josquint asks:
"Does the Computer Service/Repair field need to be regulated? This is a question I asked myself after spending a day off from my position as Lead Technician at a local computer shop, in an auto repair shop and a hair salon. In both places, I noted that all the employees had their trade credentials displayed for all customers to see. They are not only displayed as a matter of pride or to gain customer trust (as my A+ and Network Security certificate is) but as a matter of law. This regulation, to me, makes sense. If you're going to pay good money to have your automobile repaired, it better be by someone trained and proficient at doing it (otherwise I might as well do it myself!). Also, there is a matter of safety --an error in repairing a car can easily result in injury or death of quite a few people, so some accountability is needed.
The salon regulation, to me at first, seemed like the usual overkill large government regulation. However, it too is a matter of safety to the clients, as the chemicals and equipment (tanning beds especially) can also do harm if used incorrectly. Would you view regulation or mandatory certification as a good thing in the computer repair/installation/maintenance world? What kind of regulation would you like to see, if any? How and at what level would it be implemented and enforced?"
"I personally would like something that requires certain basic certifications for the techs themselves, and possibly something to do with retail shop areas (use of static mats, data backup procedures, etc). And enforced at the State level similar to most small business type codes.
I wouldn't have a problem following some such type of regulation, and probably wouldn't need to do much if anything to make code. I do a fair share of cleaning up after fly-by-night companies/consultants/johnny's-14-year-old nephew-that-really-knows-computers. It costs a lot of the local businesses serious money to replace lost data and sub-standard equipment. I just completed a total system replacement at a clinic that had the system replaced about 2 months ago. It cost them over $10,000 for a system the should have been close to $3,500, but they had to replace the first replacement due to a consultant that had no experience or knowledge in that type of system trying to put one in.
While regulation wouldn't solve everything, I think it might cut down on the riff-raff and wannabes in an industry that many businesses can't do without as they can't do without electricity."
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If you can't fix my $100 sink without a license, why should you be able to fix my $3000 computer?
Computer certification would be GREAT! We've all seen that there's no dishonest mechanics.
riding round the world on an old motorcycle
Simply because a location has gov't approval you'll assume they're qualified.. which is really harmful to the consumer. (because guess what, they're not!) We should rely on a shop's reputation built up over many years of good service to decide.
An automobile mechanic is certified and licensed because there are safety issues that can be fatal when a mechanic performs their duties improperly.
Similarly, a hair stylist has sanitation concerns that must be met to provide a germ-free and safe environment.
A computer technician normally troubleshoots and diagnoses systems that do not have concerns of this type.
Granted, there are occasions when a system is critical to the functioning of a system of this type, such as elevators, but most of those functions are licensed anyway, so the technology must be certified, rather than the technician.
All opinions presented here aren't mine.
Personally I'm against any kind of legal controls on business unless there is a huge case that those controls are necessary (not nice to have).
The things I see in the cases above are people who make bad choices and ignore the simplest of common sense when hiring someone to do any kind of work.
This would just add costs to those who want to do the work- which would get passed on to the customer and drive out the little guy who doesn't have the time or money to get a 'license' to fix computers.
Not to mention the possible legal hassles for helping someone out.
Nope.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
I'm gonna ramble a bit here...
Should we have a congolmerate authority?
Or perhaps a list of accepted certs?
Or one cert to rule them all...?
Will there be a hierarchy or certs (my cert is better than your cert.)
In the end you may open up a can o' worms. But some regulation is needed, yes. How about a union? (but I don't want to pay dues, cuz that sux, so perhaps that's out as well.) I'd also like to see a unified pricing code as well.
If the gov't is going to require certification, all you need is your A+ and Network Security certs. You know how "advanced" the A+ is with all of it's DOS and Windows 3.1 questions.
Anyone who passes these tests is definately qualified to repair my computer running my favorite flavor of *BSD or Linux!
I dont think the actual maintainance needs regulation as much as customer service in general - for all industries.
Frys for example has horrendous levels of bad/returned equipment (because the purchase and resell refurbs and returns and bad equipment side-by-side at the same prices as real brand new equipment) and they tend to have very very poor customer service.
I would rather have a level of customer service that should be expected from any and all customers - maybe even regulating the return/exchange policies....
If all companies were required to have their customer service entities live of to an expected level of performance/satisfaction it would do wonders for trust and consumer satisfaction in general.
I cannot tell you how angry it makes me when I deal with difficult, deceptive or rude customer service agents.
Think about it: Do you really want an MCSE fixing your computer? Licensing mandates a certain minimum competency, but in practice it means that all people fixing computers operate at that minimum competency. And you know that the big players like CompUSA are going to get involved in the licensing process in a way that makes their employees get the certification easier than independents.
Even if it means I have to be an informed consumer, I'd much rather have choice and make my own decisions. With choice there will be reasons for the good people to stay in the field.
In your car, it is critical that your car be fixed properly. If it is not, it may explode and kill you and your family.
As you mentioned for the salon also, there are safety implications. Chemicals used wrong could hurt you. Tanning beds could have severe consequences.
Now, your computer won't explode and kill you're family. You're keyboard won't start glowing and irradiate you and give you cancer, like a tanning bed can easily.
A mechanic must do his job right or else you may die. If I screw up your computer, you may lose information. You may not be able to forward chain letters. You may not be able to talk to Aunt Millie on AIM.
But you won't *DIE*. That's a massive difference that should be recognized.
to gain customer trust (as my A+ and Network Security certificate is)
"Certifications" like A+ are the reason our industry is plagued by morons.
An auto mechanic cert has to be half-way decent, since lives depend on it. But as long as you can buy a computer cert from an infomercial on TV, they're worthless.
I think that instead of making people display such accredidation it should be optional. BUT, there should also be some central form/way of distinguishing an accredited IT person from another. If you do this and make it known to those who will make use of their services then it is in the IT persons best interest to get and display their accredidation.
I think this should apply to software engineers as well as system maintenance people.
The biggest problem being that there is little centralization and validation of such accrediation, at least for software.
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
I don't think regulating mechanics, hairdressers, or computer repairmen does much to help the public. If a "professional" doesn't know what he's doing, he's not going to be in business very long. If he makes a mistake that injures you phyiscally or financially, you can sue him.
These sort of regulations are sold to the public as "protection." In fact, they're put in place by politicians in the pockets of established businesses to remove the lower rungs from the ladder of success for others. They make it cost that much more to get in business and compete with them.
Try this some time. You've got a car, and you know how to drive. There are people without cars, who need to get places. Put a sign on your car that says "Taxi," drive around, and offer to take people to where they need to go for a reasonable price. Be safe, courteous, and take good care of your car. See how long it takes before the cops shut you down. There are some cities where the fees to get a taxi cab medallion are in the tens of thousands of dollars. Hairdresses may wind up spending $5000 on completely unnecessary certifications. Protecting the public? A little, maybe...protecting bigger, already established businesses from cheap competition? Oh, yeah...
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
There no ordinary dust bunnies in computers! They have a mean streak a mile wide and big, nasty, pointy teeth!! *Puts fingers to lips* ... Look at the bones!
~~ Behold the flying cow with a rail gun! ~~
They ALSO need 10 stars on eBay and excellent Karma on /. !
It's Christmas everyday with BitTorrent.
Hey Jeff, could you come over and take a look at my computer?
Sorry man, I could get in real trouble if I work on your computer. I don't have a license...
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
I totally agree.
I can't help but snicker everytime I see some punk bragging about A+ (or even MSCE).
It's more of a trap so dumb people end up spending money on a certificate that they beleive will land them more jobs.
Even more annoying is management usually falls for it.
Regardless of saftey matters, some sort of licensing might be a good idea, if only to prevent people being charged outrageous prices by people who are incompetent and cause more damage than they fix
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
How can we tell how well a computer science person is?
:))
Just because I do OpenGL for a living, does that make me A+ certified? Or because I cannot do Linux Admin to save my life, am I not qualified?
Computer knowledge requires too many differnt areas of knowledge, since, by nature, they are a general purpose machine. The things that need certifications, do already, (MSIE, SUN security, Java, C++). I don't think there can be a law that requires me to be certified in computers, because ultimitly it would be a certification in many general subject that most I will never use in my Job or any job in the future I may have...(or forgotten by the time I get my new job
~~~
Click here, you know you wanna!
"Your computer doesn't support Palladium, sir, you must 'upgrade' or we'll have to notify the government."
