You ever get something that is somewhat mundane in nature, and yet for reasons unexplained, the creators of said object have placed an inordinate amount of work into some feature that provides no real value or functionality? When you look at most things, everything serves some kind of purpose, even colors which provide some aesthetic value. Most of the time, companies won't waste their time in tossing in stuff that is completely pointless.
Today, I saw an email that contained a link to our annual benefits novel, which was provided as an online doc rather than cutting down a forest to send it to everyone (which I'm sure they've done anyway). It opened up in this e-reader, similar to what I've seen used by store ads online. I'm sure you've seen these before. You hover your mouse in the lower corner of the "page", the page reacts and you can drag it over like you're turning a real page (you know, instead of clicking the little right arrow at the bottom of the screen like a sane user).
I caught the sound out of the tinny speaker in the CPU (since I really don't care about sound on my work computer; that's what headphones are for). Yeah, in this benefits document that 90% of the users will read at work, they bothered to take the extra time and expense to include a page turning sound. I can't even imagine how many man-hours went into this extremely minor and utterly pointless detail. I suppose that's my insurance premiums at work.
Every since then, I've been looking for something to compare how absolutely pointless that sound is, and I got nothing. There is literally nothing I can think of off the top of my head that would hold less consumer value than the sound of a turning page in an online benefits manual. There's a new simile for you.
That's as useless as the sound of a turning page in an ebook. And yet, that page turn sound will still be more pointless than whatever you compared it to.
Showing posts with label Computers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Computers. Show all posts
Thursday, October 24, 2013
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Relentless Updates
Here's something that came to mind as I sat down to another security alert from Java as it wants to make another update. Updates.
When a program is released, it is usually put out there "as good as it gets" for the moment until something surprising comes along to derail it, and the developer is forced to put out an update to fix whatever problem arose. These updates, or patches, are only possible because our computers are almost permanently online with a fairly speedy connection, where once upon a time, if a developer put out a program that required a patch, the consumer was screwed.
I recall one such game, called Riven (a sequel to Myst), that froze at a certain point of the game, and after some digging, I learned that the game was glitched and required a patch to fix it. I located said patch (I don't remember how) and popped that on a 3.5" disk to load into the game directory. It fixed the problem. Nowadays, your xBox or whatever would simply download the patch as soon as it was available and you'd never know there was a problem.
This ease of update has led to quite a bit of laziness on the part of some developers since they know once problems come up, they can instantly fix it and move on. This means that you, as a user, basically become unpaid beta testers of some companies' products since your instant feedback (read: ire over a crappy game) will enable the developers to correct issues they might never have found without months of more testing. One particularly heinous example was the release of the game Lego Pirates of the Caribbean. If you have the original Xbox or PS3 version of this game that came out on release day, you have a game that is can never be played without the update. The game was so badly glitched (all Lego games are inherently glitched, but this one was the worst) that the company was forced to replace all the game discs for the Wii owners since the Wii was not able to take game updates. If you're like me, however, and waited till the game went down to 19.99, then your disc is fine.
I use this update thing as a sort of gauge as to the worthiness of a particular product. For instance, Java (although supposedly in every product ever) seems to be one of the buggiest things out there. My computer gets updates almost daily for it meaning the developer finds something wrong with it almost daily.Oh sure, you might say, "well, they are improving it," and that is undoubtedly true some of the time, but developers would not update a product with newer and better stuff on a daily basis. A good portion of these are likely patches to fix bugs.
Another is Adobe Air. The Amazon Cloud Player uses this, and guess what has to update every single time I use it. Yeah. It tells me to close what I'm doing so it can make its update, so I let it finish what it is doing and then tell it to update. I figure it worked last time, and it'll work this time without their precious update. Obviously, the Air does something that the Cloud Player uses, but whatever that is has nothing to do with the updates it makes.
I know these are free, of course, but it still stinks that those developers can't just put out something that works the first (or even second) time without persistent updates that slow everything down while you wait for them to basically say, "Whoops, hang on a minute while I fix this."
When a program is released, it is usually put out there "as good as it gets" for the moment until something surprising comes along to derail it, and the developer is forced to put out an update to fix whatever problem arose. These updates, or patches, are only possible because our computers are almost permanently online with a fairly speedy connection, where once upon a time, if a developer put out a program that required a patch, the consumer was screwed.
I recall one such game, called Riven (a sequel to Myst), that froze at a certain point of the game, and after some digging, I learned that the game was glitched and required a patch to fix it. I located said patch (I don't remember how) and popped that on a 3.5" disk to load into the game directory. It fixed the problem. Nowadays, your xBox or whatever would simply download the patch as soon as it was available and you'd never know there was a problem.
This ease of update has led to quite a bit of laziness on the part of some developers since they know once problems come up, they can instantly fix it and move on. This means that you, as a user, basically become unpaid beta testers of some companies' products since your instant feedback (read: ire over a crappy game) will enable the developers to correct issues they might never have found without months of more testing. One particularly heinous example was the release of the game Lego Pirates of the Caribbean. If you have the original Xbox or PS3 version of this game that came out on release day, you have a game that is can never be played without the update. The game was so badly glitched (all Lego games are inherently glitched, but this one was the worst) that the company was forced to replace all the game discs for the Wii owners since the Wii was not able to take game updates. If you're like me, however, and waited till the game went down to 19.99, then your disc is fine.
I use this update thing as a sort of gauge as to the worthiness of a particular product. For instance, Java (although supposedly in every product ever) seems to be one of the buggiest things out there. My computer gets updates almost daily for it meaning the developer finds something wrong with it almost daily.Oh sure, you might say, "well, they are improving it," and that is undoubtedly true some of the time, but developers would not update a product with newer and better stuff on a daily basis. A good portion of these are likely patches to fix bugs.
Another is Adobe Air. The Amazon Cloud Player uses this, and guess what has to update every single time I use it. Yeah. It tells me to close what I'm doing so it can make its update, so I let it finish what it is doing and then tell it to update. I figure it worked last time, and it'll work this time without their precious update. Obviously, the Air does something that the Cloud Player uses, but whatever that is has nothing to do with the updates it makes.
I know these are free, of course, but it still stinks that those developers can't just put out something that works the first (or even second) time without persistent updates that slow everything down while you wait for them to basically say, "Whoops, hang on a minute while I fix this."
Thursday, October 17, 2013
The Computer Call
So last night as we're sitting down to a healthy dinner of chili dogs and Star Trek, we get a call from some guy with a Farsi accent telling me that he is calling about my computer. Now, these people have called before, but in my initial interrogation, they eventually hung up because the answers they gave made absolutely no sense. This time, I kept the guy on the line longer to try and figure out the purpose of his call.
Spoiler: I never did.
Anyway, he said he was calling about my computer, and I asked the most natural question that any geek should have in such a situation: which one? Well, without missing a beat, he said that they had detected that my Windows or Apple Mac computer had unsolicited programs accessing the internet and these programs were not viruses and could not be detected by regular virus software. I asked how, he said he had already told me that. I told him he hadn't, and he insisted that he could show me if I accessed my computer. I told him I would not give him access to my computer, and he said he would walk me through it to show me one of these programs.
Still curious as to what he is selling (I suspect some kind of registry cleaner or spyware/malware cleaner deal), I go ahead and proceed to my nearest computer and ask him to proceed. He asks if I'm the primary user of my computer. I tell him some of them. He paused at this answer, apparently, uncertain as to how to move on, but finally, he went ahead with his spiel. He then asks if I know where the keyboard is. I have to admit that I was completely thrown by the question. I was like, "What about the keyboard?" He asks again if I can find it. I just say yes, thinking he could not have possibly just asked me that.
Then, he asks me to find the C-T-R-L button in the lower left hand corner of the keyboard. I had to take a moment to inform him that he could speed up a bit here since I'm not a first grader, and am, in fact, a rather savvy user/programmer/sometimes hacker. I can keep up. He acknowledges and then asks me if I can find the little banner key that looks like the Windows symbol. I inform him that I'm well aware of what the Windows key is.
He asks me to hold that key down. I wait patiently for the next step, since there is no reason to just hold that key down without pressing some other key. He is guiding me to a Windows speed key combo, and I was not going to just plug that in without knowing what it is. He asks if I'm holding the key down. I ask him what the next keypress is. He asks if I can find the R button. I confirm that he is asking me to pull up the Run dialog box. I use the darn thing all the time.
Thrown by my phraseology, I guess, he mumbled out something I didn't fully understand. Still playing along, I opened the Run box and wait. He asks me if I see the box that says Run on it. I tell him that I can. He asks if I can see the white space in that box. I confirm that I can, and assure him one more time that I can keep up if he would cut to the chase.
