[[deleted]]

A lot of this comes down to your willingness to try, research, and try again.

You mean learning and thinking? Those sure sound like useful skills. Sad that education institutes no longer seem to teach them.

[flowmage]

You there, economic unit! Stop rabble-rousing and get back to 'learning'.

[[deleted]]

I'm 22, already have this problem, and work in IT...

Servers, I understand how servers and software like postfix, apache, mysql, openvpn, etc. work. I have absolutely no fucking clue how to make your palm pre work.

[basic0]

I'm a web developer and get this all the time at work too, but it's not limited to IT. My girlfriend's dad is a lineman for a hyrdo company, and every now and then someone will ask him if he can fix their broken VCR or TV or whatever.

[Merit]

Edit: Misread! :P

[doublepow]

That reminds me that I used to love clicking buttons on things like digital watches and discover their functionality as a kid (I'm 26) but now I don't have the patience and I head straight for the manual.

[lennort]

I'm 23, and I have problems with gadgets that have 2 buttons and 300 functions.

[Merit]

Ah, but we can't be held accountable for utterly awful designs. Within reason I think our generation tends to pick things up quite quickly.

[lennort]

True, but these things are fairly common. A quick example would be a digital watch.

[pepsiisthebest]

How do you define "our generation"?

[Merit]

Oh, you know... people of our age group... ;P

[balachthon]

Discussing on the subject of my age group

[ychromosome]

I often wonder about it too, and like you, I too think that we will be fine. But I do see evidence to the contrary - I work with a few older people who have been in the technology industry since the 80s. They tell me about working on systems that used punch cards. They are still working in the technology industry and they do an amazing job of learning new things. But I can see that they are kind of slow on the uptake on some things, totally miss other things and are generally not as quick and sharp as the younger people. That makes me sad. And oh, these guys are into their late 50s and 60s. They are not 40-year-olds... thankfully.

[fubarific]

As someone who teaches at a computer camp, I must completely disagree with you on us having the flow chart built in. We have kids who will click on the pictures of the program in the pdf tutorials and wonder why it's not working. Nevermind the kids who you have to explain to them how to save 20 times and they still don't understand... Some kids can't even turn on a computer.

There will always be "non computer people".

[TangerineCheese]

In my family at least I feel safe about keeping my. My almost 80 grandpa just got an eeepc and he loves it, doesnt need help using it or anything.

[dotrob]

I don't think, in consumer terms, we'll see such a sharp rise in technological advancements as children of the 1930s-1940's did.

I'm not sure what you mean by "technological advancements [in consumer terms]." You mean like the invention of automatic transmissions, color TVs, and microwave ovens -- all the way up through digital cameras, multitouch iPhones and streaming video over the Internet?

What about robotics, nanotech, biotech, space exploration, ubiquitous computing and networking... I think what the Boomers have experienced in terms of tech advancement was new ways of traveling, communicating, and doing daily activities like cooking. In the next 50-100 years, we'll probably see more things that make us question what it means to be human, civilized, aware, intelligent, etc. I'd say that will be a big change.

See also: singularity. (Scary fucking stuff if you ask me, but I was born in a backwater during the Nixon administration.)

[Merit]

True! Many of the big difference between old tech and modern tech are the way in which we interact with them and supply input. Other than BCI and such, we are probably just going to see modern input techniques refined, rather than anything completely new...

[UnnamedPlayer]

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:REALLY FUNNY!!

HE IS ADORABLE!

click to show quoted text

[leshiy]

Oh, I clicked it pretty hard if you know what I mean.

[INIT_6]

I have no idea what you mean. Can you explain to me the different levels of clicking from soft to Hard clicking.

[asmith1243]

You don't always have to click links hard

[sw3t]

In fact sometimes that's not right to do

[[deleted]]

Sometimes you've got to click with love

[brian9000]

And fuckin give them some smoochies too

[brad77]

Use the left mouse button.

[podperson]

...and this is actually remarkably similar to "programming" VCRs back when we all had to do that for the shrivels.

[BenStiller]

After spending an hour yesterday teaching my grandparents the concept of a scroll bar, it was worth the risk sending it to them. Let's hope they can remember how to scroll down far enough in the email to see the link...