FATAL ERROR - THIS UNIT WAS OPENED/MODIFIED BY NON-CERTIFIED PERSONNEL
"Oh, back in them days we just handed your server off to an available teenage nerd and charged $50/Hr for repairs. Now that all our technicians are board certified it'll be $250/Hr for repairs, but you can rest easier at night."
UNSIGNED DRIVER INSTALLED - U.S. Department of Homeland Security has been notified, please turn yourself in to reduce expense of taxpayer dollars in tracking you down and hitting you repeatedly with a bat, you filthy terrorist!
It's a brave new world...
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
And the license that you need to run a business is all about money that the local government wants.
So count me out on the added taxes hassles and overall mess.
PS: I could I get a little off the top, trim it so the hair is off the ears and trim up the back. ;)
"Certifications are a waste, since only the unskilled seem to go after them. Look at MCSE MCSA and A+"
When I worked for DEC they had a rule, "A+ or your ass is gone." To keep a job, certs come in real handy. To get a (new) job, certs come in real handy, too. Some employers (prospective or otherwise) may not care about how long you've done something, or if you've been in the field forever, but if you have the cred to "prove it."
I don't feel the need to pay some govt organization for the right to call myself qualified if I am already qualified. This is just as bad as the "Microsoft Tax" of getting an MCSE or something similar. If someone makes mistakes on the job, then they answer for it like usual. Certification doesn't change that, and accidents will happen anyway.
:)
With the way the computer industry operates, this will just become yet ANOTHER tax. You will have to pay every so often for a piece of paper that says you are good-to-go. You are being taxed to work in this industry. Don't fall for it. It's hard enough to have to keep up with new technology, do you want to have to pay even more than you already do to keep up?
Besides, I'm unemployed and broke. I can't afford it right now
-- Having a Creationist Museum is like having an Atheist place of worship
I've had many bad haircuts.
I've met lots of people who are MCSE's who are clueless.
All the certifications mean is that someone has demonstrated to someone else that they can regurgitate material that has been laid out for them. It doesn't mean they can apply the knowledge to real world situations.
I go to organizations that have a good reputation, I've had good experience with, or my friends/peers have had good experience with. If I have a bad experience with them, I move elsewhere.
I like the system. It works. Sometimes I get burned, but for the most part I'm happy because I use common sense.
Idiot, n. A member of a large and powerful tribe whose influence in human affairs has always been dominant
As a consumer I should be looking for people who have certification or experience in the fields they represent to ensure that I have the best that my money can buy.
However, mandating by law that you need it before you can do it is just a restraint of trade obstacle put up by people who want to limit the competition they have. Look at the legal field, for example. A lot of legal work can easily be done by experienced non-lawyers, but not legally.
The same is true of the medical profession. I'm not interested in non-PhD medical attention, but I don't think that means that some people shouldn't have that option, especially if someone with lesser credentials can treat minor health problems for a lot less money.
Instead of mandating certification, I'd be more in favor of a "malpractice" solution. If you claim you can do X and are in the business of doing X and you screw up, then you owe me double damages or something that would provide a strong disincentive for dishonesty or incompetance.
Then we have some people with no formal training who know there stuff and work hard and produce great work.
Similarly, we have folks who have "certifications" that are absolutely meaningless.
Same with our hardware people -- our 17-year-old interns know more about this stuff than the MCSEs.
All this does is make it harder for an independent artisan to make a living -- I don't want Intel's stamp of approval. The only approval I need is a legion of satisfied customers who tell their friends and colleagues and word spreads and reputation builds -- like in the old days before you could "buy" a certification.
While you're studying for A+ or MCSE, there's some 14-year-old with a soldering iron, learning the hard way how to fix a faulty IDE control, and a 12-year-old decompiling the NT kernel to figure out why his graphics card causes a BSoD. And in ten or fifteen years old, your certification will be obsolete, and if you're lucky, you'll be working for the now-29-year-old VP of engineering.
My 20+ years worth of non-licensed troubleshooting is far better than any certification, in my opinion. I routinely fix systems that I have never seen before just because I have a knack for it. I think certification is great, but not necessary.
What are we going to discuss next? How about "should all programmers have CS degrees?".
I can definitely understand where you are coming from but I tend to think that government should stay out of private business because legislating something like this can only lead to hand holding and unnecessary costs.
Now, after I say that, I would not be comfortable walking into any old shop and getting them to work on my computer without either having a recommendation or very visible credentials. This applies even more strongly if I was to blow 20K, 30K or more on computers for my business.
"An automobile mechanic is certified and licensed because there are safety issues that can be fatal when a mechanic performs their duties improperly."
Yeah, well when I am playing BF1942 and get shot up due to a poorly responding NIC driver or a fragged drive I want some sort of accountability. It IS a safety issue.
If for nothing else, do it for the children.
come on fhqwhgads
Considering that basic certs like the A+ are easy to pass just by memorizing a braindump from the many websites they exist on, I don't think that having one really means that much. Don't take offense if you have it, I have one as well, but it's at the point where it's no different than getting a health card to work in a restaraunt. It's easy to pass the test, but once you have it, you can still pick your nose on the job.
Cars aren't broken out of the factory. But a PC with Windows on it? Doesn't seem to fair to me.
That's Just a Burglar Alarm -- Ignore It!
Consumers should bear some responsibility for their actions rather than putting even more laws on the books. You shouldn't hire somebody who has no experience setting up certain type of system to build one for you. Period. Sometimes, the burden for getting something done should be placed on the person who needs it, not the government. If you need a computer system, research local consultants and ask for references. There's no reason why the government should have to spend time and money doing something you should be doing yourself.
There are probably going to be a ton of responses that are redundant on this thread, but mostly because there are only two answers to this question: yes or no.
Put me in the "no" side. As you said, there are valid reasons why there is mandatory certifications required for automative repair and salon work - both of which are public safety. Now, being the libertarian-minded person I am, I don't think that it is necessary, but that is the reasoning behind requiring such certifications from those types of employees. It is very difficult to make the argument for computer repair. If Grandma's computer isn't working and she can't get to her email, people aren't going to get hurt. Now, for mission critical systems, like health care equipment and the like, there are already regulations that govern.
Let the consumer decide if certification is important enough when they choose a computer repairmen. My guess is that, because you are certified, you want the laws changed to help you get more work or be able to charge more for your work. That sounds an awful lot like some of the companies and organizations that are constantly bashed around here.
Forget the whales - save the babies.
In virtually every field all the license does is create an artificial barrier to entry. Or are you telling me that you've never had (or heard of) a crooked auto mechanic, a bad hair stylist, or a shoddy plumber?
Getting a license is generally little more than paying a fee. Usually there's no testing involved. It's just another revenue source for the county or state. It's also a way to make unionizing more easy, since there's a central registry of everyone in the profession.
Frankly, as far as computer techs go, I've seen plenty of "professional" technicians that don't know their ass from a hole in the ground. And yet they stay working at large outlets like CompUSA, Best Buy, etc. because the customer service there is so crappy it doesn't matter.
Oh, and your licensing isn't going to stop most of the cases you're concerned about. In most states it's legal to do your own auto repair, haircuts, plumbing, electrical work, etc. And you can still call in a pro if you bork it up too much (or go bald/crew cut in the case of the haircut).
So what exactly were you hoping to gain from this?
Enough of regulation, at least where it is not some kind of major Health & Safety issue. Yeah great more tax dollars flushed down the toilet to manage some new government behemoth.
(If an independant group wants to start up a standards organization or something fine, then those who feel more comfortable can go and find certified techs - heh like A+)
How the hell can a state level government keep up with the IT industry? How can they possibly set up any sort of regulatory standards? Better watch it - next thing you know they'll have some crap like "class B computing device, must be compatible with Microsoft Palldium computer environment", well not exactly that, but you get the picture...
Heh you want to see something really funny - check out Canada's federal gun registry. A federal database of firearms - not really *that* big a deal is it? Well it's already cost about $1 Billion, and it's going to costs millions more because it still doesn't work. This is the bang for your buck you get from government! Or how about NASA? And you want them to regulate who fixes computers and how???
I mean, try and even come up with a base set of standards a tech should know - it can't be done.
PCI card swapping
Case assembly
IDE installation
PC case fan installation (I'm working on CPU fans)
SCSI hard drive installs (but not SCSI CDROMS, tape drives, RAIDS, or other SCSI devices)
AGP video cards
PCxxxx memory (but nothing before 1997) and not Rambus memory
Currently working on CPU install and LRF support (little rubber feet)
GIMME A BREAK!!! Fixing a PC is simple
All this is going to do is make silly tech schools (like the infomercials as seen on TV) more money and make people invest into a career that already doesn't pay that well
I hate it when educational institutions make extra money just because people HAVE to be TRAINED to do something that is REALL easy!