Undaunted by my insistence to speed up, he asks if there is anything in that white box. I tell him that yes, there is the last thing that I typed in that box. It was, in fact, the IP address of a network drive in my house that I used to copy some stuff around, though I didn't go into that with him. He told me to press the backspace button to clear that box out. Little did he know that since the info in there is actually highlights when you open the run box, you can usually just start typing, but you know, whatever.
He had, so far, spent five minutes telling me how to pull up the Run dialog box using what was, no doubt, a page of step-by-step instructions in front of him. He finally got to the meat of his instructions. What to type in that precious box. He said to press E as in echo. I press nothing and wait for whatever he wants me to spell out. He asks if I have an E in that box. I ask him what he wants me to type in the box. He says E as in echo. I say ok.
He moves on to V as in Victor. I assure him, once again, that I can keep up and note, and I actually said "for QA purposes," that he was going irritatingly slow when I've repeatedly told him to move it along. He was unmoved and said to put in E as in echo again. He confirmed "E as in echo, V as in Victor, E as in echo." I confirmed, "Are you asking me to pull up the Event Viewer?" and I quickly typed in eventvwr.
About this time, the Queen was telling me not to do anything they told me to, and I assured her I had it under control, and was still just playing along. However, I glanced at the time, and noted that a) my chili dogs are getting cold and b) I was running out of time for Star Trek since they wanted to watch that Toy Story Halloween special at 7.
I told him I had the event viewer open, and asked very directly what I'm looking for. He asked what I see on my screen. I told him there are lots of things on my screen. What does he want me to look for? He asked if I saw event viewer local. I told him yes, and he asked me to list the items below that. I told him no, and asked what the point of this was. He said he was showing me the programs running. I told him that at this point I was kind of annoyed by how slow he was going and that I really didn't have time for this right now.
And I hung up.
I am still curious as to what he was going for, who he was calling from, and what he was selling since he was basically posing as a technical person calling in response to a message sent from one of my computers. This concerned me, and I really wanted to find out who they were to confirm whether they actually did get something from one of my computers or not. Perhaps they'll call again, and I'll torture them then.
Spoiler: I never did.
Anyway, he said he was calling about my computer, and I asked the most natural question that any geek should have in such a situation: which one? Well, without missing a beat, he said that they had detected that my Windows or Apple Mac computer had unsolicited programs accessing the internet and these programs were not viruses and could not be detected by regular virus software. I asked how, he said he had already told me that. I told him he hadn't, and he insisted that he could show me if I accessed my computer. I told him I would not give him access to my computer, and he said he would walk me through it to show me one of these programs.
Still curious as to what he is selling (I suspect some kind of registry cleaner or spyware/malware cleaner deal), I go ahead and proceed to my nearest computer and ask him to proceed. He asks if I'm the primary user of my computer. I tell him some of them. He paused at this answer, apparently, uncertain as to how to move on, but finally, he went ahead with his spiel. He then asks if I know where the keyboard is. I have to admit that I was completely thrown by the question. I was like, "What about the keyboard?" He asks again if I can find it. I just say yes, thinking he could not have possibly just asked me that.
Then, he asks me to find the C-T-R-L button in the lower left hand corner of the keyboard. I had to take a moment to inform him that he could speed up a bit here since I'm not a first grader, and am, in fact, a rather savvy user/programmer/sometimes hacker. I can keep up. He acknowledges and then asks me if I can find the little banner key that looks like the Windows symbol. I inform him that I'm well aware of what the Windows key is.
He asks me to hold that key down. I wait patiently for the next step, since there is no reason to just hold that key down without pressing some other key. He is guiding me to a Windows speed key combo, and I was not going to just plug that in without knowing what it is. He asks if I'm holding the key down. I ask him what the next keypress is. He asks if I can find the R button. I confirm that he is asking me to pull up the Run dialog box. I use the darn thing all the time.
Thrown by my phraseology, I guess, he mumbled out something I didn't fully understand. Still playing along, I opened the Run box and wait. He asks me if I see the box that says Run on it. I tell him that I can. He asks if I can see the white space in that box. I confirm that I can, and assure him one more time that I can keep up if he would cut to the chase.
Undaunted by my insistence to speed up, he asks if there is anything in that white box. I tell him that yes, there is the last thing that I typed in that box. It was, in fact, the IP address of a network drive in my house that I used to copy some stuff around, though I didn't go into that with him. He told me to press the backspace button to clear that box out. Little did he know that since the info in there is actually highlights when you open the run box, you can usually just start typing, but you know, whatever.
He had, so far, spent five minutes telling me how to pull up the Run dialog box using what was, no doubt, a page of step-by-step instructions in front of him. He finally got to the meat of his instructions. What to type in that precious box. He said to press E as in echo. I press nothing and wait for whatever he wants me to spell out. He asks if I have an E in that box. I ask him what he wants me to type in the box. He says E as in echo. I say ok.
He moves on to V as in Victor. I assure him, once again, that I can keep up and note, and I actually said "for QA purposes," that he was going irritatingly slow when I've repeatedly told him to move it along. He was unmoved and said to put in E as in echo again. He confirmed "E as in echo, V as in Victor, E as in echo." I confirmed, "Are you asking me to pull up the Event Viewer?" and I quickly typed in eventvwr.
About this time, the Queen was telling me not to do anything they told me to, and I assured her I had it under control, and was still just playing along. However, I glanced at the time, and noted that a) my chili dogs are getting cold and b) I was running out of time for Star Trek since they wanted to watch that Toy Story Halloween special at 7.
I told him I had the event viewer open, and asked very directly what I'm looking for. He asked what I see on my screen. I told him there are lots of things on my screen. What does he want me to look for? He asked if I saw event viewer local. I told him yes, and he asked me to list the items below that. I told him no, and asked what the point of this was. He said he was showing me the programs running. I told him that at this point I was kind of annoyed by how slow he was going and that I really didn't have time for this right now.
And I hung up.
I am still curious as to what he was going for, who he was calling from, and what he was selling since he was basically posing as a technical person calling in response to a message sent from one of my computers. This concerned me, and I really wanted to find out who they were to confirm whether they actually did get something from one of my computers or not. Perhaps they'll call again, and I'll torture them then.
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
People Are Thick
Sometimes, people get caught up in their own little world, and reply to business emails with their strong words to impress everyone else on the massive email string without realizing that they sound like a complete idiot because they never bothered to read any of the replies to their previous inquiries. They use acronyms like crazy, especially ETA, which in most cases, also makes them sound like an idiot since they clearly have no idea what it actually stands for (Estimated Time of Arrival, just in case you're one of them, but don't want to admit it).
One individual in particular replied to an email string stating that the formatting was incorrect in a couple of fields due to the existence of decimals and commas. That is all he said about it. I didn't know which fields were affected or what sort of output he needed beyond removing those characters. Add to this that the other people were actively running the files anyway, which would mean that once they get them all done, none of them will work since they're formatted incorrectly. To date, no one has so much as noticed this little plot hole.
Anyway, on Mr. Decimal-Comma, I replied to his email string (it was a double reply since I had to address both his issue and the other one where someone was having trouble running one of the files, see plot hole) asking which fields were affected and what sort of output he wanted. Later that day, he replied again asking if the formatting was complete and for an "eta on when that will be complete". Besides the egregious misuse of the acronym, I had to wonder if he even read what I wrote before since that was literally the next reply. You may note that it does not contain the answer to my question of "which fields are affected."
I cut and pasted my previous question noting that the eta is dependent on his answer to my question. (Note the proper usage of the acronym; if you broke that out and read it in full, the statement would still make sense). I just have to wonder how some of these end up in positions of power when they clearly don't read the communication they receive.
One individual in particular replied to an email string stating that the formatting was incorrect in a couple of fields due to the existence of decimals and commas. That is all he said about it. I didn't know which fields were affected or what sort of output he needed beyond removing those characters. Add to this that the other people were actively running the files anyway, which would mean that once they get them all done, none of them will work since they're formatted incorrectly. To date, no one has so much as noticed this little plot hole.
Anyway, on Mr. Decimal-Comma, I replied to his email string (it was a double reply since I had to address both his issue and the other one where someone was having trouble running one of the files, see plot hole) asking which fields were affected and what sort of output he wanted. Later that day, he replied again asking if the formatting was complete and for an "eta on when that will be complete". Besides the egregious misuse of the acronym, I had to wonder if he even read what I wrote before since that was literally the next reply. You may note that it does not contain the answer to my question of "which fields are affected."
I cut and pasted my previous question noting that the eta is dependent on his answer to my question. (Note the proper usage of the acronym; if you broke that out and read it in full, the statement would still make sense). I just have to wonder how some of these end up in positions of power when they clearly don't read the communication they receive.
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
The Game of Reply All
I'd like to introduce you to a game you may or may not have seen before. This game is called "Reply All." It's great fun to watch this play out as a spectator because you never want to be a participant in this game. If you're a participant in this game, you have failed. There are no winners. Well, the spectators are the winners if you really enjoy the head-shaking idiocy of the whole thing. Here's how this game works.