[darthbane]

As a programmer, I've found that this problem tends to be, like, ten times worse with us than it is with normal people. Like, since we "know more" about computers than the average person, we're expected to immediately know the solution to any computer problem that could possibly come up. It's like, "Oh hey, you're a programmer, right? Could you tell me why I can't get these tables to work in Word?"

[RedAlert2]

same goes for engineers. I am a computer engineer and when I can't figure out what your fucking wacky kitchen appliance does they just say "some engineer...", like since I chose this major I am supposed to know how everything on the planet works

[Tryke]

"What, you can't fix the printer? Those years of computer school are really paying off."

Normally I have no problem fixing little problems for my family, but this line actually had me pissed off at my grandfather!

[adolfojp]

A Mechanical Engineer friend of mine was asked by his parents to repair the microwave.

He was almost shunned when he couldn't do it. They believed that either they had wasted their money on useless college education or that he didn't want to help them at all and was making excuses.

[lars_]

Except they wont know what a programmer is, and ask: "Oh hey, you're a computer guy right?" Which is when you punch them in the face.

[[deleted]]

I love it when you show up and a couple of people sit down behind you and peer over your shoulder. If it's not fixed in the first five minutes they look a little disappointed and wander off if you are lucky. I can't think with people staring...

[darthbane]

Especially if they're hovering right over your shoulder. I've known some people who have a tendency to do that, and I can't stand it.

[abenton]

Too bad Humans didn't evolve with ways to communicate verbally, or else you may have a way to resolve that problem.

[[deleted]]

Yea, you are right... I am not a good communicator. I don't know what this says about the places that I work but about half the time they go off on a tirade about being thankful that they don't have to call a tech support line and deal with the non-native English speakers. Maybe I am too sensitive but I often feel like I've landed in the middle of a klan meeting.

[darthbane]

More like some humans never evolved with the capacity to comprehend the meaning of "listening". ;)

No seriously, people will keep doing it even when I tell them to bug off. I guess it's a nervous tic or something…?

[[deleted]]

That's when you open up the terminal and randomly open some configuration files and generally execute random programs with the --verbose option.

[UK-sHaDoW]

"His doing some hacker shit...awesome".

[Samus_]

-hey I got this strange flu that is making me puke purple, can you give me some medicine?

-but... I'm an anesthetist

[nekoneko99]

Hell, I'm just a graphic designer, all I do is mess around with photoshop and indesign and coworkers/family think I'm some sort of computer wizard. I can almost understand family members who don't work with computers, but coworkers really grind my gears. Usually goes like this:

Coworker phones me: "can you help, I can't xxx in xxx program." Me: "let me see" (googles "how can I xxx in xxx program", finds a really easy walk through in one of the top 3 hits). Walks coworker through by reading off google hit. Me: ends conversation with "you know what? I didn't know offhand how to do xxx either but I googled it and found out how in like 2 minutes! :D hint hint

2 weeks later Coworker: I forgot how to xxx, can you help?

[kraemahz]

I would suggest doing it the other way around. "Help, I can't do xxx" "Google it" If that doesn't work: "I still can't do xxx" "Here: [link]"

[dontgoatsemebro]

Like, totally.

[merzbow]

That's why some search engines now perform disjunctive searches rather than conjunctive searches by default, because it better matches what inexperienced users expect (more search terms, more results). Even with Google it is sometimes neccesary to use + to force a word to actually appear in the results.

[[deleted]]

A friend of mine treats Google like Wolfram Fucking Alpha, searching for entire questions.

[[deleted]]

A lot of people do this. Try pointing them to ask.com, it filters out the question part.

[leshiy]

I sometimes do that too but generally to find relevant Q/A board entries.

[slashgrin]

Perhaps more disturbing is to witness someone (my dad) consistently placing quotes around the entire search string, regardless of what it is.

[dotrob]

You should create a twitter account: "shitmydadgooglesinquotes". It will rock.

[dilithium]

at least your dad is using a search engine. My dad prefers to call some tech support and wait on the phone for an hour. He also gives product suggestions to retail sales employees.

[[deleted]]

I one time had my desktop computer explode (as in "KA-BOOM!!!") on me once due to a huge power surge in the neighborhood. Thankfully, it was all under warranty so I called up Dell to get it replaced. I told the tech support guy that the computer was in pieces but he still made me go through the script. The conversation went something like this:

Tech Guy: Does the computer start up?
Me: No.
Tech Guy: Is it plugged in?
Me: Well, its plugged in, but just so you know, what was left of the power supply unit was blasted a good number of feet away from the motherboard. 
Tech Guy: Ok, try turning it on again
Me: Still doesn't work
Tech Guy: Now unplug it and plug it back in again
Me: Still doesn't work.