Taking a deep breath now
Just my $0.02 cents
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Licensing is simple a way to raise money for the state and create politics. Some times it makes some sence, medical doctors are licensed, but even there it simply creates a cover up indiscretions of the members. Bad doctors hardly every have their licenses revokes.
I don't know about your state. But in my state (Oklahoma) you have to go to school for two years to cut hair, two years put put plants in some ones yard, six months to train a hourse and eight weeks to be a cop.
Almost all licensing is wrong. Anyone with a screwdriver should be allowed to work on computers.
There are 10 type of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
On the other hand, certification programs are inconsistent state to state, and frequently fraught with other problems of politics etc. especially in the initial phases.
In particular, regulating "computer service techs" could be a huge bag of worms. Not only do you have different hardware (PC, Mac, PDA types, bigger iron CPUs, etc), but a vast range of OS options (various flavors of linux, various flavors of windows, macos, pda OS'). I think this makes the problem much more complex than even cars, and cars are already a pretty complex area (usually you get a certification for a particular line of cars, right?).
Finally, I have some certifications myself (solaris sysadmin I & II, network admin, others more obscure), and I can tell you that those tests don't really say a damn thing about how good an admin I could be. They really address how well I was able to remember the trivia of what the options to lpadmin are (for example). Any sysadmin worth their salt knows the man pages are more reliable than his or her own memory. So, while the face of the idea is good, the implementation is likely to be problematic at best, and potentially a disastrous mess at worst.
7 November 2006: The day Americans realized corruption and incompetence weren't addressing 11 September 2001
This would not work. The goverment is not a fast agency. If they did this we'd be proving we could repair Applie //e computers, not Intel P4's with RAID and fibre channel components.
And can you imagine the politics? Microsoft would want training for people to repair their hardware spec. Hollywood would want people to take an oath not to disable their copy protection devices that might be enabled some day. Homeland would want a quick scan of the hard drive for those terrorist keywords.
I think we are better off with the unregulated way things are now.
Where I work, we are strictly a word of mouth company. We don't have to advertise because the work I do is impeccable. When a customer comes with a broken machine, and I get it fixed quickly and save his data, I have a client for life. Furthermore, he will tell his friends, and so on, and so on.
I have more work than I can handle, and our company is growing carefully. I am ultimately responsible for any work performed on a computer, whether it is done by my boss, or my co-workers, because I take pride in what I do.
Regulation wouldn't help in this regard, but it *might* remove some of the shady/incompetent places, for example Gateway stores.
Not ten minutes ago a new customer came in crying that Gateway had formatted her hard drive to remove a virus. Data backup? What's that? Gateway didn't bother to tell her they were going to do this, they just did it.
As I said, regulation *might* remove these guys from the business, but I think word of mouth will do it faster.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
Start from the top.
As soon as regulatory authority is brought to bear to prevent software vendors from circumventing the first and fourth amendments, and when concerns such as quality and reliability are federally mandated, I'll consider supporting this.
Ummmm last I checked ASE Certification wasn't mandated for wrenches. OSHA and all that rot, yes, but that's not really a Certification on par with MCSE, ASE is. And in the end ASE is usually worth about as much as MCSE. My father has been a mechanic for almost 30 years now, and only in the last 3 years has been an ASE Certified tech. And some of the test he took sounded like the MCSE tests, counter to common sense/experience, and in some cases just dumb easy.
Personally I think that the whole industry should be regulated like Engineers, of course then you have the issue with state certification, sitting for certs in different states and such.
What if it is just turtles all the way down?
Government mandated certification would be bad (and idiotic), but there are certifications. You can get a little rubber stamp from Intel/AMD/Dell/HP/Whoever as an 'authorized dealer and repair guy'.
This is why the geniuses at Best Buy can open an eMachines PC to upgrade the RAM without voiding the warranty, and I can't.
The certification stuff is already there for those who want to embark on the high-paying lucrative career of installing video cards in people's Dells.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
I've been both a mechanic, and now a computer tech, and in both fields I've seen people with all kinds of certs that meant nothing because they couldn't do anything right. Most anyone can take a test and pass it if they study hard enough to remember all the right questions and answers. It's the person that builds off their past experiances and is able to think critically that will be of the most value. If a person can't remember something they have had to deal with in the past, the kind of problems you will never find answers to in a book or manual, no matter how many certs they have hanging on the wall, they are useless. I'm not impressed by paper, I'm impressed by a job well done.
Mine means my own, but how can this be if I owe for it?
...is often different than when they call a technician for their computer.
If I want to wash my hair, or comb it, or other such regular matenence, I don't go to a salon. Same thing with my car, I don't take it to a mechanic to put gas into it or chage the oil.
The problem is that most people do take their computer in for comparitivly simple things. Reinstalling a driver, reseating ram, things like that are in the same vein as changing oil in your car or combing your hair.
And the last time I checked, you didn't need a license to work at a full service gas station or sell someone shampoo.
Famous Last Words: "hmm...wikipedia says it's edible"
Regulation of PC repair isn't a bad idea, if for no other reason than because there are so many incompetent repair people (as well as many competent ones), but it probably wouldn't be as beneficial as it might sound.
If current certifications like the "A+", a complete joke, are accepted, customers would be no better off. Perhaps is a certification was used that actually proves the tech knows something, it would be a very good idea.
I am more for the businesses working this out for themselves though. If I go to a repair shop and see impressive credentials, I will be more likely to visit that shop again than one in which they simply take your money, take your computer into "the backroom" and give it back to you the next day.
Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes. --E. W. Dijkstra
Fine. As soon as software companies have to meet certain basic requiremnts when the sell the software. Like, yes, they may be liable if their poorly written crap shreds my hard drive. If youre gonna start hastling the poor bastard working in the back room of uncle bobs shop, you damn well better be hastling microsoft first.
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
>>the industry would not be over-run with a bunch sketchy H1-B's
Or perhaps it would... since they would posses a skill that is in great demand and rare amongst their peers.
You know you're a geek if you've ever replied to a tagline.
NOW HERE IS A TOPIC WORTH DISCUSSING!!!
Hardware is EASY!
1) Plug stuff in
2) Flip on power switch
3) Watch it go
But software
Make this the next topic!
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Most of those certifications (like your saloon example) are there solely to block competition. The excuses about protecting customers are usually prettly thin.
In rare cases, the customer protection argument makes sense, but those cases are very much in a minority. Doctors come to mind as probably the biggest case. But tanning saloons? If you believe that tanning saloons are regulated in order to protect customers, then I have a deal for you.
The Free Market Economy is self regulating in this respect. Those who desire to pay more for certified work can, and those who wish to pay less for uncertified work have the right to do so.
Besides you've all taken the tests, thier paper tests, A+ doens't mean you can fix everything, nor does it make you a trustworthy business person. Think of the possiblility of the guy with lots of certs on the wall lying about what needs to be done to fix your computer....mimics may peoples fears of the auto industry.
I just don't see how regulation will really make the market place better than it is.
I have great faith in fools; My friends call it self-confidence. Edgar Allan Poe 1809-1845
You are right, by default contract law dictates that you should know what you are doing. And myself as an engineer I have that problem. I can be held legally liable if I give advice, even if it is free.
BUT and this is what I also see. If people are not satisfied, then no matter how much we know it is a bad idea it will happen. In industry, when there is a problem that cannot be managed by the industry, regulations start. They start because people want some quality and control. And no matter how much we whine, the law makers will not care.
THEREFORE, it is up to us to fix it!
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
What about the internet? If a poorly installed/configured computer is hooked up to the 'net, the damage to other people's/corporate/public systems could be huge.
:)
Haven't we seen enough evidence of this through Windows viruses?
I can see an easy parallel between sink/sewage and computer/internet.
My 2 cents.
If we rely on the government to regulate this field, we might as well load up on useless certifications like low-voltage and mechanical licenses.
Anyone who thinks that the government has a better solution than the free market needs to have their head examined.