First, you have to be in a company or mailing list that has literally hundreds of people. Only with that kind of pool will you have enough players to make the game worth watching. If it's just your aunt and 3rd cousin, it won't last long.
The way the game starts is by someone accidentally sending a message to the wrong mailing list; this is probably the mailing list you were on, and you weren't supposed to get it either. If you're a level-headed individual who gets lots of emails, you'll look at this message, shrug, and then move on. If you're a player of "Replay All," then the game is on.
The volley starts by someone deciding they got this message in error, and the sender needs to know about it. Instead of clicking Reply, they decide to click Reply All to let that sender know. They put in a completely innocuous message such as, "Bob, I don't know what this is. Please remove me from this list." Sheep being what they are, this first message is followed by a barrage of "Me too" from at least a dozen other people.
It's time for the other side to get involved at this point because they've realized the game is on, but they don't realize that they need to stay out of it. The other side hits back with "Please do not Reply All." This might or might not have helpful instructions as to where to find the "Reply Only To Sender" button, or they could leave it at that.
Well, the "Me too" people already have a head start, and it takes awhile for that first "Don't do it" email to circulate, so that is followed by at least a half dozen more "Remove me from this list" or "Me too" emails.
Well, now management really wants a piece of this because they're getting outnumbered, so the next dozen "Me too" emails contain at least that many or more "Stop replying to all" peppered into them. At least one person by now will have changed the subject line to STOP REPLYING TO ALL (yes, in caps), but without a body text. The emails are flying fast and furious at this point with the "Me too" people desperately trying to out-email the "Stop replying to all" side as the game gets to the point that more than a hundred emails end up being sent clogging email boxes and exchange servers across the company.
Eventually, everyone has said their piece and it quiets down for a little bit. That is, until the crowd that only checks their email once a day comes in to find a zillion emails about something they have nothing to do with. They immediately (without a single glance at the subsequent string) reply all with the message "Please remove me from this list" before deleting the entire subseries of emails. The game resumes briefly with an angry "We already dealt with this. Stop replying to all" and a flurry of "Me too," but in the end, the game finally ends.
The last time this game happened, I kept every email and counted up the replies at the end, sorting them by the "remove me"s and the "stop replying to all"s along with a smattering of actual, subject-related emails that normally get lost with at least one being "Please disregard. Sent to the wrong list. Sorry." somewhere near the beginning of the game. That time, the distribution was about 50/50 between the sides.
I was reminded of this game this morning when there was an email for nominations for something or another, and someone replied all saying, "Not sure what I'm getting these. Please stop sending me these emails!" Oh, yes, he used that exclamation point! Because, why not? I got all excited hoping the game was afoot. Alas, no game this morning.
Next time the Replay All game starts in your office, don't be a player. Be a spectator and laugh at the simple-mindedness of your colleagues. Nothing shows character like a good game of "Reply All."
First, you have to be in a company or mailing list that has literally hundreds of people. Only with that kind of pool will you have enough players to make the game worth watching. If it's just your aunt and 3rd cousin, it won't last long.
The way the game starts is by someone accidentally sending a message to the wrong mailing list; this is probably the mailing list you were on, and you weren't supposed to get it either. If you're a level-headed individual who gets lots of emails, you'll look at this message, shrug, and then move on. If you're a player of "Replay All," then the game is on.
The volley starts by someone deciding they got this message in error, and the sender needs to know about it. Instead of clicking Reply, they decide to click Reply All to let that sender know. They put in a completely innocuous message such as, "Bob, I don't know what this is. Please remove me from this list." Sheep being what they are, this first message is followed by a barrage of "Me too" from at least a dozen other people.
It's time for the other side to get involved at this point because they've realized the game is on, but they don't realize that they need to stay out of it. The other side hits back with "Please do not Reply All." This might or might not have helpful instructions as to where to find the "Reply Only To Sender" button, or they could leave it at that.
Well, the "Me too" people already have a head start, and it takes awhile for that first "Don't do it" email to circulate, so that is followed by at least a half dozen more "Remove me from this list" or "Me too" emails.
Well, now management really wants a piece of this because they're getting outnumbered, so the next dozen "Me too" emails contain at least that many or more "Stop replying to all" peppered into them. At least one person by now will have changed the subject line to STOP REPLYING TO ALL (yes, in caps), but without a body text. The emails are flying fast and furious at this point with the "Me too" people desperately trying to out-email the "Stop replying to all" side as the game gets to the point that more than a hundred emails end up being sent clogging email boxes and exchange servers across the company.
Eventually, everyone has said their piece and it quiets down for a little bit. That is, until the crowd that only checks their email once a day comes in to find a zillion emails about something they have nothing to do with. They immediately (without a single glance at the subsequent string) reply all with the message "Please remove me from this list" before deleting the entire subseries of emails. The game resumes briefly with an angry "We already dealt with this. Stop replying to all" and a flurry of "Me too," but in the end, the game finally ends.
The last time this game happened, I kept every email and counted up the replies at the end, sorting them by the "remove me"s and the "stop replying to all"s along with a smattering of actual, subject-related emails that normally get lost with at least one being "Please disregard. Sent to the wrong list. Sorry." somewhere near the beginning of the game. That time, the distribution was about 50/50 between the sides.
I was reminded of this game this morning when there was an email for nominations for something or another, and someone replied all saying, "Not sure what I'm getting these. Please stop sending me these emails!" Oh, yes, he used that exclamation point! Because, why not? I got all excited hoping the game was afoot. Alas, no game this morning.
Next time the Replay All game starts in your office, don't be a player. Be a spectator and laugh at the simple-mindedness of your colleagues. Nothing shows character like a good game of "Reply All."
Friday, September 13, 2013
Just Really Dim
You know, sometimes, I feel like I go on a rant about people, but in my defense, this is my blog, and I'm in charge here, so there. Honestly, there is no better way to get something off your chest than to communicate about it in some way, so this amounts to therapy...in a way.
What I'm on about (this time) is the sheer bewilderment on y part about how some people manage to survive in our modern world. Yes, my job at present is one that is a little specialized, but what throws me for a loop is when people cannot handle or comprehend what should the simplest of concepts (relative to what they do). I'm not talking about the finite principles of writing a program or even working some of the finer intricacies of Windows (like the fact that right-clicking anything anywhere pulls up a relevant context menu ... someone's mind was just blown).
I give you two real world examples for what I'm walking about. First, logins and passwords. Everyone has a login for everything they do. Have email? You have a login. Have voicemail? You have a login. Have internet access? You have a login. With every login comes a password. Now, a quiz for you. What does a password do? Anyone? If you said, it keeps the login secure, you would be correct. If you said it controls the level of access for the user, I would look at you funny. Yet, on a very regular basis, I get asked this question. A lot.
You see, one of my specialties is making sure that our product that navigates Medicare's DDE system continues to successfully navigate said system. Part of my job is interpreting error messages. Very, very few of those messages actually relate to a bad password. Yet, it seems people ask with every other error they get if it is a password problem. One question: did it log in? If the answer is yes, then it is not a password problem. Real simple. I can't fathom where anyone would get the idea that a problem accessing certain data would be a problem with the password. Now, it's almost certainly a problem with the login and its individual setup with rights and such, but the password? Eh, never.
Honestly, who would be actively using a program, get an access denied error, and think, I must have a problem with my password? And on a pause, I have to admit probably a large number of people. *shakes head in dismay*
The other one has to do with people and the Internet. The first time I got onto the Internet was in 1994, I think. I was a late bloomer, I know. Don't hold it against me. There is one thing I've known about the Internet from the very beginning. It isn't on my computer. I have a program that I use to navigate through the world wide web, but none of the content is actually on my machine. This was back in the days where looking at pictures was almost out of the question. You wanted information, you got a text based page of info. If you wanted pics, you just run and grab and sandwich while that 350Kb pic downloads through your blazing 14400 bps modem. This is almost twenty years ago.
Yet, only a few days ago, I was speaking to someone and told her to go to a website we use for remote access. She said, "Oh, is that on the internet? I'm not sure it's installed on this computer." This is where I close my eyes and realign my chi with the universe in the hopes I don't say something to insult the questionable intelligence I've just encountered. After all, I'm not deal with a patient in a nursing home here. This is someone who works with computers (granted not in a technical capacity, but she has a job using them) every day. Here's a fun fact about Windows. If you have Windows installed on your computer, you have an Internet browser. It's integrated into the operating system. And if that computer can't access the Internet, there are a lot of things it shouldn't be doing right now that I understand it is.
Wow. Just ... wow.
