As an IT person: the technology field bleeping sucks

[lilfluff]

Currently being bitten by the computer industry's inability to actually pick or stick with standards. Especially annoying as I'm at a satellite location a three quarter hour drive from the office, so I can't just go back and spend fifteen minutes digging through drawers and then come back. At least not and come back today. Please, all I ask for is five, maybe ten minutes alone with a handful of industry CEOs and an illegally powerful electric cattle prod. Or to just get to send the whole senior management teams of most of the tech companies on a one way trip to Mars. Fluff can exile a dozen or so tech leaders, as a treat?

Comments

[siliconshaman]

Can I join in? I know some clever things you can do with bamboo slivers and finger nails. I'd love to make them type at old IBM keyboards afterwards...just so they know what RSI feels like.

[thewayne]

I've been in IT since the '80s. You can't imagine how often I've dreamt that.

My favorite regarding standards, or lack thereof, is jacks that all look the same, but aren't.

But my "someone should die for this" moment was back in the late '80s or thereabout. I was working in Phoenix for an Arizona state gov't agency and was in Yuma at a field office. It's a good 3 hour drive, or was at the time. I needed to install some stuff, it was a thing that converted Ethernet RJ-45 to an RJ-11 jack. There was some protocol conversion and other stuff going on within the devices. It was 'connect device to PC, plug RJ-11 cable from device into jack #x.' Pretty straight forward.

There were two jacks, about 2' apart, both labeled x.

I did not have toning equipment with me, nor did I know how to use it at that time (I was software, server admin, and PC hardware at the time). So screw it, day wasted, reported back that they'd need the phone company or network guys to come out and figure out what was what, then I could come out and install the stupid boxes.

I hated that drive, it was a really miserable one. And back at that time, no MP3 players or other good diversions to keep you awake.

[jecook]

I can understand this all too well, and I have sympathy.