Hammer of Truth
Who cares? Almost any computer work done under waranty is already regulated in that you can't do it without vendor certification, for off brand stuff that is I guess the price you pay for getting a cheaper pc. Besides other forms of electronics repair are not regulated so why should pc's be a special case? And finally I haven't met a tech so incompetant yet that he couldn't easily pass the A+ and whatever vendor certs are required, face it fixing pc's is not that hard.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
States make some people get license mainly to generate revenue, but more important to know who to monitor for collecting income tax. Plus the tests and cert are meaningless. All it say it at some point in time they memorized the answers to a test. Most MCSE's and even more trivial certs like A+ are no indication these people can think on their feet in real world situations. Most forget the info shortly after they take their tests, but even the ones who remember have trouble relating to real issues that don't match what their books explained.
"Blatantly incompetent people don't get very far..."
Ever hear of the Peter Principle? "The theory that employees within an organization will advance to their highest level of competence and then be promoted to and remain at a level at which they are incompetent."
This happens all the time.
Let's see: I had a Mac Powerbook 180c, and the surface-mounted powerplug pulled off the board. Anyhow, I brought it in, they charged me to replace the board, opened it in front of me... everything was fine except for that. It was an Apple-Certified Repair shop. So I got it repaired. Took it home, it worked. So then I set it aside. Later on, I pulled it out to use it: the fix lasted less than 2 weeks. They said "sorry, you waited too long. No warranty." So I got out my soldering iron and did a job myself. In the process, I also noticed, though, that they had busted the hard drive mounts, and just *set* it back in place. It was loose.
I said "no more of them". I went to CompUSA next, which was both Apple Certified *AND* CompUSA Certified. The problem was my PB3400c: the trackpad button was failing. So they got it (opening the computer: $180), and said "Well, the trackpad needs replacing, but we can't get another one for another month or so. We can close it up, and let you have it back, or we can hold onto it for a month. But meanwhile, we jury-rigged a sortof fix that might last for a while."
Hmm. It lasted for about a year. I went back; they said "well, it'll be another $180 to open it up again..." I needed it. They opened it. They replaced the trackpad -- but used a missized screw, so it failed again within 4 months. Tough. It's a 3-month warranty.
You know, certification really means nothing. I've repaired each of my powerbooks since then, I've done a better job, and the cost was a 2-3 hours of labor at most.
Requiring legal certification is just going to ensure that the people who are really good and cheap don't get jobs through us users stumbling on them and then sticking with them.
I say leave it to random chance, and just let people publish like crazy on the web who is good, and who isn't worth the screwdriver they wave around.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Automobiles and haircuts change at a relatively glacial pace in comparison to hardware. A certification could be meaningless in 3 years. I think society will move more and more to a eBay like structure where all busineses will recieve feedback from thier customers (oh, look Fry's has 14% negative reviews, maybey that sale isn't so great). Or, look this 18 year old without a degree has 260 great reviews from people he's done similar work for, while the 32 year old with the PhD in the suit and tie has 20 decent reviews and complaint.
Until our children are no longer molded into castrated sheep democracy remains a fake and a danger. -A. S. Neill
I agree in part with this.... *ALL* certifications aren't a waste, but the A+ certification sure as h*ll is, esp for people with more then a year of experience
THis kind of reminds me of the recent Userfriendly where the interview was for "at least five years experience in XP" or something like that.
The problem with the A+ is A) its outdated, B) its pretty meaningless.. in this day and age, you dont REPAIR power supplies, you put em in boxes and cross-ship them to IBM, or DELL, or whoever.
BUT... (and this is a big but) you probably wont work for any company worth its salt without the A+ cert. I know of companies where _every_ employee is required to be A+ certed, even the HR people.. because that company markets itself as staffing only A+ or better certified people.
I kind of resent the attitude that all A+ certified people are stupid.. I am one and have been in the field for five years at a fortune 500 company now.. and it is absolutely required for my job.. even if I never touch a DIMM or a Fluke Meter. (Though I do use both regularly).
Maeryk
Feminine Protection? What is that? A chartreuse flame thrower?
Absolutely! Lets make a repair license! Better yet, why not make a USER license, allowing only people who have such, to buy and or use a computer.... Better yet, Library licenses! or for those more in tune with Amerika's new direction, Knowledge access licenses! We can start teaching children only what they NEED to KNOW, can't be too careful you never know one of them might become a terrorist. Come ON! We live in a free country right? We don't want to snoop on our neighbors, And we dont want to watch everyone And we'd never ask the traveling public for ID like former eastern block countries.....
Service guarantees Citizenship! Questions Guarantee GITMO.... Amerika Uber Alles!
All this does is make it harder for an independent artisan to make a living -- I don't want Intel's stamp of approval. The only approval I need is a legion of satisfied customers who tell their friends and colleagues and word spreads and reputation builds -- like in the old days before you could "buy" a certification.
At the risk of being modded a troll or offtopic, I wanted to draw an analogy here. The statement that you don't want a stamp of approval and that your satisfied customers is all the "proof" of your competance bothers me a little. I see it coming dangerously close to the current state of alternative medicine. Like you, those practioners do not particularly care if they are recognized by the medical community as a legitimate treatment -- they proudly point to their satisfied customers as "proof" that their methods work. I'm not going to go into a long diatribe of how people can be mistaken in their belief that alternative medicine has helped them here (check out QuackWatch for a more detailed explanation). People can be easily fooled. In the process of repairing someone's hard drive, you might actually wipe out the data through your own negligence. Then you simply tell the customer that the hard drive and all the data on board could not be salvaged. Hey, it's not your fault, you tell them, it was simply fried that bad when they brought it to you. Because the customer doesn't know any better, they simply take your word for it. If you do a speedy job of replacing their hard drive, they might very well end up being satisfied customers, completely unaware that YOU were the reason the data was lost.
I'd just like to point out that this attitude that I hear in so many fields about "I don't need credentials. My customers will vouche for me." kind of spooks me a little.
GMD
watch this
...which are worthless after a few years how about a the certification agency just maintains a user-searchable comments database. You take your car/washer/computer into the shop and get it serviced. Two weeks after you've fetched it back, you get an email from the agency asking you if the shop did what they were supposed to. The agency's operating expense is covered by the "certification" fees.
Sort of a mix between the BBB and resellerratings.com. Resellerratings.com is excellent for the market it serves.
Arthur Andersen was full of these Certified, official people. Yet, they screwed their customers, employees, broke the law, cost investors billions.
I think everyone gets the idea. Why should it be any different in our industry?
there's no place like ~
I'm a political consultant, and I'm not sure whether to laugh at the ignorance implied by the proposed solution or calmly explain why things work the way they do. I'm trying hard to remember that some people actually believed the garbage they heard in seventh grade civics classes and that they haven't actually dealt with real politicians enough to know what motivates such laws.
:-)
Laws requiring people to be licensed to do certain things (such as repair plumbing or cut hair) are sold to the public as protection for the public, but, in reality, those regulations are about protecting the people already in a business and keeping prices high for the service. If you honestly think that regulations such as you're proposing will keep out incompetent people, you clearly haven't seen some of the bad haircuts that I've seen from fully licensed haircutters. Do you think the licensing keeps incompetent plumbers from working? Do you think that licensing keeps incompetent people in almost ANY field from working?
Government licensing is popular because it provides barriers to entry into a profession. It makes it harder to compete with the people who are already doing it (and tends to make prices for those services HIGHER than they otherwise would be). But all those things do is create hoops for people to jump through. Any idiot can memorize enough basic facts long enough to get a real estate license, for instance, but that doesn't mean that person is going to be a competent agent. A licensed haircutter isn't necessarily a good haircutter. And a licensed plumber isn't necessarily a good plumber.
The market is what works. If somebody is good at something, you recommend him or her to your friends -- and that person gets more business. If somebody is lousy at something, word gets around and the person has trouble getting work, until he's getting work only from people who are more interested in a cheap price than a quality job. The same is true in ANY field -- even things where we like to pretend that licensing provides a level playing field for everyone, such as with physicians.
Politicians like licensing requirements, because they allow them to tell the voters that they're protecting them, while they're really taking contributions from professional groups of union groups which are eager to lock out competition.
Giving the government the power to decide who is competent to do ANYTHING is crazy. The longer I'm around politics, the more I think that anarchy is a darn good idea.
David
That way we could get our industry up to the same level of service as Airline Security personnel.
There are 01 kinds of cars in the world. The General Lee, and everything else.
