Tech Thursday is here again, this time bringing up a question for you.

What podcasts do you like listening to?

I have a few podcasts that I listen to and definitely can recommend.

#1) Tech News Today

This podcast is a great podcast to get some quick tech news for the day, as well as get some laughs. The hosts are funny and enjoyable to listen to, and I just overall enjoy the show. Recommended.

#2) LifeChurch.tv

From the church behind the Bible app, found on ipods, iphones, ipads and android devices everywhere, comes this podcast. Basically a weekly sermon that has been great to listen to. Recommended as well.

#3) North Point Community Church

This one I just started, hearing a recommendation that I need to hear Andy Stanley speak. So far its been great and he’s an awesome communicator. Not everyone can talk for 40 minutes in a sermon and keep you entertained.

What podcasts are you listening to?

From the archives of Tech Support Thursdays:

I can’t give you the title to today’s Tech Support Thursday, without giving away most of the story.  So, here’s teh story, then you may be able to guess the title.

Me – “*ISP* Tech Support, my name is Isaiah, how may I help you?”

Caller – “My internet doesn’t seem to be working.”

Me – “Alright, let’s get started with some tests.  I’ll run a few on my side and while I’m doing that, can you please unplug the modem for 30 seconds, then plug it back in?”

Aside – I’m basically checking if her dsl modem is trained up to us, and mostly just asking her to powercycle the modem, as that fixes the issue 90% of the time.

Caller – “Sure.”

Me – “Alright, well, I see the modem came back up.  Please open up your browser and see if you can connect to the internet.”

Caller – “Ok.”

Me – [modem loses train with *ISP] “Huh, its not working is it?  It appears that the modem dropped its connection.  Can you unplug the power from the modem, and wait until I say to plug it back in?”

Caller – “Sure.”  (Strangely very compliant with what I have to say, unlike the usual caller.  I find out why a few minutes later).

Me – “Ok, the modem connected to us again.  Let’s just see what it does.”

Caller – “Ok.”

Me – [modem drops, again] “That’s weird, the modem disconnected again.  I think your modem may be having some problems.”

Caller – “Um, yeah, I think so.  Can I get it replaced?”

Me – “Let me see if you have the replacement plan, and how long you’ve had the modem.”

Caller – [as I'm searching] – “Um, will the modem work if it got wet?”

Me – “Um, it may… did you unplug it right away?”

Caller – “Yes.”

Me – “Did you let it dry out completely?”

Caller – “Yes.”

Me – “Ok, it may work, but it may not… but if it got wet, we might not be able to replace it for free.”

Caller – “Ok.  So, what if it was cat pee?”

Me – “I’m sorry, what did you say?”

Caller – “Ok, ok, my cat peed on my modem.”

Me – [holding back laughter] – “Your cat peed on your modem?”

Caller – “Yeah, I was just on the computer and the cat comes up to it, and pees all over it.”

Me – “Wow.”

Caller – “Yeah, so, you probably can’t replace it for free, can you?”

Me – “Uh, no.  I’m sorry, ut that’s crazy about your cat.  What happened?”

Caller – “I guess he thought I was spending too much time on the computer, and not with him.”

Me – “Well, I guess he’ll get his chance for a while, huh [laughing].”

Caller – [laughing as well] “Yeah.”

Me – “Alright, we’ll get another one ordered and out to you, and I’ll pass you on down to sales to get the billing information.”

Caller – “Thanks!”

This one is somewhat long, but I think you’ve figured out the title, by now.

“My Cat Peed on My Modem!”

Have a great day!

in Christ,

Isaiah

As I get back into the swing of posting, I pondered whether or not to keep Tech Support Thursdays. Re-reading this post made me realize I want to keep the streak going. So here’s one of my favorites again:

As I was trying to delve into the mine of my memories for today’s Tech Support Thursday, I couldn’t help but laugh.  You see, I had a co-worker who always seemed to get the customers who were hearing impaired.  Well, you’ll see.  Here’s a recreation of a memory, inserting my estimation of what the caller said, as I have no idea.

Co-worker: “*ISP Name* Tech Support, my name is *Co-worker*, how may I help you?”

Caller: “What’d you say, I can’t hear you?”

Co-worker: “My name is *Co-worker*, how may I help you?”

Caller: “Your name is what?”

Co-worker: “My name is *Co-worker*

Caller: “I can’t hear you.”

Co-worker: [yelling, hence the capitals] “HOW MAY I HELP YOU?”

Caller: “Oh, I can hear you a little better.  I’m not able to connect to the internet”

Co-worker: “OK, is your computer running windows?”

Caller: “What?”

Co-worker: “IS YOUR COMPUTER RUNNING WINDOWS?”

Caller: “What?  My computer won’t connect, my window is fine.”

Co-worker: “NO, IS YOUR COMPUTER RUNNING WINDOWS?”

Caller: “Oh… well, I think so.”

Co-worker: “OK.  Do you see a start button in the bottom left-hand corner?”

Caller: “What?  I can’t hear you.”

Co-worker: “DO YOU SEE THE START BUTTON IN THE BOTTOM LEFT-HAND CORNER?”

Caller: “There’s a big blue button on my screen.”

Co-worker: “NO, THE START BUTTON, IT SAYS START ON IT, ON YOUR SCREEN!”

Caller: “I don’t, I don’t understand.”

Co-worker: “THE START BUTTON!”