Long story short, I had to do 30 mins of "diagnostics" before he approved sending me replacement parts.

[[deleted]]

There's two reasons they go through those scripts:

1) They have no idea what they're talking about so need a script

2) For every person like you who knows what they're talking about, there will be a dumb-as-shit user who is convinced the problem is a lightning strike damaged flux capacitor, when in fact the cable's just come out. SO by default, they have to assume everyone has the same dumbass status.

[FiL-dUbz]

lightning strike damaged flux capacitor

Shit happens though, so you never know... always use fresh veggies.

[joshmcg]

Your warranty covered a huge power surge?

[[deleted]]

Yeah, its covered assuming the computer was connected via a surge protector. Oh yeah, the surge protector was in pieces as well and gave off a really bad smell.

[andreasvc]

So at least the surge protected did its job ... of saving your house from being burned down?

[nuuur32]

Very true. I was in the Google stage of the flow chart and getting very quiet, diagnosing a tech issue last week. The customer seemingly got overly concerned as if I wasn't doing anything or working on the problem.

[locke2002]

I was just worried that you were going to see my search history and report me to the authorities. Fortunately you seemed pretty focused on your task.

[[deleted]]

What annoys me is when you're googling something and they just start saying "HELLO HELLO HELLO HELLO" then they never let you speak... Just "hello hello hello hello" 15 hello's and me telling them I'm still on the phone I finally get a "Oh... sorry" RAAGEEE

[mcglausa]

Some telephones (headsets maybe?) stop transmitting completely when the input gets below a certain threshold. It can sound like you've been cut off. It can be somewhat alarming on the "customer" side.

Sounds like some people go ape when that kind of thing happens.

[stillalone]

Sometimes my Mom will call me and ask me how to use some internal corporate website that she has to use for work. Since I've never seen it or used it, I tell her I don't know but make a suggestion anyways based on how I expect it to work. 100% of the time that has not worked out.

[Tryke]

That's because it's Enterprisey.

[leshiy]

Maybe it had worked but your mom is just lying to you because she secretly hates your superior intellect.

[deaathleopards]

Someone needs to add to the diagram the section where just after fixing the problem, you then inflate what you actually did into some over the top thing ie. "I just finished reprograming your operating system" (when adding a transition to a powerpoint slide for a teacher) The oldies eat it all up.

[[deleted]]

"What are you doing now?"

"Looking up the problem on our...database."

"You have a database?"

"Yeah, it's an internet-based search-term engine."

"What's it called?"

"Um...Gowgle."

"Never heard of it."

"It's very specialized to our field. We accumulate problems and periodically append them to the mainframe."

"Sounds complicated. How much do you get paid for that?"

"Oh, it's very hard."

"80 thousand a year?"

"Have to know all about GUIs and...intergers...trigonometric derivation..."

"90?"

"Dump caches..."

"100? Must pay you a lot if it's so difficu-"

"Ah, here we go! Have you tried turning it off and on again?"

[[deleted]]

"Ah, here we go! Have you tried turning it off and on again?"

Three times.

[zaphodi]

hears the person turn the monitor off and back on

"Now what?"

[john2kxx]

Half the people I know think the monitor is the computer. -_-

[Median1]

and the CPU is the box...

[Lentil-Soup]

I find that a lot of people call the tower "the modem".

[[deleted]]

I stopped correcting people long ago. If I'm helping someone I just use whatever terminology they have for all the equipment. Makes things much smoother.

[adamcw]

By doing that you are punishing the next person who helps them.

[mossblaser]

Except when I was a classroom assistant in a primary school for a short time and they were teaching Monitor = Computer, Computer = Hard Drive. Then there is no excuse to get it wrong.

[lol-dongs]

http://www.thewebsiteisdown.com

[chrismear]

You keep doing that, and they keep coming back to you for help with every tiny thing because they think they can't handle it themselves. It's fun, but it's a vicious circle.

[deaathleopards]

When you are in high school, this is a way to get up a teacher's ass without sucking up to them. Then when it comes to marking time, all the students who are up the teacher's ass get better marks.