The problem is that sinks, hair salons, and even cars all tend to be (relatively) standardized. I know I'm on thin ice with the cars, but I think we can agree that most cars will not be different in radical ways from most other cars. They will all have internal combustion engines, sensors, brakes, etc. - and these will certainly vary to an extent, but I would argue that PCs are much, much more customizable, especially on the software end. This means that a certification for an auto mechanic, plumber, stylist etc. indicates at best mastery of a mature, relatively static technology. That isn't the case with computers, where the most important factor in a technician's skill (to my mind) isn't just an encyclopedic knowledge of PC parts and old windows versions, but the mind-set that allows you to pick up on how a computer is supposed to be working, and fix it, even if you've never used that particular software before, because you have a broad enough experience and knowledge to have a feel for how things are supposed to be.
My A+ certification says that I have mastered such-and-such skills, identified by bullet points on the certificate. And that's great, but a monkey could pass the A+ exam, it could easily master the specific, exact issues the exam measures. What it doesn't measure is good, ole-fashioned tech-savviness, and I don't think any certification short of a CompSci degree can. The best tech I've ever known is forty years old, former French teacher, just got his cert last year on a whim. And I've known A+ certified techs who couldn't install a hard drive.
I'm the stranger...posting to
Yeah, that's what we need....more regulation. Because there's nothing to make your job worthwile like having Uncle Sam having strings attached. Hey, Cliff, instead of doing the California Soccer Mom Shuffle and recommending NEW FREAKING LAWS, why don't you not take any more days off, if you're just going to sit around thinking, "How could the government regulate me MORE?" I have the certifications you listed, as well as many other useless pieces of paper. They were never what got me my previous jobs, nor were they what qualified me to do what I've done. So, before you go dreaming up new bureaucracies to create, new lines to stand in, new fees to pay, DON'T. The only thing that would happen is the A+ would cost 400 dollars US, require a 6 hour wait in an office 20 miles from your house in the most crumbling part of town, and guarantee NOTHING in the way of quality tech work. Thanks to great minds like yours, 6 years from now, you won't be allowed to work a tech job in America unless you have a US Department of Technology Oversite license, which requires an A+ type test to receive, a large license fee, and have strings. Guess what? You can never be issued our license if you've ever visited a DIVX newsgroup, or burned mp3s of songs you didn't pay the RIAA for the permission to burn. Good thinking, pinko moron!
1) How and at what level would it be implemented and enforced?
Constitutionally, the Federal Government has the authority to regulate interstate commerce, and other transactions are left to state and local governments, and to individual citizens. That's the model followed in regulating most industries: Licensing of Professional Engineers is done by each state, and it just happens for convenience that all states have chosen to recognize the standards set forth by the non-governmental American Board of Engineering and Technology. Licensing of local businesses is generally done by county or city agencies.
2) What kind of regulation would you like to see, if any?
As inclined towards libertarianism as I am, I'd tend to say as little as possible. It's a 'buyer beware' world, and if someone other than me is working on my home computer, I'm going to make sure they have a good reputation, even if they are still working their way through college, as my roommate is.
Now, if the people in your community overwhelmingly want some sort of government-imposed consumer protection in this regard, that's up to you. Get your city council or county commissioners to deal with it. But I don't want it imposed on me.
3) Would you view regulation or mandatory certification as a good thing in the computer repair/installation/maintenance world?
Not if it prevents people from entering freely into business deals of their own choosing. As I mentioned above, my roommate uses his computer-building and computer-fixing skills to help pay for college, but it's not something he plans on doing for his life once he graduates. He's damned good at building and fixing computers, and he could pass any certification test you could throw at him, and there are plenty of people who would be willing to vouch for him on personal experience with his work. But would it be worth the money a government or private accrediting agency would undoubtedly charge if it's not something he plans to use for more than a few years? Not likely.
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.
Take a look at Milton Friedman's discussion of professional licencing in Capitalism and Freedom. His contention is that licensing is simply another barrier to entry in an industry, and as such is almost always supported by those IN the industry as a way to keep new firms out, and prices up. He points to government licensing of pedicurists, a move which was lobbied for by (you guessed it) pedicurists, as a way to keep immigrants out of the industry (because they were willing to work for much less.
Would this benefit the customer? Or would it simply make things more expensive?
I see lots of people ranting about how certifications are worthless. Most certifications are worthless, however some are not.
Worthless:
MCP and MCSE
A+ and *+ (everything else +)
CIW
Value:
CCIE
RHCE
Just MHO
Karma: The shiznight, mostly because I am the Drizzle.
It's true that a know-nothing doughboy who fancies himself computer savvy can ruin a system. It's also true there's no shortage of scam artists and other hucksters in the computer tech field. But nobody can fuck up a computer like a user! If I had a dollar for every dingwit admin-type who downloaded Kazaa and a near-infinite variety of spyware onto their machine, plus another dollar for every manager who though s/he knew what s/he was doing when s/he installed that neat shareware program, or opened that attachment from that total stranger, then I'd be a rich man. We'd all be rich, I tell ya, because I'd have so much money I'd have to give it to my fellow Slashdotters in order to avoid becoming one of those Rich Assholes. (I'm already an asshole, so giving me money is just going to compound the problem.) I've admin'd a lot of places, and at every one of them I suggest user education. New toilet seats are a higher priority at most businesses. Most companies would rather undergo a external audit by Satan and his accountants than actually spend money on employee training. "They should already know how to do that stuff," is the attitude and answer I encounter the most, though at no point during the hire process are they assessing computer skills. (I guess the temp agency is supposed to take care of that!) Additionally, if users were certified, we certified techs could refuse to work with uncertified users. "Can you help me with my email?" "Let me see your certs." At least then they might know the difference between SMTP and POP! (Some of this was parody. Some of it was satire. Some of it was real. I can't tell the difference anymore.)
--- yr pal cal "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
Do Slashdot employees ever get bitched out for sitting around at work doing nothing but reading Slashdot? :)
And if you think back, to when you actually had to PAY ATTENTION to who was fixing your car, because Uncle Sam was not involved in the decision, you probably got much better service for your dollar, and knew a lot more about the work.
For years I took my car to a shop far from home, because they did good work, knew me personally, even occasionally let me use their tools to do a job myself, etc. I selected them based on reputation, and service, and their record with me personally. Not some license on the wall. And just as importantly, when they started screwing up my car every time it went there, I stopped going. Despite the license on the wall.
We Americans are a lazy bunch. Hey, the gu'mmint says they're licensed, must be okay. Here, Joe, fix my car. I trust you because Uncle Sam does too.
Back in 'the day' when the consumer had to actually pay attention, I'll wager the service was a lot better. Sure there were ripoff artists, and bad stuff happened, but those shops didn't stay around for long.
Just so, today, I'd bet that the overall service is better on computers, BECAUSE there is no regulation.
--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
Here on slashdot, the MCSE certification is bashed quite frequently. The 7 tests themselves are rather competent, and do deal with MS-OS issues, but due to the amount of schools out there that are willing to teach answers to specific questions, MCSE certification-holders tend to have a wide range of competency.
The A+ seems to be only worse. Haven't checked Network+ or CCNA yet, but I'd be surprized if there wasn't similiar practices with those certification programs.
The A+ wouldn't be my ideal test for first-tier general PC repair competence, but at the same time, its not a bad little test.
When I look at certs, I use them as guildlines for what I should know. I'd rather have the knowledge for the field of knowledge being tested, then to be taught the answer for each question.
Just my $.02
> an error in repairing a car can easily result in injury or death
> of quite a few people, so some accountability is needed
While I don't know what the certification regulations and laws are, I doubt that there is much of an accountability component in there. When was the last time that a mechanic botched up a repair job and his accountability for the poor (or dangerous) job resulted in any satisfactory recourse to the client? You would still end up having to sue for any admission of fault and reparations. I've had my share of bad repair jobs where the shop denied any responsibility and the cost ended up being all mine.
The salon regulation, to me at first, seemed like the usual overkill large government regulation. However, it too is a matter of safety to the clients, as the chemicals and equipment (tanning beds especially) can also do harm if used incorrectly.
You read way too much into that piece of paper. At least in my state, having that certificate on your wall means only two things:
1. At some point, perhaps thirty years ago, you passed a test.
2. You've continued to pay your US$30 to the state every two years to be able to continue to put that piece of paper on the wall.
