News: 1585296908

That's the problem with all these systems trying to make life easier, they stop people thinking about the abstractions that would help them solve this themselves (although I appreciate the main problem is people not being able to solve their way out of a paper bag)

Stress can screw with problem solving skills, too, IME.

I've seen very smart, capable people flumoxed by minor problems when they've got imminent (or expired) deadlines and an arsehole manager.

That's exactly when people need things to Just Work. Mind racing ahead to deal with the problems they know they'll have, looming spectre of the PHB in the background, folks can just hit their limit on the most trivial problems, things that normally they'd blink twice and fix for themselves.

Which is great, because it keeps us employed. ;)

My example: A university professor who had a report that needed submitting "this week". 4PM on the Friday the computer wouldn't switch on. Cue panicked phone call; he was too stressed to even attempt talking through and insisted that I drive over there (15 minutes). I proceeded to flick the switch on the mains socket and turn the computer on.

Bless him, he acknowledged that it was just the stress/panic and he didn't hesitate to pay our call-out fee.

I had a real problem of that sort, with a deadline.

A Russian student, daughter of a bank director, who was a good customer of the company where I worked. Our company lent her a PC to write her dissertation on and, on the last day, when she had to print it and hand it in, the hard drive "failed"!

Queue panic, ringing daddy, who rang the CEO who stomped on the IT manager who sprang up and down... We ended up couriering the PC from Cambridge to Basingstoke, where I was let lose on it.

The hard drive still worked, but was corrupted. I managed to recover her dissertation, although it was well junked up. A few hours in WordPerfect going through it word-by-word and correcting the corruption, sorting out the formatting. Then printing and binding, before sending the finished work by courier back up to Cambridge, it got there an hour before the deadline!

Not quite the same but we had a French placement student who'd spent all day typing a Word document (when it was DOS based) without saving it. She then closed Word and ignored the warning message.

Fortunately in those days some judicious use of Norton tools enabled me to retrieve the temp file so it just needed tidying up.

I can go one better. 2014, a new Word user creates a document, types a couple of pages, saves, prints, removes all the text, types another couple of pages, saves, prints, removes all the text, types another couple of pages, saves, prints... Can't find the original "document".

I had to explain that, although she had religiously saved the document, removing all the text from the document and saving it with new text overwrote the old text... At least she had the printouts!

At least in 2014 there was reasonable OCR software to help in the reconstruction.

Yup but with certain fonts OCR can get 1L and I mixed up.

There's a set of checks I regularly receive that the ATM frequently can't read. The handwritten checks work just fine, but the computer-printed ones often either have the wrong amount, or are rejected outright.

OCR has come a LONG way, but still has a ways to go.

Checks?

Oh, I remember those!

No, actually, I don't. Never used one.

It's cheque. #EnglishIsTheLanguage /You'reWelcome /Sarc

Quite so.

+1

Have a beer --->

O.

Many years ago, when consulting and helping a company more formally structure and document their management system, I shared an office with the CEO's secretary (this in the days when the boss' secretary was gatekeeper to the CEO). One morning she was in a panic - she'd used the previous month's board minutes as a template for the latest one and saved without making a copy. Wordperfect automatically created a backup of the previous file version before the current save operation. However, it was a function you could tun off and save the drive space taken up by always having the previous version of every document - and she'd done that. I asked if she'd let me onto her PC to try something - Wordperfect programmers were smart enough to know that users don't always think their actions through and, despite turning off the automatic backup option, it still kept the file - but hidden and available to be overwritten by DOS. It took just a minute to find the hidden file, restore it to view and rename it. Disaster averted and, from then on, I had immediate access to the CEO whenever I needed it.

I've been managing technical teams for nearly 30 years and have lost count of the number of times a hughly skilled engineer has come to me panicking because they have ';irretrievably' broken something.#

My technical skills are out of the ark so these people know far more than I do about the technologies they manage.

First thing is always calm down, then describe the problem, and then work back through how we got there. In almost every case by the time they have had to go into the level of detail needed to help me understand the problem they have also worked out what the solution was, although in one case this did end up with myself and the IBM Sysprog having to re-catalogue all the VTOC's for our production database at 10 PM at night, we had it finished and triple checked by about 1 AM but were both in extra early the following morning to be sure it loaded OK

The best manager I had had some rules for a crisis.

1) Leave the technical people to it

2) Do not stand over them because that will make it worse

3) The manager would come in every half hour for a status update - bringing in tea/coffee biscuits. It gives the technical folk a break from the work face, and make sure they were working on the right problem by talking it through.

4) If the technical people want something - the manager organises it (pickup kids from school was one example)

5) The manager takes all of the calls from irate executives etc

I had just started out coding, when I was lucky enough to have been assigned to join up with the application development staff of an affiliate bank. Their managers were incredible as "buffer zones" and ensured that none of the flak, politics, and non-technical issues ever reached the coders. We always got the job done.

A decent manager holds back the pressure from above. And applies just enough to below.

A bad manager channels the pressure from above and adds it to the pressure below.

