Overheard in My Livingroom #1

Me: Yea, I'm having a little trouble with my connection.  It appears that my router isn't pulling an IP address.
Comcast: Could you please try rebooting your cable modem?
Me: I've rebooted the modem and router twice.
Comcast: Could you please try rebooting your computer?
Me: Which one?
Comcast: silence

Ever notice how the problem always goes away within 10 minutes of calling in, even though they swear its nothing on their end?

Overheard at the Office #5

Well, you know what they say.
What do they say?
Something ridiculous, I forget what.
Who says that?
Larry the Cable Guy.
You take life advise from Larry the Cable Guy?

Overheard at the Office #4

A colleague was installing Axys3 on a clients machine.  This is (or was, we're down to our last financial client, and they don't use it. So I'm not sure anymore) a fairly standard application with our financial clients.  The installer would proceed through, but then throw an error right at the end.  He tried a couple times, same results, then asked me to help.  I told him that he should start by disabling UAC on the machine, because this was a common source of grief with this application.  He turned to me and asked what is UAC?

What is UAC?  I've just watched you acknowledge a UAC dialog box 3 times since you called me over. Do you even look at what you're saying yes to?

Overheard in the Classroom #1

I can't remember what the piece of software was that I was giving the guy a copy of, but this is true recap of how the conversation went.  Keep in mind that this guy was a senior in the IA program.  The program was given to him in a .rar archive.

Him: So how do I install this?
Me: Unpack the archive and run setup.exe
Him: How do I do that? Windows can't open the file.
Me: Download 7zip
Him: Winzip7?
Me: No, 7zip.
Him: Winzip7?

Lets just skip over how long this back and forth went on.

Finally he opens up a browser and Googles Winzip7.  Interestingly enough, 7zip was one of the first couple hits.  I pointed to it and screamed "That one!"  At this point, class started so I don't know how much more pain and suffering was involved in the installation of the program.  But after class, he said he got it installed.

Overheard at the Office #3

Me: ...so we'll probably get them a /29 from Comcast, that's pretty standard.
Him: So here's what confuses me.  What is the slash?  That's some kind of grouping, right?
Me: You've been in IT how long now?  You can't subnet?

Overheard at the Office #2

Did you just warn a client about the dangers of an application that we install on their workstations?

-Me, to an obviously confused junior technician

D-Link Emulators

Have you ever been on the phone trying to walk someone through the setup of their router or trying to troubleshoot their connection?  Wouldn't it be nice if there were somewhere you could go online and see what the GUI that they were seeing looked like?  Well, if that someone is using a D-Link product, then maybe you're in luck.  D-Link has web based emulators for a number of their products online in their support section.  I had a link to a menu of all available emulators, but it doesn't work now and I can't find a new link, but Google has your back. Too bad more manufacturers don't do this.