Why stop at just regulating technicians? I see a lot of low quality posting on Slashdot that I would prefer not to see. Maybe the government should regulate Slashdot posters to ensure high quality posts. I mean, if I'm a sysadmin for a large company and I take some advice from "Ask Slashdot" respondents, I could royaly screw up my network. And for that matter, I see a lot of low quality advice from untrusted sources all over the internet. What we probably need is a government controlled firewall to protect us from all of the bad things we might encounter on the 'Net. I'm also concerned about buggy software. It costs untold billions in security breaches. And I suspect that whole Linux thing is merely a trojan, waiting for a critical mass of people to adopt it, before it unleashes itself on an unsuspecting world. I know I would feel a lot better if people who wrote and/or distributed software were regulated. Of course hardware is no different, just think of all the copyright violations that could be avoided if hardware was regulated to prevent unauthorized copying of copyrighted material. That's probably another $100 billion or so that could be saved by just a little more regulation. And anyone who would oppose these ideas is probably just a terrorist scumbag and we should lock him up without trial or due process. Trials and due process cost a big-ole bundle of money and our goal is to save people (taxpayers) money with just a little bit government regulation. Arrrrgh! Come on people, THINK OF THE CHILDREN!
We already have a law that encourages technicians to look into our hard drives. Now you want the government to enforce a regulation that would force technicians to backup our hard drives everytime we get our PCs repaired.
If you really want to get rid of the riff raff in your industry. Differentiate yourself. Put a guarantee into the contract you give your costumers. Tell them you guarantee you won't lose their data, or you will pay them X amount of dollars. And if you're afraid they will give you a bad hard drive to begin with. Run your diagnostic and your backup in front of the costumer and offer them this guarantee only once the hard drive has been completely backed up.
If you claim to be half as good as you say you are. You shouldn't be upset that your competitors are screwing up. You should be happy about it. The more they screw up and the more you offer costumers straightforward guarantees -- the more money you will make in the end.
I was building computers when I was 16. I used to help my high school computer guy after basketball practice when I was 18. I know about 15 other people with similar backgrounds. None of us have ever even thought about getting an A+ cert. Why? Because building and troubleshooting PC hardware has always been extremely easy, straightforward, and demanded very little technical knowledge. It is a hobby for many. Such a lax and intellectually undemanding trade shouldn't require some form of regulation. Basic contractual agreements already protect a consumer enough.
Being Certified doesn't mean you can do it. I once had an MCSE ask me what port Telnet ran on.
Isn't that a bit like a unix only admin not knowing what port MS Terminal Services works on?
For an average MS admin, not knowing the telnet port would have zero effect on their ability to do their job - it's effectively only general knowledge to them (like a unix admin knowing about MS stuff).
I'm not claiming they wouldn't be a closed minded moron, but it's not generally something they would have to know to do their job.
I figure, give Windows 100 questions; the *nixes get 100 questions; 100 hardware related questions; and 100 networking questions. That's 400 questions, let them have 5 hours for the exam, charge them $500 to take it. Set the pass score at something like 87% and get the thing recognised. Then all the other certs get relegated to the backburner.
Ok, I'm crazy, nevermind...
Of course having a certified technician repair your Microsoft PC is like getting a certified mechanic to repair your Corvair.
:-D
Some things just can't really be fixed.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Interesting. I bet legally mandated IT certifications become reality as an embargo against exporting IT jobs (e.g., India). Oops, sorry, if you're providing that IT advice over the phone to a USA customer, you must first visit our country and pass our certification exams.
Oh wait, that would drive up business costs and politicians are merely corporate puppets. I guess it won't become law after all.
If you're running your own business, I would think this basic rule applies:
If they have enough money to run commercials, they must be doing SOMETHING right.
Yes, everyone screws up once in a while, that's what insurance is for. Those companies that can afford commercials, can afford to pay you for what they screwed up, because they're already a decent size. It's the small ones you need to watch out for.
That goes for everything from Hair cuts, to auto-repair, to computer repair, to telecoms, to Airlines (What was that one in FL?). Be safe, not cheap, and you'll do fine.
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
In the process of repairing someone's hard drive, you might actually wipe out the data through your own negligence.
This happens all the time; it's called "not good enough to get the job done."
We tried to get our car repaired for months, and each reputable and industry certified mechanic we tried thought they fixed the problem but it always came back.
You can go to three different doctors before they give you the right diagnosis for a complicated problem. I've heard about it from friends, seen it on ER, and have heard that if you have a serious medical problem you should consider hiring a personal nurse to keep an eye out for you anytime you go in for treatment.
If you're certified by a well-designed examination for your industry AND former customers speak highly of you, then you're probably a reliable choice.
If you only have certification, then you might be good on paper but lousy in the field, in which case I'm not interested. On the other side, you may be a smart guy who just never got certified, but for important procedures I'd like a little confidence that you've been properly educated to handle those rare situations you may not have experienced during your hobbyist years.
So I always look for both official certification and word-of-mouth reputation when I need a service. But there's no 100%. Even after 8 years of med school and residency, or 25 years as a computer hardware hobbiest, people are going to make mistakes.
$8.95/mo web hosting
Certification requirements are often just a way for a profession to regulate the number (and, hence, the pay) of workers in a particular field. A gov't should never be able to mandate that auto mechanics be certified. As a consumer, I want to have the choice of whether to take my car to a mechanic without a certification, but a great reputation. This happens all the time in auto repair. My current mechanic is an ex-cop who isn't certified and does a great job for a fair price. Some jobs he won't touch because he knows his limits -- the check light for my air-bag is broken and he told me to go to the dealer for that problem. Same should hold for every other profession including MDs, beauty salon workers, and computer repair technicians.
So what should certification be used for? Insurance, for one. An insurance company may choose to offer a reduced rate on malpractice insurance for those with certification. Customers may choose to use the certification as a starting point in deciding whether to hire an individual to perform a given service.
But certification should never be mandated. That is too open for abuse since the certification requirements are usually set by those who are already certified. This gives the certification board an incentive to make it harder than it should be to get the required certification. In some professions, you can see the long term results. Medicine is a great example. Doctors must get an MD and jump through hoops in order to get licensed. Result is too few doctors. Society has begun getting around that by letting nurses perform many of the tasks that used to require an MD. That is a hint that gov't should never have mandated that those tasks require an MD to begin with.
FreeSpeech.org
they believe will land them more jobs
Well as cruddy as a cert as it is my MCSE NT4 did get me my first real job (real being not in a retail establishment). I talked to both the recruiter and the hiring manager and they both said what put me over the top of other candidates was the cert. So I have my MCSE to thank for a job that with almost no "real world" experience got me a $50,000/year job in the midwest.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
> Because the consumers are mostly idiots?
You just hit the prime idea behind the Democratic party. The "People" are idiots and WE, the anointed few will take care of them. That is where most regulation of this sort comes from. People are too stupid to check with friends, call the BBB or know which certs hanging on a wall are worth the paper they are printed on. So WE will decide and require anyone wanting to enter a profession to obtain OUR preferred cert, pay for a license from OUR bloated govt machine (to pay for US to think for you).
And 'the People' are not just stupid, they are wicked narrowminded brutes also, so WE will take their excess cash (WE decide what is excess of course) and will do noble enlightened things with it.
Really the same mindset as Valenti & Rosen assuming everyone except them is a thief, so they demand TCPA and such to protect themselves from the rabble.
And no, this post isnt't a troll, just in an extra cynical mood today.
Democrat delenda est
The last thing we need in this business is more government "oversight" or regulation.
Professionals, such as lawyers, doctors, plumbers, electricians, auto mechanics, barbers, etc. are required to be licensed, and in most cases, this is a good thing. They work in fields where mistakes can lead to wrongful convictions, serious injury, death, major property damage, and the like.
OTOH, there are many fields where it is legal to do certain things, particular maintenence, with no license at all. I don't have to have a license to repair your deck or fix your toilet; granted, if I screw it up and your deck isn't up to code or your toilet floods your living room, you don't have many means of redress, other than suing me personally.
The problem is that the work done in these fields is not necessarily analagous to the work done by PC repair techs. Frankly, fixing a broken system is usually not rocket science; doing so with the minimal amount of work and data loss is something of an art, but most tech support guys fall back to the usual, reformat, reboot, and reinstall method if all else fails.
I don't think the government should be telling me whom I can and cannot pay to fix my computer (in my case, I fix the bloody thing myself), or my car for that matter. If I want to take it to my sister-in-law's best friend's teenage son and give him $20 to get XP working, that's my business. And if I want to get the thing fixed by someone who actually knows what the hell he's doing, and, perhaps, has all the mumble-mumble certifications to prove it, that's also my option.