[at this point I'm having to mute the call I'm on whenever I'm not talking because my caller is asking, "What's that noise in the background?  Is someone yelling?"]

Caller: “Where is it?”

Co-worker: “THE START BUTTON IS IN THE BOTTOM-LEFT HAND CORNER.”

Caller: “I don’t see it.”

Co-worker: “You know what…”

Caller: “What?  I can’t hear you.”

Co-worker: “IF YOU CAN’T FIND THE START BUTTON, I’M NOT SURE HOW TO HELP YOU!”

Caller: “Well, I’m not sure what you said, but I have to go.  I’ll call back in later.”

Co-worker: “Ok, thank you for… THANK YOU FOR CALLING *ISP NAME* TECH SUPPORT. HAVE A GREAT DAY.”

[to everyone in the office] – “That lady was deaf!” [laughs]

Me: “We know, we all heard!” [laughing]

Good times, good times.

Happy Tech Support Thursday!

Today, we’re going to talk about password strength… which all began with this comic from xkcd, posted by my friend Ben on his Google+:

password strength from xkcd.com

So, I wanted to ask you about how strong your password is. To be honest, I’ve never thought about passwords the way that xkcd shows up here. Most of the jobs that I’ve worked at have required a password with a symbol, a number and at least 8 characters.

I wonder how much time I could have saved by just putting in something like this.

How strong is your password?

Check it here.

This is a rather random post… enjoy!

You may or may not remember the last Tech Support Thursday.

It was rather exciting, and not in a good way. To break it down for you, I spilled coffee on my work laptop.

As of Tuesday, August 16th, the poor laptop is now running again, thanks to a completely new top case.

Which basically means that I just cost the school ~$100, with a 5 cent styrofoam cup and some cheap coffee. What can I say, at least I’m efficient!

Now my laptop has to wear a keyboard protector, one of those silicone covers that lays over the keys to prevent dirt/liquid from entering the laptop. Our IT director first gave me a pink one. He thought it was hilarious.

Thankfully, he must’ve ordered a bundle, as I now have a red keyboard cover on my laptop.

Come to think of it, I’m looking at a red wall too. No wonder I’ve been so hungry – red is supposed to increase appetite – but another study says it is supposed to increase the heart rate and sometimes cause more stress.

It all makes sense now.

What tech stories have happened to you lately?

Don’t let me touch your computer this week…

It’s been a bad week for me and technology.

First on Sunday, my personal Macbook’s hard drive decided to start the slow process of dying. I noticed some slowdown, ran a test and found numerous problems. Needless to say I started backing up much more often than usual.

Then Monday morning, during a training time, my clumsy hands directed half of a styrofoam cup of coffee onto my running work laptop. Ahhh, FREAK OUT!

Luckily, I knew what to do, so grabbing the laptop with both hands while simultaneously pressing the power button I poured out the rest of the coffee, on to the floor… and my pants. I was then able to remove the entire back cover of the laptop and laid it out, hoping it would dry well.

Tuesday morning came. A cloud of fear hung over me as I put the laptop back together.

Will it work? Will it somewhat work? Is it fried? Why am I so clumsy? Is there any coffee made?

Bong!

Yes, it turns on! It’s running fine!

No, wait… I can’t enter anything on the keyboard.

[Keyboard - Volume Up! Volume Up! Volume Up! Tab, Tab, Tab, Tab]

Sigh.

I then plugged in an external keyboard and found that it worked just fine with the external keyboard. Phew.

The keyboard not working is a problem though, so at this point we’ve order a special screwdriver to take the laptop apart, clean it and put it back together again. The good news is that, at most, the entire top case would cost $150. That’s much better than $900 for a brand new one.

Lesson learned – Styrofoam cups + Coffee + Keyboard + Clumsiness = Disaster.

Oh, and I was able to install a new hard drive in my home laptop, so its working fine.

So, I’ll leave this Tech Support Thursday with a couple questions:

Have you ever spilled anything on a laptop?

Did you, aaaaaaah, FREAK OUT!?! 

Today is Tech Support Thursday… and I’m going to tell you a secret.

Well, probably not truly a secret in the “I’ll have to kill you after telling you this way.” It probably isn’t even a secret at all. I think maybe I shouldn’t have used the word “secret” because I’ve gotten you all excited now.

Get to the point, Isaiah!

Fine, fine. The real secret for Tech Support is this: Google is your friend.

I know, it sounds lame, right. Let me give you an example:

Random Friend: Hey, I’m getting an error on my computer. Do you know what that means?

Me: Hmm, let me see [Google error while they're not looking] – Oh, what do you know, you just have this one setting wrong. Here, I’ll fix it.

Random Friend: You’re a genius, how do you know so much?

Me: Well, you know… I just do.

Yes, yes, I figured out the problem, but really, it’s only because I know how to use Google.

In all seriousness, during my time in Tech Support we were trained on any number of errors and problems that could come up in a conversation. Outlook Express is the bane of my existence, enough said. There were times, however, that we had no idea what this error meant. I remember looking up an error and Microsoft’s definition for it was: “A problem has occurred.” Duh, that’s why they call it an error.

That’s when I’d turn to Google, and after a minute or so, we’d find a quick solution. Once I found it, I’d add it to the database of errors we kept and how to fix it.

So, there you have it. When in doubt, Google it!

p.s. I may or may not send you to the “Let me Google that for you” page if you ask me a tech issue now. I’ve already told you the secret .