Experiences with non-techies

[Quivz]

My mother keeps everything on the desktop. When i upgraded her machine yonks ago, i moved her from Windows ME to 7 with a new build. She made me put everything from the old desktop on the new desktop in a folder called "old desktop". Not long ago i upgraded her machine again. There is now a folder on the desktop called "old desktop" that contains a folder called "old desktop". I got curious recently. The highest tier had a last modified that matched the day i did the upgrade. The lower tier was around the time she moved to windows 7. She's never opened either folder again. I've nearly convinced her that she should move to windows 10 and expect to be making a new "old desktop" folder soon.

EDIT: I almost forgot that on the initial computer when she finally ran out of space for new icons she bought an external hard drive because she thought that meant the hard drive was full.

 

There was a time she thought the sound was broken and when i came round it was a driver issue. I dont remember the exact conversation but i do remember only realising days later that must have been why she left the room, came back and put her drivers license on the desk next to me. At the time i thought she must have been prepping to do something that required id when i had finished. I imagine she still thinks her drivers license fixed the sound issue.

 

She constantly complains about voices on the tv being too soft, but wont raise the volume because "no, its loud enough".

 

She's convinced her 2008 bravia had hdr and i must have broke it when i connected the wii for the first time. She's also convinced her 2016 LG had hdr (her model doesn't have hdr) until i plugged in the PS4.

 

My dad thought the whole internet was owned by bill gates and was stored in a big industrial structure called "Silicon Valley".

 

And the one that really gets me down, people who think they're tech savvy because they can (barely) use an iPad, but still think Wi-Fi and internet are the same thing... 

[Quivz]

Actually there was also a time back in 99 when i was alone in a school computer lab at lunch. I had just needed to print something and the IT teacher had been cool with it and left me to it. After printing i had the humorous idea to make a quick powerpoint slide that simply said "Virus" in big letters and then changed the font to one that flashed different colours. I started the slideshow and left the lab. The next day, that lab was closed and the IT guy was formatting all the computers in that room.

[Godlygamer23]

4 hours ago, Quivz said:

Actually there was also a time back in 99 when i was alone in a school computer lab at lunch. I had just needed to print something and the IT teacher had been cool with it and left me to it. After printing i had the humorous idea to make a quick powerpoint slide that simply said "Virus" in big letters and then changed the font to one that flashed different colours. I started the slideshow and left the lab. The next day, that lab was closed and the IT guy was formatting all the computers in that room.

Why wouldn't they validate the presence of actual malware first? 

[Drama Lama]

On 9/19/2020 at 1:44 AM, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

Or the elderly where they just need a phone to call people. They would probably be more familiar with how to use a feature phone instead of the fancy touchscreen interface of most smartphones. Remember, these are the people who would be the most resistant to change. 

Well in theory touchscreens are more intuitive to use but for often elderly people with no experience in tech the problem is the UI with all it’s options and features 

[Bitter]

6 hours ago, Godlygamer23 said:

Why wouldn't they validate the presence of actual malware first? 

My guess? IT guy would rather spend a day working alone in the computer lab than dealing with people around the school.

[Helpful Tech Witch]

On 9/23/2020 at 5:31 PM, Andreas Lilja said:

In 2020 it's more of a tool than a luxury.

 

Might as well have no bank account.

not a tool. a utility, like water or electricity. Almost every job requires you to have a way to ecces email and take phone calls when ever. 

[vinc3nz0]

be me

be in third grade

mom walks in

we have a family computer given to us by my dad's office

"Enzo you really need to stop playing these games, if i see you wasting more of your time like this, I'll have to uninstall them from the family computer"

fast forward a few weeks

I'm still playing videogames

mom walks in super angry and drag and drops all my game shortcuts on my desktop

then proceeds to empty recycle bin

mfw she thinks that's how you uninstall programs

mfw I had to tell her years down the line that that isn't how you uninstall software from your computer

[Quivz]

7 hours ago, Bitter said:

My guess? IT guy would rather spend a day working alone in the computer lab than dealing with people around the school.

