Experiences with non-techies

[Headshot_]

When I was in the first to third grade (Our school ran windows 2000 at this time iirc.) most people in my class were CLUELESS when it came to computers. They didn't even know how to turn on a pc let alone save files on it (MS Word). 

I'm in the 10th grade and some kids still struggle with scratch and qbasic.

Eventually the teacher made me responsible for teaching people how to perform basic tasks on a computer.

(I've had a love for computers since I was 3 so I guess that gave me an edge. However my grades in Comp Sc. keep fluctuating back and forth between As and Bs and I suck at math so I doubt I'd be able to get a degree in it )

[Ruostunut kokis]

When I was in elementary school I literally knew more about PCs than my teachers. They forced everybody to use caps lock only for writing capital letters, even if it was the first letter of a sentence, you had to use caps lock and not Shift for any reason.

I used Shift, what a rebel I was. They told me I shouldn't do it that way (no clue why), so I wrote entire sentence in capital using Shift lol.

I dunno if anyone else does this (probably yes), but... I never use caps lock on purpose. Even if I write everything in all capital letters (AKA "all-caps"), I use left shift, never right shift nor caps lock. I have gotten so used to it, and find caps lock be more of a bother than a help, I wish caps lock could be rebound to some other command or disabled.

[soup]

Actually one of them is 50 some years old and still doing his job well.

 

 

Jings , as old as that, he will be drawing his pension soon.

  BTW I am 53 and do not feel at all "past it" or even approaching that state.

[WkdPaul]

I dunno if anyone else does this (probably yes), but... I never use caps lock on purpose. Even if I write everything in all capital letters (AKA "all-caps"), I use left shift, never right shift nor caps lock. I have gotten so used to it, and find caps lock be more of a bother than a help, I wish caps lock could be rebound to some other command or disabled.

I'm surprised how little people know that you can actually remap ANY key you want ... had fun way back in school! lol

 

reg edit for just caps lock;

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/disable-caps-lock-key-in-windows-vista/

 

or you can use a GUI app;

http://lifehacker.com/5883003/the-best-key-remapper-for-windows

[daniellearmouth]

Has everyone seen these stories? 'Tales of IT':

Part 1: http://imgur.com/gallery/iJD8f

Part 2: http://imgur.com/gallery/AOz0d - Thanks @matjojo for part 2.

This thing is just......the best.

[matjojo]

I'm surprised how little people know that you can actually remap ANY key you want ... had fun way back in school! lol

 

reg edit for just caps lock;

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/disable-caps-lock-key-in-windows-vista/

 

or you can use a GUI app;

http://lifehacker.com/5883003/the-best-key-remapper-for-windows

 

sadly everyone in my school needs to have a laptop of their own, but if not. I would fuck over ervery single person in the world by mapping the keyboard exactly like a AZERTY keyboard. but leaving the windows setting on QWERTY.

[WkdPaul]

sadly everyone in my school needs to have a laptop of their own, but if not. I would fuck over ervery single person in the world by mapping the keyboard exactly like a AZERTY keyboard. but leaving the windows setting on QWERTY.

That's pretty much what we were doing back then, it's sad when you realize you're better than your school IT! lol

 

We would also log into new student's account (usernames were student's names and for new accounts the password was all the same; "Welcome") and then fill their startup folder with bookmarks ... that was hilarious to see so many IE popup on the screen to the point of crashing PCs!

 

EDIT : fixed typos ..

[flibberdipper]

The students at my school are a nightmare, trust me. If you want to see what a bunch of disrespectful, immature, gangster-wannabie troublemakers look like when you put them all in one space, then come to my school. Guaranteed to have at least one day in the school year where there are 5+ fights in one day and there has to be a strong police presence on campus, but there's usually a few fights a month.

Jesus mother of Galdfhasddfhsfkajsfdhaskljfhsdf

 

I'll take the peppy wanna-be pricks at my school any day. I feel bad for your brain cells that you lost being around those people.

