TechMonday, 21 August 2006 07:24 pm
Five kinds of tech support calls you don’t want to receive:
- You know the shift key? No no, the right one. Yes. The key on its left, that’s the backslash key. Yes. Ok so now type in “http”, colon, double backslash … Sorry? Where’s the double backslash key?
- The dollar sign? You know, US dollars? Yeah yeah the symbol. Yes type it in. Erm, press shift and “4″.
- Ok right-click on the icon. Right-click. You know how you are clicking normally with your index finger? That’s a left-click. You want to right-click with your erm … *whispers to me* … what’s that finger you right-click with? (Me: I dunno.) Ok you know the finger next to your pinkie? Press down on the mouse with it. Ok that’s a right-click.
- Open up a new browser window. What’s a browser? You know the screen showing Google? Yes yes the one showing the “Internet”. Open up a new window by clicking on “File – New Window”. Yes you are allowed to see more than one Internet.
- There should be an icon on your desktop that looks like a picture frame. Close all of your windows and look at your desktop. Tell me what do you see. Sorry, you see a pile of papers but no picture frame? Erm. Ok how about the other desktop? The one on your computer screen?
My colleague got all of that in *one* call. True story.
15 Responses to “Tech support call from hell”
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not surprising it’s the same person. IT Idiots are plenty, but this grade of IT Idiots are rare. (Idiots used in a technical term here.)
haha..very funny. Years ago, a collegue of mind inserted a floopy disc in computer A and then sit in front of computer B, shortly, instead of asking nicely, he decided blame it on others and said “oh! you guys change the computer settings all the time, everything looks different now on the computer, I just want to print a file from my disk, how do i do it?”. So i said to him, double click my computer on your desktop, to which I saw him looked at his desk quickly and then stopped and think for a while, then said “ok, where is your computer?”. Of course, we all had a good laugh quietly, especially when we found out that he inserted his floopy in a different computer. Wonder if we are describing the same person..haha
Now that is why I decided not to become a teacher!
Still, it would be fun when eventually you have achieved your goal! My mum is very like the above person, didn’t know about right clicking and double clicking a few months ago!!
My grandma is pretty good, comments on blogs, posts photo’s in flickr. My main annoyances are that she call’s flickr ‘Simone’s photo site’. Oh, and she calls a screensaver a ’screenshaver’. And she has occasionally added tags to my photos which make no sense at all!!
Ahhh, all good fun!
At one point of time, I was multitasking with two computers located side by side. I was so engrossed with shuffling between both computers, that I highlighted some paragraph and pressed Ctrl+C, then moved to the other one to press Ctrl+V! Then nothing happened. I paused for a while and slapped myself at the forehead. Hahaha! A true story too…
LOL. number 4 is my favourite!
this guy calls up dell, ask for warranty replacement for a “coffee cup holder” because his broke.
The staff ask : ” coffee cup holder ?? ”
Guy : ” Yeah, the one that pops out from the tower when you touch the button “
hahahahaha…it must be a real headache to get all these answers..
apparently, another thing is when someone did something and when asked, the person will said… NO NO, i didn’t do anything!!!
hope u know what am i toking abt! hehe
“Keyboard not found. Press any key to continue.”
rationalneurotic: I like how you say “grade”, like it was some sort of meat. Heh.
JJJ: classic. He must have been soooo embarassed.
Simone: wow! your grandma is way more advanced than some younger ppl that I come across. Bravo!
ian: heheh. the phantom “paste”.
larawannabe: and I’m not making it up!
herman: ah, an oldie but a goodie.
Leonard: yeah like when they know they’ve done something *really* wrong.
Loong: that’s semi-related – I can’t say I’ve seen that message pop up before tho.
“To start computer, press any key”
Homer Simpson – “Any key? Where’s the any key?” (looks for key)
Homer Simpson – “All this work is making me thirsty, i need a tab” (press tab key)
Homer Simpson – “No time to drink now, computer has started!”
One of my favourite Simpsons lines from the episode where Homer becomes obese to get out of work and has to use a computer from home. sounds like some people really ARE that dumb. I am pretty technically stupid myself, so it’s nice to know there are people out there who know a whole lot less than I do!
Houston, We got an ID-10-T problem. Please send extermination unit to resolve situation.
girlstar7: hehe that was a classic ep! loved it!
Lupin: well not that drastic lah.
All those are computer language. I use to be so jakun. Dunno what is the name for browser or desktop. All I know is… “that one la.” “lidat la”….
hey, when you’re teaching your sister to use Linux, it’s sort of the same thing. Then she complains why it is so different, and wants to go back to Windows.
Tabbing in the commandline, different displays, window managers, passing kernel options …
Now, she uses Linux all the time.
Using a computer is sort of like speaking a sublanguage … different mode of interaction.
john: well damn your example is a bit more hardcore. Mine was just about using Windows which is as simple as it can get besides a Mac of course.