head meets desk again and again...

[slayne-souls.livejournal.com]

I know its basically bitching but I am trying to help my friend succeed in IT because granted hes got some of the knowledge and certifications but I am continuing to find his stubborn attitude annoying when I try to explain things to him.

#1. first and foremost I am trying to teach him how to use his resources and recommending websites to try for information and handy tools and software I have recommended AVAST Anti-virus instead of continuing using outdated Norton 2004. he argued it saying "it cant be that good if they offer a free edition." then trying to introduce him to firefox instead of IE again he responds with,"not trustworthy if its free". I try to help learn how to optimize Vista by guiding him to http://www.blackviper.com/WinVista/winvista.htm and he says "no need for that, I don't wanna damage my PC".

#2. even if you have anti-virus software, yes you still need Anti-spy. his argument is "it doesn't cripple my PC, so its not really necessary...besides I dont wanna pay 40 bucks for something I dont need." . ummm... free.

How can you be IT if you don't use resources argh.

::head desk::

Comments

[gilmoure.livejournal.com]

Ah, a 'box' thinker. Saw a lot of that type in the military. No way around them and no real way to change their opinions.

[forge.livejournal.com]

thankfully when I was in I was able to talk to the base level IT folk in to allowing firefox

[brotherflounder]

My old IT bosses were all ex-military, and they were quite open on IT itself. On other things, however...

[gilmoure.livejournal.com]

I was an aircraft mechanic. There were the by-the-book types, who would follow the repair manuals, even if it wouldn't fix the problem or would actually make things worse. They were also the types who would bitch and moan if they had to stay on longer than shift to fix something. Then there were others, who would come in on their time off and work at making their plane the best one in the wing. KC-135A 64-8088 had the most on time take offs for two years. We liked our plane.

[ptstech.livejournal.com]

I worked with electronic sensors, and I saw both types. Your friend sounds like quite the lost cause though. Keep us posted please...

[manuka.livejournal.com]

*waves* - Sensors here too! 2A151 at Eglin, 93-96.

[ptstech.livejournal.com]

2A171, a whole bunch of places, 85-94.

[manuka.livejournal.com]

Neat. We sensors folks seem to be pretty rare out here in the wild :)

I worked mainly on LANTIRN and sporadically on Pave Tack just before we retired the 'varks. We also tested the new 8mm cockpit camera recorders (boy, did those ever suck!)

[ptstech.livejournal.com]

I worked cameras, IR mapping, and chaff/flare for the RF-4C, then cameras on the F-16, and finally Pave Penny on the A-10. Good times (well, most of it anyway)...

[manuka.livejournal.com]

Loved the work, hated the job :)

[manuka.livejournal.com]

Isn't it funny how the camera system that was found in the F-16 cockpit can essentially be replicated now with a $30 bullet camera off of eBay ? :)

[superbus.livejournal.com]

I'm an ex Navy Nuke. If ANYONE knows how stupid some of those obtuse protocols are... trust me, I feel your pain. :(

[manuka.livejournal.com]

I hear ya... I spent a lot of time rethinking maintenance processes and submitting changes to the TOs because they were either inefficient or flat out WRONG. I made a lot of bonus money that way.

One of the joys of being in an AFMC test wing was that we were not only allowed to think out the box, it was strongly encouraged.

One of my lasting legacies there was that my final parting gift was a working power supply test station for LANTIRN. It had not been completely functional since before I arrived, and spent much of the time while I was there not functioning at all, and it was sitting awaiting parts when I left. 2 weeks later, the part finally arrived, and the station was finally operational. The manuals had long since ceased to be effective at troubleshooting it. We had to send our power supplies back to the

[manuka.livejournal.com]

Gah, stupid misfire....

We had to send all our power supplies back to depot for repair, which meant 6-9 month turnaround time. Luckily, we kept a few spares around. Not generally approved when it's a $750,000 part, but given the circumstances (dead test equipment worth 10x that), they cut us a little slack.

[slayne-souls.livejournal.com]

sadly yes a box thinker, but what do you expect hes an MCSA

[immer-nachoha.livejournal.com]

I smell management in that man's future!

[slayne-souls.livejournal.com]

in mine, thank you....or is that sarcasm to his, if it is I guess I was here guessing wrong, LOL.

[immer-nachoha.livejournal.com]

In alot of companies you rise to your own level of incompetence, in those company's he will go far.

[asbrand.livejournal.com]

Arrogance and Ignorance, all in the same package. How efficient.



-Az

[slayne-souls.livejournal.com]

lol, I was trying to explain that to him that he cant be arrogant about it.

[manuka.livejournal.com]

He's never going to make it in IT, then. One of the first things we ask in interviews is what online resources you like to use.

Sounds like this guy lacks the creative thinking ability that's essential to the field. He doesn't just think inside the box, he doesn't go anywhere near the edges.

[slayne-souls.livejournal.com]

pretty much.

[jecook]

+1. At my place of work he'd get chewed up right quick.

We have resources. Not only do we have the Intarwebnet, we also have vendors (many of whom we have a 24/7 support contract with!), and we have roughly 10 GB of internally written documentation/configuration examples/step by step procedures for just about all of the stuff we support. (Yes, GB. We *like* documentation!)

But there are still people who refuse to use it, and it pisses me off to no end, because I end up getting our own techs who are like "can you help me do x?" while I'm in the middle of trying to do y,z, and q at the same time.

Hell, I blew 4 frelling HOURS yesterday getting something to work that technically should not have been possible (coercing a DOS boot disk to use a thumb drive to image one of our point of sale machines because some asshat broke the USB CD-ROM drive's cable). This required a lot of research into making it all work, but the end result will be another internally developed tool for the department to use in a pinch.

[webmiss-k.livejournal.com]

Please stop encouraging him to succeed in IT. I do not want to have to worry about the possibility of working with this guy, ever.

[inahandbasket]

ditto.

[slayne-souls.livejournal.com]

agreed at this point.

[gilmoure.livejournal.com]

**off topic**

Hey, you have an icon of the only bumper sticker I've ever put on my cars. I like to park next to the Evolution is Science Fraud guy at work.

[kuangning]

He does realise Microsoft offers IE for free, yes?

[http://users.livejournal.com/hub_/]

but it comes with windows !

[kuangning]

yeah. IOW, it's so bad they can't get anyone to take it, even *free*, unless they get them used to it with bundling.

[slayne-souls.livejournal.com]

damn Microshaft forcing my computer to clunk thats why im learning linux now

[http://users.livejournal.com/hub_/]

much like windows :-)

[kuangning]

Enh. I can co-exist with Windows until such time as all the apps I need for work and recreation are available -- without a headache -- under some other OS. As it is, though, none of those apps come bundled with Windows; I've found alternatives for everything except the OS itself. I keep trying Linux and I keep coming back, too; it's so close! -- but it's just not there yet. When it is, I'll gladly jump ship too.

[geekgrrl-ca.livejournal.com]

I've not only jumped ship on the OS (I now use OSX), I jumped ship on the OS I support (I only support peripherals on OSX now). Life's so much easier...

[featheredfrog.livejournal.com]

It's clear he doesn't respect stuff he isn't actually paying for. The problem is you're trying to help him FOR FREE.

Charge him: he'll listen then.

[superbus.livejournal.com]

Tell him you got the Advanced version of Firefox Enterprise, and you'll sell it to him for $20. Then he'll use it.

[liber-cogito.livejournal.com]

Please encourage him to learn to say "Would you like fries with that?" instead of going into IT.

[geekgrrl-ca.livejournal.com]

Get him to buy a web tv... he's not cut out for using a PC