What I'm on about (this time) is the sheer bewilderment on y part about how some people manage to survive in our modern world. Yes, my job at present is one that is a little specialized, but what throws me for a loop is when people cannot handle or comprehend what should the simplest of concepts (relative to what they do). I'm not talking about the finite principles of writing a program or even working some of the finer intricacies of Windows (like the fact that right-clicking anything anywhere pulls up a relevant context menu ... someone's mind was just blown).
I give you two real world examples for what I'm walking about. First, logins and passwords. Everyone has a login for everything they do. Have email? You have a login. Have voicemail? You have a login. Have internet access? You have a login. With every login comes a password. Now, a quiz for you. What does a password do? Anyone? If you said, it keeps the login secure, you would be correct. If you said it controls the level of access for the user, I would look at you funny. Yet, on a very regular basis, I get asked this question. A lot.
You see, one of my specialties is making sure that our product that navigates Medicare's DDE system continues to successfully navigate said system. Part of my job is interpreting error messages. Very, very few of those messages actually relate to a bad password. Yet, it seems people ask with every other error they get if it is a password problem. One question: did it log in? If the answer is yes, then it is not a password problem. Real simple. I can't fathom where anyone would get the idea that a problem accessing certain data would be a problem with the password. Now, it's almost certainly a problem with the login and its individual setup with rights and such, but the password? Eh, never.
Honestly, who would be actively using a program, get an access denied error, and think, I must have a problem with my password? And on a pause, I have to admit probably a large number of people. *shakes head in dismay*
The other one has to do with people and the Internet. The first time I got onto the Internet was in 1994, I think. I was a late bloomer, I know. Don't hold it against me. There is one thing I've known about the Internet from the very beginning. It isn't on my computer. I have a program that I use to navigate through the world wide web, but none of the content is actually on my machine. This was back in the days where looking at pictures was almost out of the question. You wanted information, you got a text based page of info. If you wanted pics, you just run and grab and sandwich while that 350Kb pic downloads through your blazing 14400 bps modem. This is almost twenty years ago.
Yet, only a few days ago, I was speaking to someone and told her to go to a website we use for remote access. She said, "Oh, is that on the internet? I'm not sure it's installed on this computer." This is where I close my eyes and realign my chi with the universe in the hopes I don't say something to insult the questionable intelligence I've just encountered. After all, I'm not deal with a patient in a nursing home here. This is someone who works with computers (granted not in a technical capacity, but she has a job using them) every day. Here's a fun fact about Windows. If you have Windows installed on your computer, you have an Internet browser. It's integrated into the operating system. And if that computer can't access the Internet, there are a lot of things it shouldn't be doing right now that I understand it is.
Wow. Just ... wow.
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
No Thought Given
So I am supposed to call people to help them through their technological problems, and most of the time, I have to leave them a message. Not only do these people have problems answering their phone, they also have issues calling back. And then, when they do, they act surprised that I need to get into their machine to help them (goes with the territory of a locally installed application).
Such was the case with this person. I left a message this morning, and this lady called back pretty soon thereafter. I was impressed. Then I said I needed to get onto the machine, and well, she was like, it is working right now, so you can't actually see the problem. It's a big job, too, and will take awhile before it finishes. I tell her this is fine because I can look at some of the data I need without disturbing the job it's doing.
She notes that, well, she isn't next to that machine. It's a few desks over. Then silence. It should not have been a surprise that I would want to see the problem and want to look into it. I finally tell her that I am open to suggestions, and she says she'll call back when it is done.
Why did she bother to call if she was not in a place for me to actually do anything? Happens all the time.
Such was the case with this person. I left a message this morning, and this lady called back pretty soon thereafter. I was impressed. Then I said I needed to get onto the machine, and well, she was like, it is working right now, so you can't actually see the problem. It's a big job, too, and will take awhile before it finishes. I tell her this is fine because I can look at some of the data I need without disturbing the job it's doing.
She notes that, well, she isn't next to that machine. It's a few desks over. Then silence. It should not have been a surprise that I would want to see the problem and want to look into it. I finally tell her that I am open to suggestions, and she says she'll call back when it is done.
Why did she bother to call if she was not in a place for me to actually do anything? Happens all the time.
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Audiophile
So as you may well know, I'm all into music. It makes me happy. I speak the language. I can't get enough of it. A guy at work (who I noticed I had referred to as The Mixer at one point) called me a media mutt when it comes to what I listen to and watch because there are no limits with me. I will listen to and evaluate anything. New or old makes no difference. There is nothing before or after my time.
Right now, for example, I'm listening to Richard Wagner's Das Rheingold, the first part of Der Ring des Nibelungen, his 15-16 hour epic opera cycle. Yeah, it's in German. Anyway...
I have the Amazon Cloud Player and for the first time since the iPod, I am able to organize a large amount of music, but unlike the iPod's 80Gb limitation, the Cloud has a limit of 250,000 songs, regardless of size. This is staggering. They do this by having space available for upload along with linking songs with their own download library so that some of the dongs are your own while others are those they've matched to theirs. Anyway, my count after all the burning and uploading that was to be done over a 3 week period tranferring everything from iPods, hard drives, and CDs came out to a little over 32K tracks. I cannot say songs because not everything is a song or even music, but tracks accurately describes it.
I believe the oldest pieces date back to the 1600's while I have stuff from 2012 as well. Haven't grabbed any 2013 stuff, cause the year is too new to know what's worth getting. That may seem like a lot and even raise an eyebrow, but I've been buying CDs and downloading from a variety of (legitimate) services since high school. I would blow hundreds of dollars when I was in the military buying entire artist catalogs on a whim (I specifically recall doing this with Billy Joel, Oingo Boingo, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Stephen Sondheim to name a few). If someone said "listen to this," I'd have the CD before going to bed. I went through hundreds of CDs in my garage determining what I had on my iPod and what I hadn't. And I was not alone either. The Queen listens to different genres of music than I frequent, so she had her own catalog of CDs to review and upload.
Now, I'm going through music I've not listened to in years simply because I never had room on my iPod for it. It was stored on CD, so that was enough. Now, it's accessible. In addition, because of how the cloud player works, anyone (in my family) can get what they want from the library and place it on their iPods to listen to. Whenever and wherever without waiting for me to plug in and find it for them.
Rock Girl was excited anyway.
For me, it means I can delete some things off my iPod that I've kept on there for storage and free up some space for music to actually listen to. This thing is going to completely change my iPod's purpose. It's very cool.
Right now, for example, I'm listening to Richard Wagner's Das Rheingold, the first part of Der Ring des Nibelungen, his 15-16 hour epic opera cycle. Yeah, it's in German. Anyway...
I have the Amazon Cloud Player and for the first time since the iPod, I am able to organize a large amount of music, but unlike the iPod's 80Gb limitation, the Cloud has a limit of 250,000 songs, regardless of size. This is staggering. They do this by having space available for upload along with linking songs with their own download library so that some of the dongs are your own while others are those they've matched to theirs. Anyway, my count after all the burning and uploading that was to be done over a 3 week period tranferring everything from iPods, hard drives, and CDs came out to a little over 32K tracks. I cannot say songs because not everything is a song or even music, but tracks accurately describes it.
I believe the oldest pieces date back to the 1600's while I have stuff from 2012 as well. Haven't grabbed any 2013 stuff, cause the year is too new to know what's worth getting. That may seem like a lot and even raise an eyebrow, but I've been buying CDs and downloading from a variety of (legitimate) services since high school. I would blow hundreds of dollars when I was in the military buying entire artist catalogs on a whim (I specifically recall doing this with Billy Joel, Oingo Boingo, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Stephen Sondheim to name a few). If someone said "listen to this," I'd have the CD before going to bed. I went through hundreds of CDs in my garage determining what I had on my iPod and what I hadn't. And I was not alone either. The Queen listens to different genres of music than I frequent, so she had her own catalog of CDs to review and upload.
Now, I'm going through music I've not listened to in years simply because I never had room on my iPod for it. It was stored on CD, so that was enough. Now, it's accessible. In addition, because of how the cloud player works, anyone (in my family) can get what they want from the library and place it on their iPods to listen to. Whenever and wherever without waiting for me to plug in and find it for them.
Rock Girl was excited anyway.
For me, it means I can delete some things off my iPod that I've kept on there for storage and free up some space for music to actually listen to. This thing is going to completely change my iPod's purpose. It's very cool.
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Last Night's Castle
I've watched the TV series Castle on Monday nights for a couple years now. It follows new episodes of either the Bachelor/ette or Dancing With The Stars (both of which are shows that the Queen watches). The series has its ups and downs, and at the moment, it is on a down. The episodes remain entertaining, but the cases are a bit weak. In addition, Castle's involvement in the cases have run very minimal the last couple of shows. He is there to give some key piece of insight, but what was clever about the show before was that he was the one to fully solve the case by thinking completely outside the box. The cases themselves remain fairly textbook for a crime show: the one who does it is the one you usually meet first and then forget about completely through the course of the show.
