Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
1–10 of 36 posts
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#2One word of advice that is missing from this article: if you provide the solution, you own the outcome.
Say you updated uncle joe to the latest version of outlook. Great! Now he will call you when he doesn’t understand the new interface. Or you told your aunt to buy this model of laptop. Great! She will call you when it doesn’t boot up one day.
My advice is to tell people where they can go for proper support. You want to buy a new laptop? Talk to the guys at Best Buy or Apple. You want to upgrade outlook? Talk to Microsoft customer support. Your computer is slow? Take it to the local tech shop.
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#3For those who don't mind being a hero. And getting an extra slice of pie
https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/in-which-i-fix-my-girlfr...
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#4To be honest as a sysadmin sometimes I just say to my friends and family that I am just a lousy sysadmin... And if they are sure they want to leave their pc on my hands... It works!
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#5One word of advice that is missing from this article: if you provide the solution, you own the outcome. Say you updated uncle joe to the latest version of outlook. Great! Now he will call you when he doesn’t understand the new interface. Or you told your aunt to buy this model of laptop. Great! She will call you when it doesn’t boot up one day. My advice is to tell people where they can go for proper support. You wan…
I've often found myself as "Tier 2" support - someone who _thinks_ they know what they are doing comes in and make it objectively worse for everyone involved, so then I'm pulled in to fix the fix.
Unless it's broke, don't fix it, and if it is broke, make sure that whoever is going to use it cares for it to be fixed in the first place.
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#6For those who don't mind being a hero. And getting an extra slice of pie https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/in-which-i-fix-my-girlfr...
Yeah, i had that period in my life, then i got older and realized that peace and quite is golden...
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#7Put the least senior person exclusively on call for the week before the holiday and throughout. Berate them with vitriol until leaving for the week. Come back after the holiday and look for things they did wrong during the afk and berate them even more.
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#8One word of advice that is missing from this article: if you provide the solution, you own the outcome. Say you updated uncle joe to the latest version of outlook. Great! Now he will call you when he doesn’t understand the new interface. Or you told your aunt to buy this model of laptop. Great! She will call you when it doesn’t boot up one day. My advice is to tell people where they can go for proper support. You wan…
True enough, but on the other hand I am happy to keep my 88 year old grandmother's laptop going strong so she can talk to her friends in the online clubs she belongs too. I would feel bad sending her to some stores knowing they will possibly be taken advantage of. I guess just pick and choose wisely :)
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#9> Many of the common complaints, such as "my computer is slow," have known solutions: registry cleaners for Windows
Registry cleaners are rarely, if ever, the solution for a slow PC.
Re: Tips for being the family holiday sysadmin
#106) Upgrade their Windows 7 before it comes back to you once its EOL in January 2020