didn't think i'd have to ever post for assistance but...

[110billion.livejournal.com]

I can browse fine, but in four browsers, make that five over two OSes, I can't browse to secure sites.

These being IE 6 (x2), Firefox 1.0.x (x2) and Mozilla 1.7.
The two OSes are WinXP Pro (SP2) and Win Server 2003, Enterprise Edition. (One machine)
I did browser maintenance on a couple, got sick of doing the remainder.

I'm actually getting bored, not being able to check these secure sites. Heh :\

I'm starting to think it's actually my connection, but I don't feel like bothering the grave guys (my connection is through the ISP I work for).

Anything else that you girls/guys could think of?
Oh yeah, disconnected and reconnected. Obviously rebooted, in order to swap OSes.

edit: problem solved. port forwarding on ports 1024-5000 i had disabled. re-enabled them, works like a charm.

(no subject)

[ex-deliveryboy.livejournal.com]

So on most of the email addresses we provide, we have server-side "spam
blocking" that can be customized via the customer web
interface.

Admittedly, it's basic and shitty. If the customer was already
receiving ass loads of spam prior to using the spam blocker, it's pretty much
worthless.



We get calls all the time (housewives mostly) about
the amount of spam they are receiving that is pornographic in
nature.


"why are we getting these? Nobody here would *EVER* go to
those sites!"





soooo... taking them into their Temp
Internet Files and showing them the cookies, pics, websites and such that have
been visited... Is that bad?



I have a 45 minute escalated call
where a husband and wife had me on speaker phone absolutely irate about the spam
they were receiving. I was mostly talking to the wife, but her husband kept
making snide little comments in the background about how I was wrong, how the
system sucks, etc etc.


When I finally had had enough, I took her into
the Temp files and showed her what was there. Absolute silence from the
husband.


Wife: "I don't know why these things are there, *cheating
housewives* *married and flirting* *Discreet fucking* etc. it's only the two of
us that live here"



Do the math lady.

(no subject)

[jacobine.livejournal.com]

As a note, in my job, I take calls for phone problems as well as computer problems. I can't fix the phone ones, but I send tickets out to our telephone people.

Even our phone people are not saved from stupidity....

Ticket opened with description: User is calling because the phone is dead. Ext 333

Ticket resolution: Power was out. They have power now and phone is working.

How do you make them shut up?

[katyism.livejournal.com]

Earlier, someone inquired as to what are the most effective questions you can ask your lusers to get the job done.

I'd like to ask a related question which will probably yield some entertaining answers:

What are your favorite tactics or things to say to get the luser to shut up and/or hang up?

Doesn't matter whether you've solved their problem and want them to go away, you can't solve the problem and need the user to do something before you can, or if they keep interrupting you so that you can't solve the problem, etc.

My top three (in the setting of a university tech support call center)
1.) "Run a virus scan. That'll take about an hour (on your POS machine). Call us back with the results, k?"
2.) "Actually I can just schedule an appointment for Dorm Tech to visit your room and fix the computer."
3.) I stop talking if a professor is being long-winded and complaining more than working with me to solve the problem. They'll go on talking for awhile until they realize I'm not saying "mmm-hmm..." anymore, then they'll get back on task with something like "Are you still there? I'm sorry, what was I supposed to click on?"

I know, I'm lucky I have those tactics at my disposal, that they work, and the supervisors encourage us to use them :)

Best type of questions?

[the-s-guy.livejournal.com]

What's the most helpful type of questions in your repertoire? The ones that cut through the most crap in the shortest time?

( For instance - )