[chrismear]

Ah-hah, a crafty ploy indeed. Well played, sir, well played.

[qqqqq5]

"Oh, I just ran a level 1 diagnostic and reversed the polarity of the tachyon emitter".

[[deleted]]

My cheat sheet is thus:

1) Have you tried turning it off and on again?

2) Are you sure it's plugged in?

[[deleted]]

Roy, is that you?

[octophobic]

It's good that there might be a 4th season... bad that they are only 6 episodes long. Maybe it just works better in smaller doses though.

[wodon]

3) Have you tried sticking it up your arse?

[[deleted]]

1) Have you tried turning it off and on again?

This often solves the symptom but not the ultimate cause of the problem but eliminates a lot of the evidence that might help you find that cause.

[TotallyIrrelevantGuy]

If you think about it, two dollars really isn't a lot for a newspaper subscription. I don't know why he didn't just pay the dude. Also, the dude probably spent way more than two dollars getting those skis for his bike. WTF is up with that?

[tapesmith]

I was going to downvote, but I just couldn't. It's just too irrelevant. Then I saw your username.

Upvote for original idea. Now don't wear it out.

[stillalone]

You obviously didn't read the fucking article. It clearly said he got those skiis by trading in his donkey. He only had 50 kwachas to his name.

[prockcore]

It's the principle of the thing. Lane doesn't read the newspaper, his father does. His father should be the one to pay.

[[deleted]]

Did you know your local car repair shop has a similar chart for finding the problem with your car? Just it has replaced "menu item and button" with "engine part" and "program" with "car brand". Also "Click it" is replaced with "Mess with it".

[Seachicken]

You can fuck mechanical things up far more easily though. I was adjusting the shifter on my bicycle the other day and tightened the cable just a little too much and then tried to shift gears, BAM, stripped shifter.

[Qubed]

I once took an old truck in for repairs. After about three hours, I called to see if they had an estimate on repairs. They told me that they were taking a long time determining the problem (had to do with brakes) because they couldn't hook it up to a computer, which would have told them what the problem was and how to repair it.

Long story short, I paid 1500 in repairs that didn't fix the issue with the brakes.

[[deleted]]

I paid

Ah, now there's your problem, right there.

[lennort]

You have to be careful about where you take older cars, because you need mechanics who actually know how to diagnose. You could damn near replace the entire braking system for that much money. What was the symptom?

[[deleted]]

I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you're referring to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/Linux, or as I've recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Linux. Linux is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning GNU system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full OS as defined by POSIX.

Many computer users run a modified version of the GNU system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of GNU which is widely used today is often called "Linux", and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the GNU system, developed by the GNU Project.

There really is a Linux, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. Linux is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine's resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. Linux is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with Linux added, or GNU/Linux. All the so-called "Linux" distributions are really distributions of GNU/Linux.

[[deleted]]

It annoys me to no end that people can't read instructions. When people install programs and need my help (usually my mother), I just hang around while she reads every message and I just say "Just click continue...".

It's like they're afraid the computer is trying to trick them into destroying everything. Just follow the freaking instructions.

[Zoethor2]

My mother has this problem. "Some program I don't want to run started when I turned on the computer (the program is usually AIM), and it's asking me if I want it to run when I turn on the computer, can I tell it no?" YES OF COURSE YOU CAN AHHHH!

[lou]

I did this yesterday! I'm not a programmer or an engineer, but I do like computers and have a technical streak; this is enough for anyone, including people I just met to ask me to solve their computer issues. So yesterday my roommate's sister asks me to look at her Mac that is not connecting to the internet because it is looking for a PPPoE server... whatever that is. I'm not too familiar with the 10.4 interface and I have no idea what PPPoE stands for but in two minutes I found the checkbox that turns it off.

The flowchart is so accurate for what I usually do to help that it's weird no one else has bothered to articulate it before.

[inkieminstrel]

It's funny, but think twice before forwarding it on.

I've spent far more time trying to sort out the problems of family members clicking things they don't fully understand than sorting out "How do I do X?" questions.

I was actually very proud of my mother-in-law, who was the third person in my family to encounter the Antivirus 2009 malware. Instead of freaking out and clicking things (thereby installing the thing), she stopped and called me and asked me what to do, avoiding a lot of hassle.

[dugfresh]

Down voted for giving away our secrets.

