Sunday, December 28, 2014

Overheard at the Office #7

A client called in and explained that the phone system was down. They had an Asterisk based PBX box on site. We attempted to access it remotely, but it was not responding at all. A coworker was getting his stuff together to head out and take a look at it. Suddenly, the client called back in.

Client: You can cancel the trip out, we're good.
Coworker: What do you mean you're good?
Client: It's working again. I fixed it.
Coworker: What did you do?
Client: I kicked it really hard and it booted right up after that.
Coworker: You literally kicked the server?

The client didn't have any trouble with that box again after that, though they did eventually replace it with a Cisco UC500 solution 6 months later.

Friday, December 12, 2014

My Number One Requested Feature

On all of these printer/scanner/fax combo units, there is a web page to manage the settings. In it, among other things, you can set it up to scan and send to an email address. They give you somewhere to enter all of the settings to send it along to an smtp server of your choosing, but there is never a test button.

I work for an MSP, and 99% of the time, I am doing work like this remotely. It's unreasonable to drive out every time a client gets a new printer if they didn't buy it through us, so I'm just going to remote into a machine there and go at it.. But this requires me to call in, and have someone on the phone with me hitting send.  It often times takes a few tries to get all the settings right, requiring you to keep telling them to try again over and over again.  So my number one feature request is a test button which will allow me to test the settings (by myself) from the configuration web page.  Is that too much to ask?

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Overheard at the Office #6

Mgmt: Do you know how to make an activity?
Minion: Yes
Mgmt: So make a drive wiping activity.....
Minion: How do you make a drive wiping activity?
Mgmt: You just said you know how to make an activity.....
Minion: Yes
Mgmt: Seriously?