And then last night, they had this plot. It is a well known fact that screenwriters and/or producers (can't figure out which) are some of the most out of touch people on the planet. They put forth things that people will kind of accept, but if you have any knowledge at all about the topic, you're stuck shaking your head at the naivety. This is what happened last night. The big twist (and apologies if this spoils it) was that there are two rivals in the music industry: one older, one younger, just like the show, Nashville produced by the same network. The younger is coming into prominence while the older is dropping into the shadows. The older tries to sabotage the younger by (and I'm not making this up) stealing the master recording of the younger's next album, giving it to a "hacker friend" who was going to upload it to the "Internet" (you know the place, right?) at the same time the album comes out to undermine sales of the album.
Hm. Having the knowledge I have, and knowing the people I know, I have some reasons that real people (not the bloated record company statistics) have for downloading music from the all-powerful and mysterious "Internet" as well as how this process works. First of all, stealing the master files for the album and releasing it online at the same time the album comes out is one of the dumbest plans ever. Why? Because people rip and upload the album in its full quality to the mystical Internet within hours of the album's release anyway. In fact, they'll go one step further and buy it from Amazon or iTunes and just keep the files going right out to the online file storage.
And now, would this move actually undermine sales? I really doubt it. The record companies will tell you that piracy is a huge deal and they're losing billions. They're probably guessing that number based on how many downloads they can estimate are going out from sites that host them. The reality is that they're not losing as much as they claim. Here are reasons that various people I know download music along with the amount that the record companies lose in that process.
1. They already have the album and have misplaced it, but want to get ahold of the music while trying to locate the missing disc. Money lost: 0.
2. Would never have bought the album in a million years, but are curious enough to give it a listen, yet too lazy to check it out from the local library. Money lost: 0
3. The target album is out of print. Money lost: 0
4. Want to hear the music now, but intend to buy it anyway. Money (ultimately) lost: 0
5. Not sure if they would like the album, so listen to it now to evaluate it, and then buy it because they wish to support the artist if they feel the music was worth it (don't laugh; I know someone who does this). Without listening first, they would not purchase it. Money lost: 0
6. Is flat broke and cannot afford to buy anything, so wouldn't have bought it. Money lost: 0. When they do buy music, they generally get it at a second hand store anyway, so the music companies still made no money on them.
I would imagine the subset of people who want the album, can afford the album, and can equally choose between buying it or downloading it is actually quite small. In addition, despite being in the technological age, a lot of people have no idea where to go to actually download anything. They probably lose more when people shoplift the album than when people download it.
So the fictional person went to jail for murdering someone who caught them in the act of a pointless crime that would not have changed anything. It was another one of those plots that was more of a public service announcement than it was an actual crime drama.
I suppose I should also throw out that this is not a commentary on the validity or legality of downloading unpurchased music, but a notation on the ridiculous nature of the plot / crime in this episode of Castle.
And then last night, they had this plot. It is a well known fact that screenwriters and/or producers (can't figure out which) are some of the most out of touch people on the planet. They put forth things that people will kind of accept, but if you have any knowledge at all about the topic, you're stuck shaking your head at the naivety. This is what happened last night. The big twist (and apologies if this spoils it) was that there are two rivals in the music industry: one older, one younger, just like the show, Nashville produced by the same network. The younger is coming into prominence while the older is dropping into the shadows. The older tries to sabotage the younger by (and I'm not making this up) stealing the master recording of the younger's next album, giving it to a "hacker friend" who was going to upload it to the "Internet" (you know the place, right?) at the same time the album comes out to undermine sales of the album.
Hm. Having the knowledge I have, and knowing the people I know, I have some reasons that real people (not the bloated record company statistics) have for downloading music from the all-powerful and mysterious "Internet" as well as how this process works. First of all, stealing the master files for the album and releasing it online at the same time the album comes out is one of the dumbest plans ever. Why? Because people rip and upload the album in its full quality to the mystical Internet within hours of the album's release anyway. In fact, they'll go one step further and buy it from Amazon or iTunes and just keep the files going right out to the online file storage.
And now, would this move actually undermine sales? I really doubt it. The record companies will tell you that piracy is a huge deal and they're losing billions. They're probably guessing that number based on how many downloads they can estimate are going out from sites that host them. The reality is that they're not losing as much as they claim. Here are reasons that various people I know download music along with the amount that the record companies lose in that process.
1. They already have the album and have misplaced it, but want to get ahold of the music while trying to locate the missing disc. Money lost: 0.
2. Would never have bought the album in a million years, but are curious enough to give it a listen, yet too lazy to check it out from the local library. Money lost: 0
3. The target album is out of print. Money lost: 0
4. Want to hear the music now, but intend to buy it anyway. Money (ultimately) lost: 0
5. Not sure if they would like the album, so listen to it now to evaluate it, and then buy it because they wish to support the artist if they feel the music was worth it (don't laugh; I know someone who does this). Without listening first, they would not purchase it. Money lost: 0
6. Is flat broke and cannot afford to buy anything, so wouldn't have bought it. Money lost: 0. When they do buy music, they generally get it at a second hand store anyway, so the music companies still made no money on them.
I would imagine the subset of people who want the album, can afford the album, and can equally choose between buying it or downloading it is actually quite small. In addition, despite being in the technological age, a lot of people have no idea where to go to actually download anything. They probably lose more when people shoplift the album than when people download it.
So the fictional person went to jail for murdering someone who caught them in the act of a pointless crime that would not have changed anything. It was another one of those plots that was more of a public service announcement than it was an actual crime drama.
I suppose I should also throw out that this is not a commentary on the validity or legality of downloading unpurchased music, but a notation on the ridiculous nature of the plot / crime in this episode of Castle.
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Cloud Player
As the Queen is completely sick of hearing, my project at present is the Amazon Cloud Player and uploading everything I've ever owned up to it. At present, I'm pushing just shy of 22,000 tracks, and I'm sort of leveling out as I rip the final CDs in my collection. It's the clean up that's cumbersome. Anyway...
I'm presently trying to get some of the Podcasts I want to keep hold of on there. Thing is, Amazon states that they do not support a number of different audio types at present, including Podcasts and Audiobooks. However, I wonder what it is they don't support or how they even know it's a Podcast. When I did my massive iPod uploads, I managed to upload both Podcasts and Audiobooks without the system so much as whining. However, when attempting to deliberately upload some of the other ones, now it seems Amazon is onto me, and it ignores the files. Odd, I thought. What is different about these files versus the others?
Hence, I tried experimenting with all kinds of variations on the files. I've tweaked the metadata all over the place changing the file type from Podcast to Music, changing the genre, changing the artists. Well, it was too wise to fall for any of that. I ran the files through converters to change the entire file type from mp3 to other bit rates of mp3 and aac, but it was still wise to me.
So I thought back to the iPod and its uploads. What is different about the iPod files? Well, when you copy a file to an iPod, it pops it in a hidden directory in a completely random location and renames it from "Bob's Secret Podcast for Geeks Who Like To Watch White Out Dry on a Monitor - Programme 47.mp3" to "ACYX.mp3". I thought that was novel, so I renamed all my Podcasts to four letter file names.
It totally worked. Almost.
I had 16 remaining Podcasts that for whatever reason would not upload (actually there were three others, but in my various upload attempts, I managed to grab one at a time...yeah, I don't know). So I decided to run them through the MP3 converter and rename them (for a third time). It finally worked for those last few.
Never tell a geek he can't upload a file he wants to upload. He will find a way.
I'm presently trying to get some of the Podcasts I want to keep hold of on there. Thing is, Amazon states that they do not support a number of different audio types at present, including Podcasts and Audiobooks. However, I wonder what it is they don't support or how they even know it's a Podcast. When I did my massive iPod uploads, I managed to upload both Podcasts and Audiobooks without the system so much as whining. However, when attempting to deliberately upload some of the other ones, now it seems Amazon is onto me, and it ignores the files. Odd, I thought. What is different about these files versus the others?
Hence, I tried experimenting with all kinds of variations on the files. I've tweaked the metadata all over the place changing the file type from Podcast to Music, changing the genre, changing the artists. Well, it was too wise to fall for any of that. I ran the files through converters to change the entire file type from mp3 to other bit rates of mp3 and aac, but it was still wise to me.
So I thought back to the iPod and its uploads. What is different about the iPod files? Well, when you copy a file to an iPod, it pops it in a hidden directory in a completely random location and renames it from "Bob's Secret Podcast for Geeks Who Like To Watch White Out Dry on a Monitor - Programme 47.mp3" to "ACYX.mp3". I thought that was novel, so I renamed all my Podcasts to four letter file names.
It totally worked. Almost.
I had 16 remaining Podcasts that for whatever reason would not upload (actually there were three others, but in my various upload attempts, I managed to grab one at a time...yeah, I don't know). So I decided to run them through the MP3 converter and rename them (for a third time). It finally worked for those last few.