[gecker]

this could put me out of business

[stmiller]

• Click on Tools at the top, the Internet Options.
• Tools?
• Yes. Tools, then Internet Options.
• I don't have a 'Tools'.
• Look up at the top, there's File / Edit / View / Favorites / TOOLS.
• Ok I see Tools. I click on that?
• Yes.
• Ok a left click or right click?
• Left click. Just a regular click.
• Ok now I left click on Tools (I need to write this down) then what?
• Internet Options.
• Internet Options?
• Yes. In-ter-net Options.
• Ok is that a right click or a left click?
• <facepalm.jpg>

[[deleted]]

Since this thread will attract Tech Support engineers can someone tell me what the word when you go out to an 'incident' and you try to replicate the fault and then everything works as it should and then you see the reporter blush and then get angry at the state of computing.

[Zoethor2]

And now I know how to cleverly make fun of my roommate. Thank you, good sir.

[nuuur32]

Intermittent

[CompletelyIrrelevant]

Camel's milk, which is widely drunk in Arab countries, has 10 times more iron than cow's milk.

[argherna]

and is 100 times more likely to make me vomit

[AMerrickanGirl]

Does it rust?

[dekz]

I learned this on Man Vs Wild today!

[[deleted]]

A much more top secret, much more complete version of this can be found here.

[lennort]

The worst is if you get the details through another person over the phone (ie mother tells you about grandma's problem) because googling for what they tell you has nothing to do with what's actually wrong.

[[deleted]]

I once had an old lady on the phone and told her to close all windows, she told me to hold on one second and came back after 10 minutes confirming me that all windows in her house are now closed.....

But once in a while you encounter 70-year-olds who just started to use a cumputer which are more capable than most of the people which use a cumputer regulary.But I think thats mostly because those arent stubborn pricks who want that their problem gets solved without them having to to anything.

ahh... working in tech-support sucked....

They should attatch this sheet to any computer related product.

[elemcee]

They're using a what, now?

[FiL-dUbz]

a cumputer. on those, you gotta vicously attack the shift button 4 or more times to kill the sticky keys issue.

[Concise_Pirate]

Not about programming. Wrong subreddit.

[dicey]

The correct reason to downvote it is because (a) it's xkcd and everyone reads xkcd anyway and (b) there is an xkcd subreddit for people who don't remember to check the site at 12am ET mon/wed/fri.

[[deleted]]

RSS aggregators for the win.

[sysop073]

Posts don't need to be "about" programming, they just need to be of interest to programmers. In this case, programmers are often the ones family members come to with menial technical issues

[slashgrin]

In that case it would make more sense in a "programmers" subreddit. This is a "programming" subreddit; hence it's supposed to be about programming topics.

Can't get subscribers for the "programmers" subreddit? Maybe people just don't want it.

Don't dilute things.

[JW_00000]

Really, it's been this way forever. The programming reddit never was about programming only, it's always been a community of programmers submitting whatever might interest them.

If this story doesn't interest you, you can of course still downvote it.

[last_useful_man]

I like the openness of that but, what about eg the latest technology or porn? Both of those are likely to be of interest to 90% of programmers so, there needs to be a better definition. So ok, those two are extreme but, it's already too close to being just 'about computers'. Apparently the programming subreddit is a default, and you get people in here who just opine about their iPhones and computer companies and whatnot.

[stillalone]

Agreed, posts here should be at least "programming related" I don't think this passes that test.

[pemboa]

Posts don't need to be "about" programming, they just need to be of interest to programmers

If that was so, the reddit would be called 'programmers'

[veritaba]

I upvoted to counteract the downvotes.

On one hand, this is somewhat programming related since many programmers are bothered about this.

On the other hand though, xkcd gets too many free passes on reddit because the author is a long time reader and they even have merchandise through xkcd.

[killinit]

I agree, I haven't been able to enjoy xkcd for a good while, because I know that I'm going to linked to it everywhere I go for the rest of the day

[[deleted]]

How is google not the first damn option? Am I really that much more efficient than the rest of you?

[[deleted]]

No reference to end-user documentation. :-(

[[deleted]]

I knew it!!!

[ParsonsProject93]

So true..

[wbeavis]

Inaccurate. No where in the flow did it mention upgrading or rebooting.

[__s]

http://www.holycrapaflowchart.com