0627: "Tech Support Cheat Sheet"

[51ck-6-51x]

- If this is really meant for "Not computer people" then I am really not sure about the "follow any instructions" in the Google instruction ( my grandmother isn't really that into some of the stuff one may well stumble across with seemingly innocuous search terms, and when she searches for how to make Excel act as her new TeasMaid she'll end up wasting a day making tea stained eggs, and no, she wont stop after 1/2 an hour if she does not look ahead on the chart - it took over an hour for her to understand the cursor & mouse under instruction of a normal user ( my sister ) [ she was 91 at the time though ]. )

To the people who keep saying they are going to make this into the desktop background for their parents/aunts/grandparents/guncles.... here's what that looks like [...]

- You could always add:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER[ Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced ] = ( HideIcons, REG_DWORD, 1 )
But then they may make use of the flowchart to revert that change.

[super_aardvark]

I thought this was brilliant and would solve all my problems, until I saw this: http://notalwaysright.com/closing-arguments/2381. It seems the whole "menu item or button which looks related to what you want to do" thing is beyond some people.

[littlelj]

I know pretty much cock all about computers.

But I count as "pretty damn techy" at work by comparison with my colleagues. Typical conversation:

Colleague: How do I do this?
Me: Well, first you right-click on My Computer ...
C: Your computer?
Me pointing: No, "My Computer". Right-click.
C: Oh, ok.
Me: No, close that. You need to right-click. Click with the right mouse button.
C: The what?

So I roffled hard at this comic. I am looking forward to helping colleagues tomorrow. I predict that their .pdfs won't open properly. That's what happens when you click Open in Word...

[Monika]

Not-tech-savvy people just trying stuff has its drawbacks.

Former-boyfriend-now-husband, after having used my secondary computer: "I downloaded this software and it's not doing what it is supposed to do."
Me: "Uh, you downloaded something and ran it on my computer? Did you check it's no virus or dialer?"
He: "I know it must be legit, I typed OK in a field."
Me thinking: Waaaaaaaaaah. (Always dialers, these.)
He: "And besides, I didn't save it. There were the options "save on computer" and "run locally", and I didn't choose save, but run locally, so it can't have done something to your computer."

It all depends which location one thinks of when reading locally, he thought it meant the server it came from. It doesn't help that the German "vor Ort" is even more ambiguous than "locally".

(I got him on Kubuntu now. No more virus hunting finally.)

Step-dad: "I can't start AOL. It says the disk is full."
Me: "Shouldn't really prevent AOL from starting, it's only creating a 0-byte lock file I think ... tell me, *how* do you start AOL?"
Step-dad: "Well, I insert the CD and then I click on Continue Continue Continue"
Me: "Wait, why did you insert the CD? You don't need the CD to start AOL, just double-click on the icon on your desktop."
Step-dad: "But it said I have to do it."
Me: "What exactly did it say?"
Step-dad: "such and such error message. Please re-start AOL."

So AOL finally added some sensible information to their error message - restarting the AOL software solves most of its problems - but didn't consider that their target group does not know the difference between "restart" and "reinstall". I think I found 8 AOL installations on his computer.

Also, my former-boyfriend-now-husband used to delete all programs instead of uninstalling them, resulting in some strange problems on his Win98.

And then there was the case of an acquaintance who sorted the files in the win directory by filetype from the folders they were in into folders that matched their extensions (not subfolders of the previous folders) ...


/edit: ardvaark party!

[mumble]

"Tech Support Cheat Sheet" has to be the most on-the-button xkcd cartoon ever; many and many an earlier cartoon has resonated with me, but never before so strongly. We're onto A Great Truth, here, I want to go out and super-glue laminated copies of it to the doors and desks of that select group of colleagues most in need of its benefit.

Yes, please, there should be a T-shirt of this cartoon¹. In the meantime, in between time, these past T-shirts not having worked, unfortunately:

...let us try another tack:

¹ ...and it would be interesting to see how well it sold relative to the other xkcd T-shirts (which comparison should be an interesting demonstration of something-or-other).

[alextm]

Like niteice (and proably others), I have school around this time. I created some business card sized versions of this. They are geared towards young eyes (4pt font)
Have OmniGraffle 5 source file, 8.5x11 PostScript and PDF 8x per page with borders, and 1x for special formatting pdf.

