Words: they has a meaning

[guinevere33.livejournal.com]

Two morning conversations have really made me wonder about the reading comprehension skills of research scientists. The first one involved our friend from the dog photo incident:

CW: How do I copy my files from the gel computer onto my floppy?
Me: The same way you do for anything else - open the drive in "My Computer", then drag and drop the folder onto it.
CW: Er...
Me: *knowing this person has rocks for brains re: computers* Do you already have the floppy disk in the drive?
CW: Well, um, it's not a normal floppy.
Me: ...
CW: It's one of those, like, 100 MB ones?
Me: *lightbulb* Ah, you're using the zip disk drive. It should still work the same way.
CW: But which drive to I drag the files to?
Me: I don't know the drive letter off the top of my head - let me go check on it with you. *walks to room across the hall*

The drive letter she was looking for was B:. It said so right on the front of the computer. On in inch-high pink sticker, mere millimeters from the slot she'd had to physically insert the disk into. It was also written on the instruction sheet taped to the wall at eye level. /cries

Three minutes later, Joe walks in:

Joe: So, I know there used to be an external zip drive we could hook up to the lab PCs. What happened to it?
Me: Did you check the "Peripherals" drawer in the computer lab?
Joe: Huh, no. Where's that?
Me: It's the drawer. labeled. "Peripherals".

And god help me, now the color printer isn't working (again). It's gonna be one of those days.


ETA: It gets better! Turns out these two requests were related - coworker #1 copied the files onto a zip disk, then asked coworker #2 to go hunting for an external drive so the computer she wanted the files on could read it. For those of you keeping score at home, the original PC has a CD burner. And can read USB keys. And has a wireless internet connection. And a floppy drive if you're desperate. But rather than use any of these, she picked the one option incompatible with the machine she wanted to transfer the files to.

(And the zip drives? Totally not my fault. We have CD burners in all the machines and shared lab USB keys. My users are just neanderthals who refuse to learn to use anything new.)

(no subject)

[tpajaz.livejournal.com]

Due to lack of funding for UPSs - last night was not fun.

Power Cut 1:

Ok *sigh*, reboot half the network. Right.. nearly an hour later, done.. phew!

10 seconds later...

Power Cut 2:

AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHTOSSINGBUGGERYGODDAMMNIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just WT?

[255-255-255-0.livejournal.com]

An Email I got this morning:

Good morning X

 

Just wondering if you have had a chance to format my motherboard, this replacement is horribly slow.

 

Many thanks

X

Another one of them ..................

[255-255-255-0.livejournal.com]

User just go a new computer

User: Can you come see me for a moment
me:   you have a new computer try password XYZ
User: It's not that can you come see me?
me: walks the 20-30 steps to  desk
User: it's different
me: yes it's a new computer,
User: But ....... it  LOOKS  different
me: I copied all your shortcuts from the old computer to your new desktop, they are ALL there; what do you mean by different ? the text size,  the icons, the resolution?
A.   User: No,  my email, (meaning icon for outlook) used to be there, (pointing to top left of screen)
B.   me: Oh we'll just drag it there then, (showing her)
C.   User: and my internet used to here, (pointing somewhere else)

***repeat A-C several times using various icons, get the idea ****

me: there are you OK now?
User:Yes, thanks

Shhhh no sound !

[255-255-255-0.livejournal.com]

Jeez three in one day !      Sooooo glad it's Friday

Intro: Yesterday I got a spyware alert from the A-Virus server. I plodded over to the suspect person/PC un-installed the myriad of crap he'd installed and unchecked a couple of things in MSCONFIG .

** Fast Forward to today **

User: my sound doesn't work since YOU <slight pause> played with my computer yesterday.
me: Are the speakers turned on?
User: YES    (Sounding annoyed)
Me: plodded back over to User had a quick look at the screen and pressed the mute key on his keyboard   (TA-DAaa   the sound works).
User: Oh <Long Pause>  Those speakers are rubbish can I have some new ones?

ARGH.

[wxgeek.livejournal.com]

Customer: "I want to check my e-mail. For the login screen, what do I put in the field that says e-mail?"