Other than freedom of choice (in who fixes my PC), the other effect of regulation would be to price or lock out uncertified individuals, such as myself, from the market. Granted, I like my job as a software engineer. But if the economy continues down the crapper and I lose my job, it wouldn't be below my dignity to make some extra bread fixing computers. My 15 years+ of PC hardware and software knowledge certainly is worth something to someone. I shouldn't have to go blow several thousand dollars getting A+ and Microsloth Certified Ignoramious certificates to get a job.
I've worked with many engineers who had all those fancy certifications and many who did not. From what I can tell, they don't make a lick of difference. The only thing that really counts is knowledge (however it's acquired) and experience (and a healthy dose of intuition and luck). The worst thing is someone who can talk the talk and has the cert's but is fundamentally incompetent. Frankly, if I'm interviewing two guys, and one has an MSCE and the other claims several years of administering a Windows NT/2000 network, I'll probably consider them equally and ask them the same questions. I actually have more respect for the guy who's been debugging problems for the last couple years than someone who just passed some exam.
Finally, perhaps as a coup-de-gras of sorts, consider all those Cisco Certifications. As much as Cisco hypes them, you'd think that lots of Cisco employees would have them. Well, I used to work there, and guess what? They don't. Generally, the engineers there are quite unimpressed by anything other than a CCIE (of which there are only a couple thousand in the whole world). It's not about how many tests you can pass, it's about what you've actually done and what you can do.
The cert classes are a nice way to fill in some gaps in your existing knowledge or to get a jumpstart on a new technology, but, by and large, they don't mean dick.
I don't care if they are licensed, as that would only increase the cost of doing business, and cut out a lot of the smaller shops.
However, one should be insured for reasonable liability..
This goes for any industry as far as I'm concerned. My Auto mechanic isn't licensed, but his work IS guaranteed.
If they are incompetent they don't stay in business anyway. Sort of self-policing.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I think that mandating certification in anything is total bs and should be branded so. What does any government have sticking their nose into what ANYONE does? If I want to hire noncertified people, I will damnit.
And don't hand me any shit about "But what about people's lives!". That is exactly what I'm talking about. Control of lives. If people want to purchase goods and services from noncertified people... let them. They may get better service or higher quality goods from certified shops, but that is all part of the free market.
Certification laws were lobbied by commie unionists who wanted to control the market of workers, making their pay go up so they wouldn't have to learn another trade that was more in demand. Fuckers are worse than farmers.
Another way to look at this, if you are IBM or SUN or Cisco or any other manufacturer/service company, do you have the right to train your own people and set your own standards, or do your technicians have to pass some sort of test set up by a government bureaucrat (perhaps with the "guidance" of a competitor like Microsoft)? If Sun can fix Sun systems and IBM and others can fix IBM mainframes, why should the lowly PC be given a higher status?
And don't think for a minute it stops there. Once the government gets it's fingers in here, there will certainly be software "certification" for those who write code. Sure, Microsoft will still be free to put out system that crash regularly and to export jobs to lowest bidder countries, but an individual who can do the work on his own will be required to learn the Microsoft sales pitches and be able to present the Microsoft product line before he can be "certified" to do the work he is already making a living at.
I'd rather count on the market place to regulate the industry than bureaucrats. The market isn't perfect, but it's far better than the alternative. Consumers who hire idiots should not be an excuse to take away good people's right to earn a living.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
How much has changed in the hair care world in the last 10 years? How much have automobiles changed in the last 10 years? Now compare that to how much has changed in the field of computers in the last 10 years. Notice the several orders of magnitude difference beating you over the head with a big stick.
By the time a beaurocrat gets their ass off of their head long enough to attempt to regulate computer repair, everything they've tried to do by regulating it will be worthless and obsolete.
blind regulation is bad. reputation is good.
Generally do work at home. Some hairdressers do, but not many that get high customer volume
A lot of techies (and good ones) work from home, such a requirement could very well kill their business. All things considered, if a business kills a computer - they should replace it. If there's very valuable data on it, the customer should notify them beforehand and they can weight the risks.
On the other note: I recently sent my semi-computer-illiterate grandparents to pick up a new fan for their old Pentium 200 from the local Future Shop. They told the main tech they had a Pentium 200 ($5 heatsink+fan combo), and were given a huge heatsink+fan combo ($25) for an Althon XP/P3/P4. Being idiots, they decided to try installing it themselves, and ended up damaging capacitors near the CPU socket with the oversized heatsink. Apparently Future Shop has no liability in this, they hire idiots for techs who can't read that a heatsink is for a Socket A/370 (Athlon/P4) mainboard.
My point? If major businesses were required to hire at least semi-competetent techs, it would be better. But by the same reasoning I am guessing that people reading this article (who didn't already know of FS's tech crappiness) will keep this in mind when getting PC work/parts from there. Word of mouth is a big factor in a PC business... and a bad reputation as a computer dealer can sink you very fast sometimes.
I don't think having the certification proves that you know more than the guy next to you who doesn't have the certification. Being certified does not equal having years of experience. That said, I don't agree that all certified people are morons as some people in this thread are saying. I do agree that many people who have no real know-how but have lots of money run out and get certifications just to have them. And that's unfortunate because it makes the rest of "us" (those of us who know our stuff) look bad. But the same thing has been happening for years. A high school diploma used to be optional and you would still be able to land a decent paying job as long as you knew what you were doing. My dad never graduated high school and made over 60 grand a year working at Caterpillar as an electrician. He knew how to do his job and back then, that was all that mattered. But now - a 4 year college degree barely qualifies you for 25k a year and lower management.
I'm getting me a butt-load of stock in that company. You know, the one that Sally Struthers says I can get a degree from.
Or was that the one that feed the starving children?
Can't remember, oh wait
1) Starving Children
B) Sally Struthers
III) Degree In PC Repair
Four) Profit
the current piss-poor economy has acted like regulation. i have seen many a wanna-be, dishonest middle man or liar driven out of business, because they cannot get cash when the goods are fake. lets face it, there are scammers out there that say they'll hand out the stars and the moon on a PC, but that was the nature of the boom times too. people are more wary today, ever so slightly more educated (no browser?? ok, just click the big blue E) and not in the same frantic state of mind that the boom created.
in short. the industry is self-regulated and should stay that way. keeping barriers of entry (in the fiscal world) low serves to draw more people into the field. the barriers of entry right now are only time and brains. lets keep it that way.
the only person served by your regulation would be established businesses, and that is what creates stagnation and problems.
"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste." - Rahm Emanuel
How long had there been automechanics and hairdressers before either industry was regulated?
How long have people been repairing home PCs? (Maybe 20 years?)
[Home] Computing's still a very young industry. A lot of the experience is still self taught, rather than learned on courses (though it's shifting), much like with cars in their early days.
While it wouldn't suprise me in the least to see legally required certifications around the centenary of the home PC, just like we see for the centenary of the car, does every other industry get regulated this quickly either?
Yeah, but do you get the bitchin' Vorpal sword and the Elven cloak of Invisibility?
Do I, as your customer, get saving throws when you trash my hard drive?
Sorry.. Had to go there.
Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
I think mandatory certification for PC repair services would be the kiss of death to affordable quality service. The fact that a business person doesn't request several bids, or, get references for a likely contender for a job, should not be the premise upon which licensing mandates are instituted. That would only reward lazy business owners/managers, and reward easy fixes.
The fact that a person can afford to take a test to get certification doesn't say squat about that person's ability to solve problems requiring critical reasoning or independent thought. I would rather hire someone based on his or her reputation for having their shit together and getting the job done right the first time. And, on the flip side, I would like to think that my own reputation spoke more highly for me than having any certification a well-trained chimp might get its hands on, given said chimp's ability to pay for it.
I tend to be nominally liberal, but in such a case as this, I am all for unregulated commerce. Dumbshits who fuck up will not be in business for long. Honest people with their act together will find their isn't enough time in the day to accept all requests for service.
Now, when it comes to coding software, I am in favor of regulation, especially for operating systems coders. but then, that is another kettle of fish entirely...
Mmmmmm... Bold, yet refreshing!
I think not. Sure they don't mean you know anything. Everybody has meet a MCSE who is utterly clueless, but they do help your resume move to the top of the stack.
Let's be honest most people only get certifications to get a better job. That and your employer pays you to get one.
although they show competance, they don't really mean crap when working in a Computer Repair dept.
When I worked at CompUSA - although I had an A+ certification already - most of the problems were specific system issues that Compaq or Pacbell new about. ie: Compaq had a flaw in their X series MB's that caused cd drives to go out - so all those systems would come in with people complaining about their cd-rom not working and we simply order the new MB and cdrom and replace them - that used about 1% of the information covered in the A+ Exam Cram.