Whereas the worst manager stands over you going

"fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it is it fixed yet fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it if it aint fixed in 5 mins you're sacked fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it fix it oh why have I got a spamnner inserted sideways in my mouth and howdo I remove a robot gripper thats been anally inserted?"

Thank gawd for isolation and that I'm out of that madhouse for 2 weeks :D

You're a cardboard engineer!

Long ago and far away a fellow programmer had made himself a plywood engineer. Worked for him.

My Father taught me a similar technique when I announce I would follow in his footsteps and become an engineer.

'When it all goes wrong, and it will, get a sheet of A4 paper and explain to it in detail every step you have taken to get to the mess you now have. Before completing the sequence you will realise which step you missed out/messed up.'

He may even have asked questions during his ?training? - I can picture the kind of patronizing smart-arse who would fob him off with: ?Yeah, for your job, you only need to remember to click the 1...?

One of those dicks who thinks knowledge is a power that should be reserved only for them

"That's the problem with all these systems trying to make life easier,"

Upvote x 1000.

Recently opened files and default file locations are all well and good, but if your workflow deviates from the concept Microsoft had, then these become obstacles not aids. Many people find a work-round , but I've sympathy with that User believing that the software was there to help him.

BTW - having a two onedrive accounts, or is that one onedrive account and one sharepoint account. Confuses the Office applications and me both.

Before computers put versatile devices into user hands, most devices worked with fixed sequences of operations, and usually there were only one to perform a given task. Users got used to memorize them.

I've found it when I had to train elder people - every time I tried to show them the "abstraction" (say "what is a file and ways to open it") they asked for a "repeatable sequence" (as "in put a sheet into a typewriter and turn the knob") - and it was hard to make them understand any "repeatable sequence" could stop working (as in the article case) because the system was not so "closed" and things could change depending on previous actions and other factors. So I'm not surprised at all about the user behaviour.

Nice perspective. It's Friday (obviously since the article was On Call), so have this -->

"It's Friday (obviously since the article was On Call)"

Good to have these reminders. The days are all starting to look alike in these locked down times.

"They stop people thinking about the abstractions"

The problem may well have been more basic than that. If the user has only ever been told click "this, click this, go there, type that, click here and here" then there are no abstractions to think about.

"Muscle memory" also plays a part - it's all too easy to get confused or break things if something changes.

F'instance, I occasionally get mildly frustrated when tapping at the virtual keyboard on my mobile, for the simple reason that /sometimes/, the keyboard switches to "domain name" mode, in which it shortens the space bar to make room for a "www." button. Which rather handily puts the full-stop button just where my thumb normally hits the space bar.

Sadly, this behavior doesn't seem to be configurable, so I quite often find my browser search terms turning into "how.to do.something"...

Equally, I booked a hire car last year when tootling around Barcelona. So not only was I driving on the wrong side of the road, but I was also sitting on the wrong side of the car.

It's amazing how much muscle-memory plays a part in driving - I'd indicate to turn and then drop my left-hand to change gears, only to have to stop the movement and use my right hand to reach out to the gearstick.

It didn't take too long to adjust, and it helped I was driving around early on a Sunday morning, but there was certainly a bit of cognitive dissonance the first couple of times!

This still happens with me, we have a package that every dot release is treated by "recent files" as a new program, so after each update we get calls along the lines of "my map has gone".

We know now to ask first how they open them

I guess professional development wasn't a thing back then...

Since when as professional development (or even basic MS office training) even been a thing for low level office types?

Unfortunately, back then 'Professional development' meant something like 'we pay our programmers enough that they don't have to dumpster dive'....

About the same as what it means today, really...

Stress and panic may explain why the guy didn't find his spreadsheet, but that does not explain why he didn't try and learn from the situation.

When you find yourself in a bind and someone comes along to dig you out, you're supposed to gain experience and learn how not to get yourself in such a situation again.

I guess that, since apparently he didn't call back the next day, he at least learned to pay attention to the recent file list, but most probably he just went back to his habit of clicking on the first thing in the list. Oh well, maybe after a decade he finally learned how files work.

"...but that does not explain why he didn't try and learn from the situation...."

My cousin, a well educated school teacher, has convinced himself that computers are too complicated for him to understand. Much like the user in today's article, he knows what he needs to do to get his job done, send emails and surf the net, but can't/won't understand anything beyond that. The first time he lost loads of stuff on his home PC I recovered as much as I could and set him up with a backup disc and instructions for regular backups. The second time he lost loads of stuff I sat down and tried to explain the basics of a file system and backup to him. I couldn't get as far as the equivalence between a physical filing cabinet and the file system - he simply refused to accept that anything on the computer could be related to anything in the physical world; "they're just too complicated and I'll never understand them". So I gave up. Every Christmas, when we go to his place I just sort his laptop out and get him up to date with backups and updates. It's hard to understand cos apart from this he's a normal, very bright bloke.

If he refuses to learn about Backups, tell him he needs to have the backup disc up and running all the time and set the laptop to do a full backup every time he starts it up... Not a perfect solution* but it means there should be *something* there next time...