Never tell a geek he can't upload a file he wants to upload. He will find a way.
Thursday, August 9, 2012
Rehearsal and Google
Two things come to mind for today. Google and last night's rehearsal.
What's up with Google? Well, they've been doing this thing where they're taking over various websites and implementing this sort of standardization of the logins across all of them. This login standardization is wreaking havoc with my logins because I had accounts on all these different sites before Google got to be a part of them. I did not always use the same email address when setting them up, so passing between these sites is nothing short of a chore. For instance, blogspot was not always a Google property, but Google adsense was. So I had a Google adsense account under my home email address, but this blog is actually setup under a completely separate email address to preserve its rather transparent anonymity. Then Google acquired blogspot. Adsense is an actual deal you can put on the blog, but since this blog is under a different email address than my adsense, I can't do that.
Even worse than that, though, Google acquired Youtube, and recently killed all the old logins to favor the email address it was setup under. It linked this email address to any other Google properties that also use that address. YouTube had my home address as the contact, so it linked that to the adsense stuff along wth the other Google stuff there. Where it gets really complicated is the Queen uses the home address for her Facebook login where I use yet another email address for mine. When Google came up with +, I figured it would be good to just use the same email addresses for that (not that we ever use it). Oh, and did I mention that I had used that home address on a completely different blogspot account to write some stuff up once?
This means that Google has managed to make a mess of my online life by trying to make it easier. In order to write this blog, I had to log out of the Queen's Google account (you know, cause it took the Google + account holder's name and made it the primary name) because I had logged into my YouTube account earlier today and login to this one. You could say I did it to myself, but at the same time, we share the home email address. This whole thing was only further complicated by the requirement of setting up a Google account for our Android phones and linking that to everything else.
Anyway, last night, I had my Wednesday night rehearsal for church. These days, I alternate between keyboard and bass, and last night I was on keys. We primarily worked on a single new song, but at the end of the rehearsal, the leader wanted to try playing through the song again on his electric guitar rather than his acoustic. He said anyone who wanted to go could go and anyone who wanted to stay could stay. Naturally, I wanted to stay because I like playing with people. I moved myself to piano to play the missing part since the piano player left as soon as she could get out the door.
It was very fun. It was just fun to just play because that's what it felt like. We decided we needed to get together and just jam, so he figured we'd wait till the first days of school wound down and maybe do something in the fall on a Saturday. I hope we can, because playing together when you're not cramming for a performance is invigorating.
What's up with Google? Well, they've been doing this thing where they're taking over various websites and implementing this sort of standardization of the logins across all of them. This login standardization is wreaking havoc with my logins because I had accounts on all these different sites before Google got to be a part of them. I did not always use the same email address when setting them up, so passing between these sites is nothing short of a chore. For instance, blogspot was not always a Google property, but Google adsense was. So I had a Google adsense account under my home email address, but this blog is actually setup under a completely separate email address to preserve its rather transparent anonymity. Then Google acquired blogspot. Adsense is an actual deal you can put on the blog, but since this blog is under a different email address than my adsense, I can't do that.
Even worse than that, though, Google acquired Youtube, and recently killed all the old logins to favor the email address it was setup under. It linked this email address to any other Google properties that also use that address. YouTube had my home address as the contact, so it linked that to the adsense stuff along wth the other Google stuff there. Where it gets really complicated is the Queen uses the home address for her Facebook login where I use yet another email address for mine. When Google came up with +, I figured it would be good to just use the same email addresses for that (not that we ever use it). Oh, and did I mention that I had used that home address on a completely different blogspot account to write some stuff up once?
This means that Google has managed to make a mess of my online life by trying to make it easier. In order to write this blog, I had to log out of the Queen's Google account (you know, cause it took the Google + account holder's name and made it the primary name) because I had logged into my YouTube account earlier today and login to this one. You could say I did it to myself, but at the same time, we share the home email address. This whole thing was only further complicated by the requirement of setting up a Google account for our Android phones and linking that to everything else.
Anyway, last night, I had my Wednesday night rehearsal for church. These days, I alternate between keyboard and bass, and last night I was on keys. We primarily worked on a single new song, but at the end of the rehearsal, the leader wanted to try playing through the song again on his electric guitar rather than his acoustic. He said anyone who wanted to go could go and anyone who wanted to stay could stay. Naturally, I wanted to stay because I like playing with people. I moved myself to piano to play the missing part since the piano player left as soon as she could get out the door.
It was very fun. It was just fun to just play because that's what it felt like. We decided we needed to get together and just jam, so he figured we'd wait till the first days of school wound down and maybe do something in the fall on a Saturday. I hope we can, because playing together when you're not cramming for a performance is invigorating.
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Blogger on Android
I think blogger/blogspot has something to do with Google, and as such, I figured Android would have some kind of app to post blog entires on here. There has been a good one out there for awhile that is basic, but effective called Blogger-Droid. But then I noticed that Google came out with an official version of the blogger app, and I figured it would be better.
I really couldn't say.
Apparently, the Google blogger app programmer(s) presumed that when you post a blog, you always do it from a Google address entered into your phone, not from a proxy email address like I do with this one. I cannot enter my geek address on my phone, and therefore, I cannot use the official Blogger app, since I cannot find a way to login to any blog from any email address.
So I'll keep using the other one. It's free, so it's not like it's a big loss. I already know how to use it. It can upload pics and everything else. I used it on our Colorado trip last year for the portions that I did blog of it. My sincere hope is that they figure out that people create blogs under email addresses other than their primary ones.
Seriously, I can't be the only one who does this.
I really couldn't say.
Apparently, the Google blogger app programmer(s) presumed that when you post a blog, you always do it from a Google address entered into your phone, not from a proxy email address like I do with this one. I cannot enter my geek address on my phone, and therefore, I cannot use the official Blogger app, since I cannot find a way to login to any blog from any email address.
So I'll keep using the other one. It's free, so it's not like it's a big loss. I already know how to use it. It can upload pics and everything else. I used it on our Colorado trip last year for the portions that I did blog of it. My sincere hope is that they figure out that people create blogs under email addresses other than their primary ones.
Seriously, I can't be the only one who does this.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
I Didn't Know You Used ALL the Programs on this Machine
This was pretty amusing when Optimus Prime told me about it. I just had to post it to share with all of you wonderful person that reads this blog.
So this IT guy at this hospital decided to take the CPU that Our Software was installed on, back up what he thought he needed to back up, re-format it and then pop a new machine in its place for the end user, who had no idea this was going on. I mean, why check with the actual user of the computer before switching it and completely repurposing the old machine? She got into work the next day and found that Our Software wasn’t there at all. The IT guy came out and tried to re-install it, but part of it won’t work now primarily because he didn’t know how the program worked so he didn’t know that a) it needed to be saved and b) what part of it he needed to save. What did they do next? Call us to fix it. Oh, and it needs to be done NOW.
So, naturally, we did what we could with this, but really, it wasn't going to work without a reinstallation. And since this program is fairly customized from place to place, he'd better hope that he backed up the right parts of the software or we're talking a cost to the tune of no less then $500 depending on how customized it was and how much time it will take to get it going again. But hey, he was proactive in keeping the end user on an brand new, updated computer.
Now, this was an older product, and I think Prime talked the end user into exploring the newer version of it since they were going to have to pay anyway. That newer version is much easier to maintain for them and us.
This whole scenario is akin to you changing out my car while I’m sleeping and putting a new one in its place. The new car is great and all, but you didn’t move the locks over and you don’t have a new key to give me because you threw those out thinking they weren’t needed anymore. To top it off, I can’t even have my old car back because you sent it to the scrap yard and now it’s a big square paperweight. Let’s call Ford. I’m sure they can fix this.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
(Lack Of) Progress
So between me and the Engineer, we'd been trying to solve a little problem that cropped up while trying to record some movie music. For years now, I've been using a Yamaha SY85 sequencer to sequence the instrumental parts of my music since it uses samples to output sound and sounds really good. Well, for some reason, the sound outputs went out on this thing a few weeks ago, and now, only the MIDI outputs work. That's bad, but also good. The fact that we still have the MIDI outputs means there's hope for retrieving the volume of music I have recorded on this thing and have saved on a half dozen 3.5" floppy disks that only work in this device. I searched for an emulator, but no dice.
So, he and I turned to the programs that he has available on his Mac: Ableton Live, CuBase, and Garage Band. He got the MIDI signals, but the best we could do is record the input on ONE of them as a single combined track. That won't work. I came up with some ideas for his later, but let me finish this. We couldn't figure out how to get either CuBase or Garage Band to record the MIDI input in its entirety.