Either this or he couldn't be bothered trying to explain to the IT teachers what was actually happening and just smiled and nodded. He seemed pretty competent to me. But a few of those who taught IT didn't. It took another semester, but they changed to a client image or virtual machine or something. Not sure what terminology i'm looking for here, because its something I've never done, but the computers took several extra minutes to boot and you couldn't do any permanent damage anymore. If you logged off and back on again you had a brand new clean desktop with all your applications and any changes you'd made in your previous session were gone. And if you were in year 12 (Australian school system, year 12 is your final year), you got an extra application... GTA, playable across the network. We were allowed to play it in our free periods.

[Bitter]

10 hours ago, Quivz said:

Either this or he couldn't be bothered trying to explain to the IT teachers what was actually happening and just smiled and nodded. He seemed pretty competent to me. But a few of those who taught IT didn't. It took another semester, but they changed to a client image or virtual machine or something. Not sure what terminology i'm looking for here, because its something I've never done, but the computers took several extra minutes to boot and you couldn't do any permanent damage anymore. If you logged off and back on again you had a brand new clean desktop with all your applications and any changes you'd made in your previous session were gone. And if you were in year 12 (Australian school system, year 12 is your final year), you got an extra application... GTA, playable across the network. We were allowed to play it in our free periods.

I'm familiar with that system but I'm blanking on it. It's similar to a thin client setup, some banks use it internally for security reasons. Probably same reason a school uses it.

 

Free period? We don't have those. You could drop a class and get a study hall period but you had to do school work not nap or goof off. NO FUN SHALL BE HAD BETWEEN START OR END OF DAY. No wonder we're all awful adults.

[Results45]

17 hours ago, Bitter said:

I'm familiar with that system but I'm blanking on it. It's similar to a thin client setup, some banks use it internally for security reasons. Probably same reason a school uses it.

 

Free period? We don't have those. You could drop a class and get a study hall period but you had to do school work not nap or goof off. NO FUN SHALL BE HAD BETWEEN START OR END OF DAY. No wonder we're all awful adults.

 

Is that why your forum pseudonym is "Bitter"? 

[pm128]

I know my school's admin password for PC's .

[Bitter]

3 hours ago, Results45 said:

 

Is that why your forum pseudonym is "Bitter"? 

Probably.

[soldier_ph]

So we use Office 365 Business at school (again) and I had to show one of my classmates, who started his apprenticeship normally back in August and not like me who only now had his first day at school today, how to download the Office programms and I also had to explain to him that you're supposed to turn off the Device after you've finished using it: His Surface Go 2 was really hot and it was really frozen and sluggish to the point of almost being unsuable. Once I opened Task Manager the case was clear: He has not turned off his Surface Tablet for 8 days straight. Also I had to remind him what his Email was and had to make sure that he changed the default Password to something more secure that only he knew. Oh and also they Nicknamed me the Hackerguy now because well I'm too smart for them

[FakeNSA]

1 hour ago, soldier_ph said:

So we use Office 365 Business at school (again) and I had to show one of my classmates, who started his apprenticeship normally back in August and not like me who only now had his first day at school today, how to download the Office programs and I also had to explain to him that you're supposed to turn off the Device after you've finished using it: His Surface Go 2 was really hot and it was really frozen and sluggish to the point of almost being unsuable. Once I opened Task Manager the case was clear: He has not turned off his Surface Tablet for 8 days straight. Also I had to remind him what his Email was and had to make sure that he changed the default Password to something more secure that only he knew. Oh and also they Nicknamed me the Hackerguy now because well I'm too smart for them

Congratulations: You are now the local IT guy.

[Donut417]

3 hours ago, soldier_ph said:

I also had to explain to him that you're supposed to turn off the Device after you've finished using it:

Shit. Ive had machines running for months and months. Generally most people dont turn their stuff off after they are done. 

[Godlygamer23]

10 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

Shit. Ive had machines running for months and months. Generally most people dont turn their stuff off after they are done. 

I never turn off my PC lol. 