*hopefully it slows the laptop appreciably and he asks you to make it go faster. Then you can tell him if he runs the backup manually like you suggested, it might clear the memory storage dump out a bit quicker... I know there's no "memory storage dump", hopefully you know there's no "memory storage dump", but he is unlikely to - and once you're happy he's doing what you suggested, you can stop the backup-at-startup malarkey!

If he was literally only told to click on entry 2 there aren't many clues about files, recent lists or why that even worked!

THIS drives me mad.

I can understand if someone has a deadline to hit and simply, really doesn't have time, but the attitude from users that 'alright, you've fixed it, now why are you still here' is becoming more, not less prevalent.

... the performance of the Banks when things got a bit rough.

Mix 1 part moronity with 2 parts of greed and you get a tasty taxpayer-bailout cocktail.

I know several people (the wife included) who for whatever reason are either unable or unwilling to understand what they are doing on computers, smart phones, recording programs on the TV etc, so rely on doing it exactly the same way, parrot fashion, time after time. Some even have notes listing all the steps in order. This only works until something breaks that sequence, as in this article and they are left floundering. Maybe it is down to poor training, or poor aptitude for the task or just an unwillingness to learn and understand the underlying aspects of what they are doing.

I always try to explain to people what is happening behind the scenes of their button pushing / mouse clicking sequences but am sometimes met with bafflement, resistance or sometimes plain hostility - "I just want it to work, OK!" You just can't help some people.

Learning how to do it is one level; Understanding how to do it is a much deeper level.

It's part of a wider problem of people not wanting to bother with the what and how of the stuff they use. It's a kind of snobbery. Knowing stuff is beneath them.

"I haven't got time!"

"Just make it work!"

Either or both....

Or, failing to teach, so many companies ake on minions, show them how to carry out one operation and leave them to it.

Often it will be the fault ofa low level supervisor who is both lazy and doesn't want anyone to know enough to challenge their position. Overall, situations like this are failures on the part of proper management.

"Often it will be the fault ofa low level supervisor who is both lazy and doesn't want anyone to know enough to challenge their position."

Or doesn't know themselves. Repeat up the scale until you get to one senior enough to have a PA who actually knows stuff.

Nobody should be made to feel bad because of their ignorance. However, when people take their ignorance and put it on a pedestal as something to be proud of and refuse to learn, well then they should be ashamed.

In WW2, pigeons were taught to guide bombs by pecking one way or the other. They were taught this by rote. When people refuse to learn anything beyond doing it by rote, then they are reducing themselves to the level of pigeons. TBH, in some cases, the pigeons may be brighter.

Graduate (UK) Manchester - Marketing

Spreadsheet

Enters column of figures, about 80.

Gets calculator out to add up column of figures.

WTF!

How?

I might do that

.

.

.

as a verification of having entered all figures correctly, making the same mistake twice is unlikely.

I do some work occasionally, in my retirement, that is paid by a mixture of hours and sessions. The claim form was created on a spreadsheet, to be printed and filled out by hand.

No formulae. (Until I set them up for myself and gave it to anyone who wanted). It was just a matrix for a printed form. And this is in a secondary school! What a waste of time. And effort. For me, though, no effort. Counts the number of full sessions (tick in the cell), multiply that by the number of hours in the session, which is standard. Counts the extra hours. Adds them together.

I save and email to the manager.

There are people who spend time printing the form, writing in the sessions, multiplying by the length of session, adding...... etc etc.

I might have told this before, but WTH.

I was doing the non-IT (main) part of my job, visiting a school SENCO to give advice on one of their kids.

When I got to her office she made me wait outside, because- as she told me after- she was working on a confidential document and didn't want to lose it so had to finish and print it.

She then said that she was always losing work like that, because of getting called away to handle emergencies etc. in the middle of typing confidential documents so she had to turn the computer off in case anyone went into her office while she was awy from her desk, but this one had taken her so long to do that she couldn't risk it. (My visit wasn't an emergency, that's true). So of course I expressed some puzzlement.

It turned out she didn't know how to save files and had never asked anyone.

I took over a friend's entry level position in the late 80's. One of the things he'd done was create a Lotus 123 spreadsheet to track "buy cards".

The thing is, spreadsheets back then had a macro language that was somewhat primitive, and he'd never gone past the keystroke method.

Me, being an efficient typist, would often "type ahead" so that I wouldn't have to wait for things.

I did a "type ahead" one time in that spreadsheet, and the macro went NUTS and overwrote a whole BUNCH of data, including the MACRO ITSELF!

The first time that happened, my friend was still there to fix it. Unfortunately "auto save" was part of that macro, as I recall, so "fixing ti" could be rather "involved".

Needless to say after he left I accieentally killed it AGAIN, but having been so fragile I actually bothered to learn about protected cells, advanced spreadsheet formulas, and proper macro programming and fixed it properly. Then its need disappeared... so it was all just a waste of time after all!

(later I used that position as a stepping stone to an IT career, by producing a weekly report that used to take an entire WEEK, in about 3 hours, automatically starting 2 hours before I arrived monday AM, so I could monitor the printout in case it jammed - after 2 hours of copying and distributing it, I had an additional 37 hours to do "whatever" which became actual programming and data analysis - all good!).