On the other side of things, it appears that the ongoing "Good Times" virus hoax has claimed another victim. Earlier, I recieved a stern warning from my dad never to read any e-mail message with the subject line "good times". He had recieved the warning from his MIS department (it seems that at least one person in an average MIS department should no better.) In response, I had to go find and print a 10-page document that explains that the whole thing is nothing more than a hoax. (Time to pull out the VRML soapbox again...) It seems that this is one that refuses to die. Anyone who understands the workings of the Internet would realize that although viruses may be spread through e-mail attachments, there is nothing for a virus to attach to in the actual message. Furthermore, if it were possible for a virus to attach to an e-mail message, it would have to also be capable of working on every different PC, Mac, Unix and other type of computer and operating system in existence. Not an easy task.
For anyone who still isn't convinced that this whole thing is a fake, This FAQ should be enough to convince you otherwise... The aforementioned MIS department will be recieving a copy of this FAQ very soon. When you think of it, the fact that this whole recurring abomination came out of AOL is really not surprising...
Ok, now that I have thoroughly exhausted my $0.02 worth on that one (which is twice what it's worth), we now return to our erratically scheduled column already in progress. Anyway, now that I have spent a couple of weeks answering the phone for Microsoft, I have learned of the occupational hazards of the job (it's no coincidence that a large chunk of the team on the floor wears little round stickers reading "PSYCHO" on their badges, compliments of Todo Loco, an excellent little mexican food place in our building.) One is expected to have a command of a whole bunch of technical terms such as "hosed" (the state many caller's computers are found in before, during and/or after a call) and "FDISK and reinstall" (standard troubleshooting procedure.)
Despite the difficult stuff we're supposed to figure out, one of the most challenging parts of our job is dealing with the users. It's bad enough that some of them fumble around Windows, but you never know how difficult it can be working with luddites and technophobes until you try guiding them through the wilds of DOS.
The horror stories you see on the net about the incompetence of some people when it comes to technology (and technical support) are legendary. These are the type of people who will do the exact opposite of what is intended. These people are skilled at doing anything damaging to a PC at the hardware or software level... but totally inept at doing anything trying to fix it.
As an example of what us techies go through to guide the clueless through the wilds of DOS, I have written up this little "incident." Since someone may get mad if I don't include a disclaimer here, this is not based on any actual incident, but on several different instances and the reports of others around the office.
For my example, I used a standard troubleshooting procedure for when a Win95 system has a corrupted registry. What we're attempting to do is to replace the SYSTEM.DAT file in the Windows directory with SYSTEM.1ST from the root directory. This involves taking the read-only, system and hidden attributes off both files, renaming the old file, copying the new one into it's place, and replacing the attributes on the files. Let's listen in as the valiant tech tries to walk the clueless user through this one:
Tech: Ok, are you up to a prompt yet?
Caller: It's stopped working.
T:What dies it show on screen?
C:Well... everything looks fine until the end. Then there's some sort of C-colon-backslash thing, and the thing stops working.
T: (Great, it's one of those calls...) Can you type anything here?
C: Hold on a sec... (clickety click) Oh... I guess that it's not crashed after all. What do you want me to do next?
T: Well, first we need to type "C-D space Windows"...
C: What good is that going to do me? For one thing, my CD-ROM isn't working, and for another thing, I don't have any game called "Spacewindows"...
T: I mean, type "C", then type "D", press the spacebar, then type Windows... (then go FDISK and reformat your brain so it may actually work...)
C: Ok, I'll try it, although I don't think you know what you're doing... (types furiously) Ok, it didn't do anything, what next?
T: Did you press Enter?
C: Does that matter?
T: Yes, just press Enter.
C: (click) Hey! I want to speak to your supervisor! Your computer just called my directory an invalid!
T: What did it say? (as if I didn't know...)
C: "Invalid directory..."
T: Ok, read back what you typed.
C: C-D-space-W-I-N-enter.
T: You have to type in the full name of the directory...
C: You mean you can't abbreviate directory names? I paid a hundred bucks for this blankety-blank operating system, and it doesn't even let you abbreviate stuff!
T: (Whatever...) Ok, try typing the command again...
C: What did you want me to type again? I'm not too good at this DOS stuff, you know.
T: (as if I needed any reminder...)
[meaningless drivel and caller ranting deleted]
T: Ok, now we need to type "attrib"...
C: Uh, could you spell that for me? I'm not a computer person.
T: (F-O-R-M-A-T-space-C-colon-space-slash-U-enter.) Ok, that is spelled A-T-T-R-I-B...
C:A-T-R-I-P? What are you trying to do, put my computer on LSD?
T:No, that is an "A", two "T's"...
C:Uh, Did you say two "D's" or two "T's"?
T:No, A as in "Apple", two Ts...
C:Two "P's"?
T:No, two "T's..." (as in "technophobe"...) I need to check with a resource. I'll be back with you in a few minutes...
[after ordering a copy of "Hooked on Phonics" FedEx'ed to the caller's door...]
T:Sir? Are you still there? C:Yes... By the way, while you checked with your resources, I figured out my problem... My system really hasn't worked properly ever since it got struck by lightning...
[Fifteen minutes of hysterical laughing later...]
T:Sir, it appears that what we have here is a hardware problem...
C:It can't be a hardware problem. Windows95 has ruined my system! I demand to talk to your supervisor immediately!
[At this point, the technician reaches into his phone and strangles the caller through the phone line. When questioned by police about the incident, the technician told them that the caller's brain was trying to process 32-bit instructions with a brain that only operated in real mode. He is currently serving 15 to 20 years in Packard Bell tech support, appealing his sentence on the grounds of "cruel and unusual punishment."]