[TechuntrTM]

Alright, I am a techie type, I can make anything work if given enough time. But my fiencee is definately one of those gamers that have no idea how the system they play on works. She is also subborn, I love her to death tho. Most of the time if she has an issue she will come to me, other times a game will be running slowly and she will just sit there frustrated and I come over and classic "no way to get it to work better or at all" no matter what I say cant change her mind, so I usually just do it anyway and get it to work, also she was on odd hardware at the time, and not all the games were officially supported, so most of the time it was my tinkering that had it working, so I always knew once in a while I'd have to re-do things to get it to keep working as updates came. She was running a Phentom II AMD processor with like 4 cores. Not a lot of power there, had a GTX 970 ti with it, and like whatever ram I could fit, prob around 28GB DDR3. Odd combo but worked alright for a long time, until she could get her next. But yea I have a lot of funny (to me) stories of issues shes had with that odd combo of hw.

[soldier_ph]

On 10/15/2020 at 2:22 AM, Schnoz said:

Me: *receiving computer to repair* ...and what operating system does it runn?

 

Other person: "Windows Vista"

 

Me:

-Image Snip-

Some people think that Operating systems are like Wine: The older they are the better they get. 

[FloRolf]

GF: My laptop doesn't turn on!

Me: ok

Me *pushes power button* - nothing

Me *holds power button* - nothing

Me: is it charged?

GF: Of course, it's fully charged!

Me *plugs into charger anyways*

Laptop *turns on*

Me: ....

[soldier_ph]

Got asked like 10 times today from my classmates if I can "hack" x thing. They still don't know the difference between programming (creating) vs. hacking (cracking) Software and think I'm some sort of master Wizard that could get into any System/Bank account/Social Media account. It's illegal and non of my business, though I'm still laughing my ass of at the kinds of Passwords people use to "secure" their accounts. I told one of them that there's huge data basis of Billions of leaked Password that you can just download and feed to a script and start trying out and stuff, he was surprised.

[WhitetailAni]

Not directly related but here's something fun.

In 7th grade during science class, I was fiddling around with a 9V battery and a light bulb.

Connected the wires to the lightbulb, held them to the battery.

My teacher comes over and says "Stop that! You'll get electrocuted!"

Me inside: "I've been doing things like this since 2nd grade. And have I been electrocuted?"

 

I haven't gotten anything funny yet (my family, yes even my grandparents, are pretty tech savvy), but probably will soon.

Once I can go to high school in person I will have some for you

 

Probably me opening device manager on a school computer will seem like magic to some people.

[azblurbit]

On 10/20/2020 at 3:04 PM, FloRolf said:

GF: My laptop doesn't turn on!

Me: ok

Me *pushes power button* - nothing

Me *holds power button* - nothing

Me: is it charged?

GF: Of course, it's fully charged!

Me *plugs into charger anyways*

Laptop *turns on*

Me: ....

I get this call at work at least 5 times a day.

 

Client: I can't print from my RDS!

Me: Have you disconnected and reconnected?

Client: Of course I've done that!

Me: *remotes into computer and does just that*

Client: Oh that test page came out! Idk what you always do but it always works great!

mfw

[azblurbit]

3 hours ago, ragnarok0273 said:

Not directly related but here's something fun.

In 7th grade during science class, I was fiddling around with a 9V battery and a light bulb.

Connected the wires to the lightbulb, held them to the battery.

My teacher comes over and says "Stop that! You'll get electrocuted!"

Me inside: "I've been doing things like this since 2nd grade. And have I been electrocuted?"

 

I haven't gotten anything funny yet (my family, yes even my grandparents, are pretty tech savvy), but probably will soon.

Once I can go to high school in person I will have some for you

 

Probably me opening device manager on a school computer will seem like magic to some people.

That's where it starts my dude! My dad got me into tech by teaching me how to solder when I was your age (I promise I'm not that old I can't believe I just typed that). Keep it up and keep learning and experimenting. A raspberry pi and a Linux distro can do wonders for learning.

[WhitetailAni]

Raspberry Pis are fun.

My Pi 2 B+ got me second place in my 6th grade science fair.

 

Windows 10 going weird every month isn't fun though.

[OnlyOneJame]

Just now, ragnarok0273 said:

Raspberry Pis are fun.

My Pi 2 B+ got me second place in my 6th grade science fair.

 

Windows 10 going weird every month isn't fun though.

What was the project you did for the science fair?