Dear Users… (A thread for Sysadmin, Technical Support, and Help Desk people) Part 10

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TragicMonkey said:
My theory is that the people who fuss the most about such things are the ones who do the least amount of actual work. There's a lady on my team who (in the olden days when we were still in the office) spent at least 80% of her working hours fussing about her benefits, her online learning courses, her chair, her cubicle, her supplies, her computer...everything except the actual tasks she was being paid to do. She occupied herself with the accoutrements of work, rather than the actual work.
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Yeah I've got users like that. Them just setting down at their desk and logging in in the morning is this whole goddamn Japanese Tea Ceremony.

The giggling coyish "Oh it's my OCD, tee hee hee" thing is something I could never hear again and die happy.
 
JoeMorgue said:
Yeah I've got users like that. Them just setting down at their desk and logging in in the morning is this whole goddamn Japanese Tea Ceremony.

The giggling coyish "Oh it's my OCD, tee hee hee" thing is something I could never hear again and die happy.
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Unplug their keyboard. They won't notice and can't work for days. Don't rush to fix it. Everyone else will get stuff done.
 
Again people "LOL just screw with your users, it's so much fun" isn't an option for me.
 
JoeMorgue said:
*Groans, head into wall*

More desk moves. 8 of them. And at least 4 of them are users being moved back to their original desk.

Okay seriously someone reading this thread has got to have been a manager/supervisor at some point in an office setting. Please help me understand the constant need to arbitrarily move people.
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My theory. It costs nothing and gives the appearance of action.
 
Ideal Software Developers: "I understand my software build tool, which is why when I run it in an automated environment, I make sure it's set up to use that environment properly, same as I do when I'm developing locally and configuring everything by hand."

My Software Developers: "tHiS Is tOo cOmPlIcAtEd"
 
theprestige said:
Ideal Software Developers: "I understand my software build tool, which is why when I run it in an automated environment, I make sure it's set up to use that environment properly, same as I do when I'm developing locally and configuring everything by hand."

My Software Developers: "tHiS Is tOo cOmPlIcAtEd"
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At <Major Bank> I had to deal with both. I wrote and helped support a couple of systems and the big one was a, call it a service layer, that application programmers called instead of learning all the underlying stuff. We never heard much from the ISDs apart from clear questions. Other teams.....
We had a guy join us from one of the former teams and he was a real asset and a good guy. One time me and him were having a few beers after work and he vented a bit about my team's attitude to developers.
I may have mentioned this common interaction:
Us "Have you tried running this by your chief programmer?"
Them "I *am* the chief programmer."
Anyway he thought we had a very negative view of application teams. Then a few weeks later he answered my phone while I was getting a coffee. The guy, a chief programmer with 13 (10+3) years experience with that language in that environment asked to speak to me. Dave said I was away and could he help. The guy said "Well I got this email from him about how my problems were because I had a 'static' instead of a 'dynamic ' link to your programs and I don't know what that means."
Basically it means instead of calling our programs he'd told the build to copy our program into his so he would never pick up new versions.
Dave said "Oh that just means that you....".
The guy interrupts "No, no, no. I don't want to know what it means. Just tell me how to implement it."
Dave "Put the program name in quotes in <build thing>."
"Ok thanks."
Poor Dave was in shock for weeks. In that OS/language/build environment it's schoolboy stuff yet this guy has 13 years of accumulated ignorance. In that and another role I realised it was cultural, guys like Dave were all in teams with leads like Dave. Guys like Mr 13 were all in teams like him and produced guys like him. Many teams looked on RTFM the way the Papacy looked on Martin Luther.
 
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I remain unable to understand why people still don't get the idea that the more they behave like dicks to us, the less inclined we are to help them.
 
arthwollipot said:
I remain unable to understand why people still don't get the idea that the more they behave like dicks to us, the less inclined we are to help them.
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When I have a stack of work of equal priority I do it in the order most convenient to me. If anyone pesters me with what I feel is undue attitude I move their request to the bottom of the stack. I consider this to be operating as an agent of localized karma.
 
TragicMonkey said:
When I have a stack of work of equal priority I do it in the order most convenient to me. If anyone pesters me with what I feel is undue attitude I move their request to the bottom of the stack. I consider this to be operating as an agent of localized karma.
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There are people who are pleasant to work for and their work always seems to float to the top of the to-do list.

One in particular, I know is an odious man who I would not even want to have lunch with, but he is very pleasant via e-mail and makes it seem like I’m not even working when we have to really hash things out.

I was trying to think of a counter example, but we fired them all over the pandemic. I hope the new people work out.
 
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