So I worked with it using some demos of Finale 2007 and Cakewalk SONAR Producer 7. Sonar did record it, but all on one track, and when I played it back, it didn't contain all the notes. I tried Finale, and it did the same thing. But with Finale, when I tried to run all the tracks (I am outputting as many as 8 at once), it wouldn't scribe anything. When I ran one at a time, it did work, but it wouldn't do all the notes, just like Cakewalk. I was flummoxed and frustrated after fooling with this for 8 hours on a Saturday.
What I wished for more than anything was the program that did work. Back in 1999, I was using an old computer that run Windows 98, and had a program that not only captured all the notes, but did it in one pass and separated it all into the separate tracks. I knew I had done this using an old version of Cakewalk, and I had another program called Midisoft Recording Session, written for Windows 3.1 and 95, as well. I dug through the garage for Midisoft and found me one broken CD. Dang it. I knew my old computer had Cakewalk on an 80 Gb drive I'd put on there just to store stuff, and at present, the boot drive had a broken version of Windows XP.
My solution was to reinstall Windows 98 on the boot drive, and see what I could gleen from the storage drive. Or that was the plan. I popped the original restore disk for this computer into the CD ROM. It gave me all the warning about it formatting the hard drive and and all info lost, yadda-yadda-yadda. Well, I'd done this before, and it always popped the OS on this 6Gb hard drive that I'd been abusing ever since I got my XP machine. So when the re-install was done, I watched it run a check disk and tell me...I have 78,000,000 Mb available. Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
Yeah, it wiped my 80Gb hard drive. In a move completely contrary to the machine's BIOS setup, it arbitraily decided that C: was now the 80Gb hard drive instead of the drive marked as its primary master drive, the 6Gb. Never in the life of this computer has the 6Gb been anything other than the primary master, but sure as it was done, it booted onto that broken XP drive. I had to dismantle the computer, move the jumper to the 80Gb to designate it as the master, redo the BIOS to detect it in a new capacity and ignore the 6Gb. I figured the info was gone, so I had to move forward. I was very, very angry, but there was nothing I could do at that point. I knew I should have disconnected the drive first, but no, I just let it run.
Anyway, I got it hooked back up and found Midisoft Recording Session online. Yeah, someone actually had a copy of the installation program stored online. The Internet is awesome. You can find anything. I installed it, hooked up my sequencer using the old cable that came with Midisoft to begin with, and pressed play. Before my eyes, every note on every track was actively scribed into the program. With two clicks, I separated the completed sequence onto 7 separate tracks.
So in the end, I lost a bunch of ideas and script versions as well as the first version of these files I had created and a mysterious version of Cakewalk that I haven't found yet that has a picture of Van Gogh's Scream for a stop button, but I was able to start pulling all those sequences of 15 years worth of music off that sequencer into a usable file format. I have mixed feelings about what all happened, but I'm very happy with the end result. Now, I just need the time to do it.
Friday, July 10, 2009
Two Reasons I Find Facebook Annoying
I nearly called this post "Two Reasons I Hate Faebook," but as a point of fact, I don't hate the site. I think it's clever enough for social networking, but past social networking, its usefulness stops. There are some things you can't do on facebook, and the fact that you can't just annoys the crap out of me. The main one that I want to do and can't involves music.
When I uploaded the little gif to Facebook, I got me one static graphic. No movement at all. You can see here that it's an amusing little loading screen. The fun is lost if it doesn't move.
Now, I understand why they would not have this functionality. People would abuse it by uploading their favorite song, Facebook would get into copyright litigations, record companies would complain that their schtuff is being spread all over the internet even worse than before, yadda yadda yadda. Well, that places us poor schlubs who actually write music and legitimately own the rights to it in the hamper of paying the price for everyone else's irresponsibility. Strangely, Facebook allows videos, which means I just copy the song I want to post into the soundtrack of a series of titles, and boom, postable.
The second thing that bugs me only came up this morning. I don't know if this blog allows this, but I'm going to try. I wanted to post this graphic in honor of Friday:
When I uploaded the little gif to Facebook, I got me one static graphic. No movement at all. You can see here that it's an amusing little loading screen. The fun is lost if it doesn't move.No no loading graphic on Facebook. Apparently, photos means static photos only and no animated gifs. Again, I suspect this has to do with rights and the fact that most social networkers aren't programming graphics. Facebook probably also didn't want a slew of animated gifs mucking up their walls and such.
Oh well, there's the rant. I have one workaround and I just posted the graphic here. For fun, here's a second, similar graphic I found. That's all for now, though.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
How To Relay The Obvious
This was a hard one. You know, I use a lot of straight logic in what I do, and sometimes, people don't quite understand logic past their own function in life. Such is the case with this problem with a printer. Paper insurance forms come in two varieties at the moment: red and grey. The printing difference here is that the red forms print just text on pre-printed forms that are colored in red (or actually, pink) and the grey forms print the text and form in its entirety.
The way our program works is that you select red or grey, which in effect selects whether you want the lines or not. This individual was having a problem with the grey lines printing over a red form. Logically, there are only so many ways this can actually happen. Either they have selected the grey form option or its a problem outside of our control.
I watched them pull up a window showing just the text lines of the form with no grey outlines and they hit print. It printed with the grey lines on top of the red. Total weirdness, right? This means that the problem was outside of our program's control since once it passes the image of the claim into Adobe Acrobat Reader. It's actually the Adobe program that does the printing along with the local printer hardware and printer driver.
I was left with two answers here. Either they had some weird paper loaded that had this goofy outline on it already, or something in this ancient printer preprinted the grey lines of the form. Well, they got their IT guy over there and he determined that he had to switch out the printer since it was misbehaving. It is good when people listen.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Another Another Reason I Don't Understand People
Oh boy. You know, I wrote this whole thing yesterday evening about this random email. right? Well, some smart aleks tossed around the question of this email eating up our 100Mb limit of space that those who store their emails on the server have been crunched down to, and they figure if this email doesn't die, it'll eat that space up fairly quickly. It actually won't since it's all text, but the thought of a single reply all email killing the space max is amusing.
Anyway, after yet another comment from someone about not hitting "reply all" to the email, it wasn't 15 minutes before yet another genius popped a reply all to request to be removed from the email list.
I mean, seriously, do you people actually look at your email and think before you hit reply? I just had to laugh.
If anything comes out of this, I'll bet the original sender will think twice before sending an email to that list again...no, probably not.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Another Reason I Don't Understand People
Email. Nearly everyone in the world has or has access to an email address, and most of those people have been using it long enough to get a misdirected email or two. Not spam, mind you, but just an email that went the wrong direction. It's an innocent enough problem, and a misdirecte email is nothing to get bent out of shape over. Really.
Well, on Friday, I got a random email having to do with some kind of approval. I glanced at the addresses on it, and found that it was directed to a group email that I logically would belong to, and whoever replied to this email managed to reply to a huge list across the organization instead of whoever they needed to reply back to. This isn't the first time that this has happened, but what's weird is the chaos that comes out of these misdirections is always the same.
The first part is logical enough. Person sends reply to the entire organization (whoops), and someone from within the organization (often in that person's area, by the sound of it) replies stating that they needed to reply to whoever or that they shot the email off the wrong way or something. That should be the end of it...but it isn't.
Enter three days of replies like this: "I am receiving these emails in error. Please remove my name from the mailing list." And then a handful of following emails that say "me too." This set of emails gets followed up by someone stating the obvious: "The email was sent in error. Please disregard." Is that the end? Nope.
You see, people don't read their emails starting with the last reply. They either start at the beginning or somewhere in the middle. They also don't read the email string to the end before replying to it. Hence, after this email of "please stop replying," we get a renewed round of "Take me off the list" emails, because all these people see is a bunch of replies to an email string they don't want to be a part of.
So today, after an even longer string of "please remove my name" emails, another email was sent saying "everyone got this in error, just disregard it." Not a minute after that email, came another "remove me email." And they're still coming. There was only one single email about the issue and one more stating that it was misdirected. Every subsequent email has been about people asking to remove themselves, and if they would just stop replying, it would be over with.
Finally, enter the last email today where someone has repsonded yet again telling everyone to not reply all, and adding to the mix that people have been sending emails that they are frustrated with all the emails. That makes me laugh because these people are perpetuating the situation themselves by replying all to the email string. They are sending emails to get something done about the emails they're receiving, and those emails are saying stop the emails even though they would have stopped the emails themselves if they never replied to them to begin with. Pretty whacked, if you ask me.
I just don't understand where these people come from or why they were allowed to touch a computer. I mean, on the one hand, the level of tunnel vision is amusing, but really, they need to stop hitting "reply all."
Monday, June 8, 2009
Linux and Solaris
So I've been doing some research into different operating systems, since Windows seems to be generally annoying from an architectural standpoint, and I figured that since I was using a virtual machine anyway, I'd check out several OS's. It's been kinda fun while being a tad annoying at times. I've run across some that require an advanced computer degree to install, and others that are fairly easy.