[Shabtai1024]

When I was in the first to third grade (Our school ran windows 2000 at this time iirc.) most people in my class were CLUELESS when it came to computers. They didn't even know how to turn on a pc let alone save files on it (MS Word). 

I'm in the 10th grade and some kids still struggle with scratch and qbasic.

Eventually the teacher made me responsible for teaching people how to perform basic tasks on a computer.

(I've had a love for computers since I was 3 so I guess that gave me an edge. However my grades in Comp Sc. keep fluctuating back and forth between As and Bs and I suck at math so I doubt I'd be able to get a degree in it )

Dude, If you love it go for it.  Math is not nearly as important to programming as logic and creativity.  A program may involve math but that will be mostly incidental.  Programming is more like a game where you have to communicate to a very literal minded individual (the computer) a specific task you want it to perform while being limited to a very small collection of words.  If you can figure out the most efficient use of those words, how many times each one is used and in what arrangement, you win the game.

 

BTW, my best friend is making 6 figures now overseeing his own team of programmers and he still sucks at doing basic arithmetic in his head.  Board games w/him are always interesting and often involve opening up a calculator for verification.

[Shabtai1024]

I dunno if anyone else does this (probably yes), but... I never use caps lock on purpose. Even if I write everything in all capital letters (AKA "all-caps"), I use left shift, never right shift nor caps lock. I have gotten so used to it, and find caps lock be more of a bother than a help, I wish caps lock could be rebound to some other command or disabled.

You could always remove the keycap.

[Sauron]

In their defence, if you have physical access to the machine, it's game over - doesn't matter what OS (if any) is installed.  At that point, you can mess with it all you want, booting other OSes, changing BIOS settings, or even swapping components if we want to get extreme here  You can really only start talking about "security" if ( A ) you are talking about the OS & configuration of a server you are accessing remotely, and/or ( B ) the strength of the lock on the server room door

 

That said, the school definitely could have tried a little harder to make it not that easy!

 

Note: I'm assuming the hard drive's not encrypted or something, but again - doesn't matter what OS you use at that point

 

There's something to be said about encryption though, even with physical access to the hard drive an encrypted file system can prevent a thief from stealing your data.

 

Besides accessing a computer in recovery mode and tearing it apart in public make a different impression you can't just pull out a screw driver and steal a hard drive from an imac without anyone noticing...

[Sam Harradine]

This thing is just......the best.

ARE THERE MORE?!

[flibberdipper]

Logic of people in my school: If your Chromebook doesn't navigate to the intended page immediately, bash the keyboard.

 

This is what I get to deal with.

 

Some of the people here are so retarded.

[DarkBlade2117]

that's pretty much what we were doing back them, it's sad when you realize you're better than your school IT! lol

 

we would also log into new student's account (usernames were student's names and for new accounts the password was all the same; "Welcome") and then fill their startup folder with bookmarks ... that was hilarious to see so many IE popup on the screen to the point of crashing PCs!

My middleschool IT teacher ( No IDEA how he affords this stuff ) Runs a i7-4770k and 780Ti's in SLI all in a custom loop lol. I think he uses a Fractal Design S and I forgot most of what he had after that. A ton of storage and RAM and some EVGA PSU. I think it was the GS or P2 though don't remember.

[Starelementpoke]

So today we were joking to someone about them not knowing anything about tech. And so they used the argument that we don't know anything about football, but we were trying to say that football doesn't matter, you use technology every single day of your life yet you don't know anything about it. Anyway, later on in the conversation I bring up a picture of a motherboard and I mention a processor, and this is the golden bit, he goes "I just don't get it, like; how does a processor know all of the internet?".

One could argue that you can earn over 10 million $ from football just by being good at it.

[Alir]

The police presence in my school is actually calming. They seem like good people. Actually one of them is 50 some years old and still doing his job well. Anyways, we actually had a car set on fire a few weeks ago. Official story is electrical fire, but everyone knows it was arson.