Tech.zip

OmniGraffle (zipped)

(29.86 KiB) Downloaded 112 times

Tech1.pdf

1 on 2x3.5 pdf

(19.73 KiB) Downloaded 161 times

Tech.pdf

8x pdf

(33.54 KiB) Downloaded 151 times

Tech.ps

PostScript

(454.69 KiB) Downloaded 97 times

[Monika]

"Tech Support Cheat Sheet" has to be the most on-the-button xkcd cartoon ever; many and many an earlier cartoon has resonated with me, but never before so strongly. We're onto A Great Truth, here, I want to go out and super-glue laminated copies of it to the doors and desks of that select group of colleagues most in need of its benefit.

Yes, please, there should be a T-shirt of this cartoon¹. In the meantime, in between time, these past T-shirts not having worked, unfortunately:

The site does not seem to allow hotlinking, the pics don't show. And red is reserved for mods around here.

Let us know how your glue-to-the-doors experiment turns out ... will they stop asking you? Will they wait for you in a dark corner and hit you over the head?

[Eternal Density]

I taped this up at my workplace.

[EhloVader]

This is definately true, the whole file menu thing gets really messy when you factor in having to have your family member list all of the options at each level over the phone. But randomly trying every possibility is more effective than you would think.

[VNVKingdom]

Should probably mention that this has been duly printed out and pinned to my wall! Thinking of adding it to our IT FAQ page too...

[VNVKingdom]

And then there was the case of an acquaintance who sorted the files in the win directory by filetype from the folders they were in into folders that matched their extensions (not subfolders of the previous folders) ...

I feel your pain! My father used to go through the %systemroot%\system32 directory deleting things because "Hey, I never use that! And here it is taking up room on my computer!"

[Szech]

My mother already does this, but it takes half an hour for her to pick a button at random so she ends up calling me for help anyway.

[Symmetrical Feet]

At the radio station at which I volunteer, they have Winamp in a perfectly-set, default way. Someone clicked the box that pops up to update the program, and that changed the skin, thus confusing everyone and they wanted it back in its basic form, because that worked best.

Well, the computer was out of use for Winamp purposes for a few days because of that...
Ten minutes of clicking around and downloads (because I thought it was part of the version change, and not a skin; I don't use Winamp or skins on stuff), trying to circumvent locks in place to keep stupid people from messing stuff up...

Srsly, three-fucking-click fix. Change skin.

(I also scared the hell outta one guy because the screen flashed as I set the refresh rate from 60 to 75.)

Edit: I will print many of these out in mini form and keep them in my purse, to hand out to anyone whom I help.

[shadyraptors]

the phone is definitely not the best way to do tech support. Skype has screen sharing, really useful (provided the computer's turned on)

[Glenn Magus Harvey]

All too true.

[Steax]

There should never be a "give up" step. Always blame the original manufacturer/programmer.

"If I made it, I wouldn't have made it this way! This is stupid!"

--

About why people just don't dare to try things... I guess it goes back to the old use of mechanical machines and stuff. Things that break catastrophically when you press the wrong button or fail to do some routine task. People don't understand that computers have failsafes and error-catching tools... Well, the better programs do.

I've rarely had F1 do anything good for me. Manuals for stuff like Photoshop don't help, they're ridiculously hard to navigate. The only program where F1 did magic for me was 3dsmax.

And I learned C++ from misc bits of the Dev C++ manual...

[Gregorz]

When I saw this, I immediately printed it out and put it on my mom's desk. I've explained basically this a number of times and after years of using a computer she still hasn't figured it out. Hopefully this will do the trick.

[imMAW]

My mom just asked me to find out which ink cartridges were low. I almost printed this out for her, but decided not to give up the secret just yet.

[Freiberg]

...Damned thing burst back into life.

I love it. That's happened to me, too, when I do something the other person has already done several times, and it works for me. That story, however, takes the cake. You get a free internet.

[Fat Tony]

I just printed this out and gave it to my mom and my little brother, telling him to get his own freaking internet working.

[webb.am]

I do the googling step before clicking random buttons, I find it saves time.

Used well, Google and Wikipedia pretty much turn you into a cyborg

[TheNewGuy]

I would love to see this as a laptop skin.

[Monox D. I-Fly]

I remember when I was undergoing a computer test in college and I did it fluently. My friends who saw me as a clumsy person who couldn't do anything properly were surprised to see it since they were struggling. Well, actually I just read the Help menu, so I cheated a lot in that test (and my friends didn't know English quite well, so it didn't occur in their mind).