One thing with non-Windows OS's is that where in Windows, the Graphical User Interface (GUI) is the primary access point for the operating system, in other OS's, the access point is a command line interface, and the GUI is run on top of the basic OS. Hence, when I installed a couple of Linux systems, they were using a desktop environment called Gnome. When I installed Solaris, an OS also based on Unix by Sun Microsystems, it also used Gnome for the desktop GUI. Hence, on both systems, I ended up looking at exactly the same screen and options...and neither one of them were interested in my blasted video card.
To digress to the video card problem, I have an NVIDIA GeForce 6200 which came packaged with my PC when I bought it, and while Windows seems to get along with it just fine, I've had nothing but trouble in getting Linux to acknowledge its existence. Solaris permitted me to change the screen resolution, at least, but Unbuntu locked me into a max resolution of 800 x 600, and while Debian has me at a large-enough-to-use resolution, I have scrollbars on the outside of my Virtual Machine that I have to get to if I want to see the bottom of the screen. It's annoying.
Anyway, I decided to see what people thought of Solaris versus Linux in terms of use, and the universal answer from those geeky enough to know both of them turned out to be "it depends on what you want to do with them." What does that mean for me? Not a whole lot, to be honest. So I went to my next source: the library. I searched in the extensive database of available reading material in the Tulsa City-County Library System to see what I could get on both Linux and Solaris.
My first victim was Linux which returned pages and pages of books on not only the OS itself, but the variations of it like Fedora, Red Hat, Ubuntu, and the many versions of each. That was cool, so I requested some books on the basic OS, and one on Ubuntu since it seems to be fairly popular. Time to see what I could find on Solaris. Typed it in.
Nothing. Not a single book in the entire library references this OS. As much of an internet hound as I can be sometimes, I still prefer a hard copy of material to read, since scrolling through pages while you're actually trying to do something on the machine is no fun. I also can't afford to be printing out all that material, even if I could find it online.
That pretty well clenched. Linux it would be since there's no info on Solaris. Linux has a greater community support structure online as well as being almost 100% open sourced, whcih means those with the know how can update and tweak it as needed. Solaris has an open sourced version, but it's still a proprietary OS owned by Sun, just like Windows is owned by Microsoft.
The last thing on the current OS run I learned this morning. Windows has a version of their next OS, currently referred to as Windows 7, online and licensed to try out for nothing until June of 2010. My Virtual box might just need another entry...
Friday, June 5, 2009
Laptops and Linux
So there are some toys out there that are fun when you first get into them, and there are some that remain fun no matter how long you have them. Two such toys are in my possession at this moment. One is a laptop that I have on loan from work for a trip that I will be taking across the country in a couple weeks so that I can keep in touch this time, unlike last year when I was almost completeely incommunicado. The other is a virtual machine running Linux. This laptop, of course, is running Windows XP, but where's the fun in that? No, I got myself a free, open-source virtual machine, and installed a free, low memory usage distro of DSL (damn small linux).
This means I am accomplishing the completely pointless venture of running one operating system on top of another operting system just to surf the internet. Why, oh why, would I do such a thing? In all honesty, there is no reason to do this except that it's fun for me. I could argue the point of near total security of my surfing practices, but I don't go anywhere that is terribly seedy. So there's nothing to hide. I suppose I could be keeping all my passwords and such a secret... I'm sure they're real interested in learning all that. But then, I already visited several sites on the base XP OS anyway, so I would only accomplish visiting said sites...again.
So in the end, the only reason to do it is because I think it's fun. I mean, I'm running Linux on Windows. I have a second machine mounted on the main machine, and it's a machine that, while it uses the memory and hard drive of its host, it's moderately independent of the host and it can be instantly zapped from existence if I screw it up and crash it...not that I will.
I've always been curious about how other OS's work anyway. I mean, I grew up on Microsoft. Really, you'll find a minority who didn't. Sure those Unix and Apple users are out there (and yeah, I spent my time on an Apple IIe as well as a TI99/4A), but for the most part, once we actually started in on the hard core computing, what did we have? MS-DOS and then when the 90's rolled around, we got ourselves the latest and greatest: Windows. But it turns out that while Bill Gates bought everyone's love, the other OS's quietly hung around, buildin their own fan bases.
Besides the Linux I'm running here (there are actually multple distros of Linux, DSL being the smallest of the bunch), there is still Unix, something call Solaris, the Macintosh OS, and apparently more that I've heard even less out of. Microsoft being the big dog on the block, it receives the most flack of them all and really, its size is its greatest weakness.
I cannot admit to being the biggest expert on the matter, but here's what I do know about it.
Microsoft tried to make Windows all things to all people. It has a huge distribution, big demands, and a lot of expectations. This means that the company has to make the OS to ceertain specifications. Not only those of the consumers, but also those of the people who have worked on it before, and the businesses who depend on it. They also have to use and refine what hasa come before so that all the programs and such that were based on the previous versions will still work. So if there wewre bugs in the previous versions due to any number of factors, those bugs have to be corrected and that code revised and updated to a current standard of memory, hardware, security, etc.
Once upon a time, there was an operating system called Unix. It was then and is still known to be incredibly stable. Windows doesn't use Unix. It was based on some other code that Bill Gates got off someone else. Unix remains stable and the amusing thing is that in my company, while Windows is used for nearly everything in the building, several of the servers that handle the important transactions run on Unix because of its stability. Funny, huh?
So Windows is something else. But what about the others. Here's what I do know. You may have heard that MacIntosh's OS is more stable than Windows. Guess what it's based on? Unix. That's right. OSX is a proprietary version of Unix made for Mac. What about Linux. Also based on Unix.
This would be why I'm curious about Linux. And this is why I'm playing with it. I've heard that Linux runs a bit slow on a VM in a Windows box, but ironically, Windows runs better in a VM on a Linux box.
I think I started babbling. Bottom line is that my battery is about to die and then the fun will really be over....
This means I am accomplishing the completely pointless venture of running one operating system on top of another operting system just to surf the internet. Why, oh why, would I do such a thing? In all honesty, there is no reason to do this except that it's fun for me. I could argue the point of near total security of my surfing practices, but I don't go anywhere that is terribly seedy. So there's nothing to hide. I suppose I could be keeping all my passwords and such a secret... I'm sure they're real interested in learning all that. But then, I already visited several sites on the base XP OS anyway, so I would only accomplish visiting said sites...again.
So in the end, the only reason to do it is because I think it's fun. I mean, I'm running Linux on Windows. I have a second machine mounted on the main machine, and it's a machine that, while it uses the memory and hard drive of its host, it's moderately independent of the host and it can be instantly zapped from existence if I screw it up and crash it...not that I will.
I've always been curious about how other OS's work anyway. I mean, I grew up on Microsoft. Really, you'll find a minority who didn't. Sure those Unix and Apple users are out there (and yeah, I spent my time on an Apple IIe as well as a TI99/4A), but for the most part, once we actually started in on the hard core computing, what did we have? MS-DOS and then when the 90's rolled around, we got ourselves the latest and greatest: Windows. But it turns out that while Bill Gates bought everyone's love, the other OS's quietly hung around, buildin their own fan bases.
Besides the Linux I'm running here (there are actually multple distros of Linux, DSL being the smallest of the bunch), there is still Unix, something call Solaris, the Macintosh OS, and apparently more that I've heard even less out of. Microsoft being the big dog on the block, it receives the most flack of them all and really, its size is its greatest weakness.
I cannot admit to being the biggest expert on the matter, but here's what I do know about it.
Microsoft tried to make Windows all things to all people. It has a huge distribution, big demands, and a lot of expectations. This means that the company has to make the OS to ceertain specifications. Not only those of the consumers, but also those of the people who have worked on it before, and the businesses who depend on it. They also have to use and refine what hasa come before so that all the programs and such that were based on the previous versions will still work. So if there wewre bugs in the previous versions due to any number of factors, those bugs have to be corrected and that code revised and updated to a current standard of memory, hardware, security, etc.
Once upon a time, there was an operating system called Unix. It was then and is still known to be incredibly stable. Windows doesn't use Unix. It was based on some other code that Bill Gates got off someone else. Unix remains stable and the amusing thing is that in my company, while Windows is used for nearly everything in the building, several of the servers that handle the important transactions run on Unix because of its stability. Funny, huh?
So Windows is something else. But what about the others. Here's what I do know. You may have heard that MacIntosh's OS is more stable than Windows. Guess what it's based on? Unix. That's right. OSX is a proprietary version of Unix made for Mac. What about Linux. Also based on Unix.
This would be why I'm curious about Linux. And this is why I'm playing with it. I've heard that Linux runs a bit slow on a VM in a Windows box, but ironically, Windows runs better in a VM on a Linux box.
I think I started babbling. Bottom line is that my battery is about to die and then the fun will really be over....
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