 

That's actually nice to know. I like hearing about good cops. With the insane number of stories of cops black mailing, bribing, raping, killing people. And even shooting dogs because they "got scared". Mailmen seem to do their job fine delivering letters, while getting barked at. So far, I'm pretty sure no mail man has felt the need to pull out a pistol and shoot a dog.

 

Anyways. Rant over.

I just hope more cops in schools are like that. Especially towards minorities.

[Alir]

My friend's macbook wasn't booting after a failed update so I took it apart to re-seat the RAM. As it turns out he has never had the thing cleaned in 4 years...

 

The motherboard was fuzzy with caked on dust

 

To be fair, not many people dust computers.

 

They don't think it's even something that they need to do. They don't even think CPUs need to be cooled or something. They just don't know about any of this stuff.

 

They probably think even unscrewing the side panel will irrevocably (YEAH! I SPELT THAT RIGHT!) damage the computer. *Ahem* I actually used to think that about my old desktop; hadn't cleaned it in the some 5 or so years I had it. Built a computer. Then it occurred to me that my old PC was probably loud and slow because of overheating. Opened the side panel. It looked like there was a cat on my heatsink.

 

BOLD: I realised I didn't finish the sentence lol

Edited January 15, 2016 by Alir

[Alir]

When I was in elementary school I literally knew more about PCs than my teachers. They forced everybody to use caps lock only for writing capital letters, even if it was the first letter of a sentence, you had to use caps lock and not Shift for any reason.

I used Shift, what a rebel I was. They told me I shouldn't do it that way (no clue why), so I wrote entire sentence in capital using Shift lol.

 

 

STOP SHOUTING IN MY HEAD. DAMMIT DUMB TEACHERS

[Alir]

I dunno if anyone else does this (probably yes), but... I never use caps lock on purpose. Even if I write everything in all capital letters (AKA "all-caps"), I use left shift, never right shift nor caps lock. I have gotten so used to it, and find caps lock be more of a bother than a help, I wish caps lock could be rebound to some other command or disabled.

 

That's actually a good idea. Double tapping shift could be an alternative for Caps Lock. I've always wondered how keyboard layouts could be improved (note I use UK keyboards). I have always hated Alt Gr. It doesn't even do anything. Just sits there mocking you like an ass.

[Alir]

I'm surprised how little people know that you can actually remap ANY key you want ... had fun way back in school! lol

 

reg edit for just caps lock;

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/disable-caps-lock-key-in-windows-vista/

 

or you can use a GUI app;

http://lifehacker.com/5883003/the-best-key-remapper-for-windows

 

YOU ARE AMAZING!

Problem is though it still will say Caps Lock. I like my keys doing what they say. lol

[Alir]

sadly everyone in my school needs to have a laptop of their own, but if not. I would fuck over ervery single person in the world by mapping the keyboard exactly like a AZERTY keyboard. but leaving the windows setting on QWERTY.

 

That's the most satanic thing I can imagine.

[Alir]

My middleschool IT teacher ( No IDEA how he affords this stuff ) Runs a i7-4770k and 780Ti's in SLI all in a custom loop lol. I think he uses a Fractal Design S and I forgot most of what he had after that. A ton of storage and RAM and some EVGA PSU. I think it was the GS or P2 though don't remember.

 

Is his name Walter White? If so I may know how.

[Alir]

wow I posted a few too many posts.

 

Is it possible to delete some? If not, just leave 'em all there.

[NtB]

Windows 10?

You got jokes lol

[Principis]

That's actually a good idea. Double tapping shift could be an alternative for Caps Lock. I've always wondered how keyboard layouts could be improved (note I use UK keyboards). I have always hated Alt Gr. It doesn't even do anything. Just sits there mocking you like an ass.

I need to use Alt Gr. everyday (Azerty keyboard )