The other common issues were people who had tried to instal Win X over Win X and turned the poweroff halfway through and needed their system restored.
Ave Molech Setting
Problem is there is no equivalent of the PE for CS people.
I'm unsure how well the PE would actually speak to a persons software engineering skill as it currently stands.
"They" are currently working on a Profession Software Engineer ( or whatever it is called ) cert though.
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
As someone mentioned earlier, the A+ Operating Systems test no longer has any Windows 3.1 questions, and its command line questions are either related to DOS in Win9x, or to the commands in Windows 2000.
Anyone who passes these tests is definately qualified to repair my computer running my favorite flavor of *BSD or Linux!
What in the world does the operating system have to do with repairing the physical computer? If the floppy drive is hosed, replace it. If you want a DVD-RW drive installed, not a problem. Of course, drivers and compatability are another story, but physical installation shouldn't be an issue.
While I wouldn't let the average A+ Certified technician loose on my Linux installation, they're probably quite capable of fixing most hardware problems you might have. And you can always require them to be Linux+ certified if you need help with that, but since that's aimed at techies with 6 months of experience, I'm not sure that would be your best option either.
At this point, since a number (but not all) of the IT certifications out there can be earned with a majority of studying and minimal hands-on experience, I don't think requiring certifications in the industry is going to do anything more than further boost the popularity of those certifications. We've all heard the horror stories about NT MCSE's who couldn't make a boot floppy.
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. -- Gandhi
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. -- Gandhi
However, this is not the case with computers, given the wide variation in platforms AND software. Keeping a tech current just to satisfy "legal" requirements would take 100% of the tech's available time.
Imagine that, by law, an image of your hard drive must be sent to the government, your DNA swabbed from your input devices, and bugs/keyloggers routineley installed if they find any sign of terrorist or criminal activities or intentions....
Such as:
Naturally, copies of your drive image will always be sent immediateley to the proper authorities for America's protection.
As we all know, no Saudi funded terrorist group could even dream of affording it's own bunch of nutbars to read up on some HOWTOs and sort out their own computers.
Have A Nice Day!(tm)
Ali
Ph33r m3!!!
When I worked for DEC they had a rule, "A+ or your ass is gone."
Judging by the fact that DEC stock now trades under HP's ticker symbol (DEC -> Compaq -> HP), I would think long and hard before looking to their more asinine management policies as being a Good Thing.
--
I Hit the Karma Cap, and All I Got Was This Lousy
1. Cars are still far more expensive items. For most people, a car is the most expensive item they own (houses are a very close second). You can pay as much for a non-ridiculous repair on a car as your entire computer, software library, and home network cost.
2. Safety is a critical feature of a car. Safety is an almost unknown feature in a home computer. Certifying mechanics to bleed brakes saves lives. Certifying techs to configure IP addresses is a waste of eighty bucks.
I realize that nobody is going to read comment #500 on this busy story, but here goes:
Certification in the computer industry is a waste of time, MOSTLY (with a few exceptions -- maybe general security practices, TCP/IP stuff, could be certified) It matters so little to me that the guy working on my computer has a piece of paper that says he took a test. Tests do not matter doodly-squat compared to hands-on experience.
True story: Former network admin here, MCSE, was backing up Exchange as though it was just another file. He never got priv.edb and pub.edb because (duh) Exchange keeps a lock on those babies. End result: Big Owie! (as the Gungans say). Paper tiger got burned. Me, with no cert but a clue, got his job.
One of the BEST things about the tech field is that it is relatively free from unions, guilds, and various other anti-competitive exclusionary practices. We need to keep it taht way. My highest-paid buddy only has a H.S. diploma, and he runs major web sites for big time companies. He didn't get hired because of some stupid piece of paper, but because he can get the job done.
Isn't that refreshing? We in the tech field have a self-sufficiency gene. We are all adults here, unlike teachers or policemen or the guy who bags your groceries at the Safeway -- we don't need a corrupt union to "watch out for our best interests" because we already know what our own best interests are! (href: all I wanted was a pepsi!)
Now, I wouldn't hold it against somebody that they had a tech certification. But it's much less important than their people skills, etc.
ANd how many of us haven't been ripped off at ASE-certified mechanics?
Okay, so I work on Windows systems, but it's obvious to me (and to my employer after they got burned) that MCSE and such is really all about marketing. It's supposed to demonstrate that MS has an army of highly-trained specialists who can help your organization. But it's crap, and we all know it.
Another example: a guy from Dell was here the other day to replace a failed HDD (in the Exchange server, as it turns out. God bless RAID). It took him like two hours to figure out that he needed to change the SCSI ID on the new HD. This guy was certified, but he had never heard of a SCSI ID? That's so pathetic.
If we are going to have certs, at least give me a way to file a complaint against the tech who takes two hours replacing a HDD in my mission-critical email server because he doesn't know what a SCSI ID is. Something like the Bar Association for lawyers. But I can already see where that would go: Right into the Llinux vs. Windows Flame Pit From Hell.
That's why those of us with open minds and a clue don't need any damn certs. We can stand on the merits of what we know, thank you very much.
I do a fair share of cleaning up after fly-by-night companies/consultants/johnny's-14-year-old nephew-that-really-knows-computers. It costs a lot of the local businesses serious money to replace lost data and sub-standard equipment.
So why are you complaining? The fact that you're trusted to clean up these mistakes shows that you evidently have the experience/credentials/word-of-mouth-reputation that these fly-by-nighters, consultants, and nephews lack. On your part, you'd make less money if it weren't for two things:
1) Some of your customers were at one point careless with their money.
2) You have something better to offer than their previous servicefolks. Something that allows you to charge more, and forces them to either discount or get Darwinized out of business.
And on the part of your clients, they gain the benefit of wisdom (good judgement comes from experience, experience comes from bad judgement). Plus, it is worth the money they pay you to have you around to clean up their mistakes.
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.
You can vist the System Administrators Guild at sageweb.sage.org
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Questionnaire:
1) How happy have you, your friends, and your relatives been with licensed auto mechanics in the past?
2) How happy have you, your friends, and your relatives been with licensed hairdressers in the past?
3) Do you now think government licensing has anything to do with customer satisfaction?
11*43+456^2
Your point is well taken, but imagine a world where Pfizer and GlaxoKlineSmith decide who gets certified. That's where the world is headed with IT certifications - there is no FDA of computers, and if there was, it would be controlled by special interests like Microsoft and Disney.
Even if you have "certified" support from a company like Microsoft (or Red Hat or whatever) they still aren't particularly accountable -- they're perfectly happy to tell you "too bad" or "it's your fault" when their software crashes and you lose data.
Microsoft uses their customer base to support the claim that they aren't evil, but there's lots of dispute.
But to go back to the analogy someone made about mechanics, I'm more likely to go to a mechanic recommended to me by a friend than one I find in the phone book. I never wanted to use customer satisfaction as a means of advertising or justification, only that it is sufficient for my own self-reliance.
Also, if you have a reputation for fixing problems, what difference does it make if you backed up their software and reinstalled the OS versus going into the registry and fixing the problem manually. Aside from the fact that if you choose the first route too often you'll lose your mind.
Unfortunately the BBB is mostly B-fucking-S.
I dont know what type of success you have ever had with filing complaints with the BBB against companies - but I can tell you from the many times that I actually have - it really doesnt do jack.
For example - one company (a car dealership that sold me a car that was a lemon (as defined by the lemon law) would not cooperate and do what was required of them by law to take care of the problem) whom I tried to report to the BBB was rated as "a gold business member" by the BBB and the BBB rep said "I can't believe that they would act in this way". After sending the copy of the complaint and the copy of the complaint I made to the state attorney general I still didnt even get results.
You want to know what did get results? Pushing the car (yes physically pushing the broken piece of shit) into their entrance and throwing the keys in the face of the dealer in front of about 10 other customers that were there.
On other occasions not only did I file with the BBB - but I also called the insurace commision about insurance problems (a carrier refused to take a car I no longer owned off my policy and kept billing me for it) - still no results. I was told by the insurance commission that this "was common behavior" - and they didnt do a damn thing. Common?! I just let them bill me and I never paid them - just switched to another carrier. "Good for you!" you might say. Bullshit. I shouldnt HAVE to switch.... and anyone that thinks that switching is an acceptable solution to this sort of problem is an idiot. its no solution - shit like this should be taken care of, we should NOT have to deal with crap like this.
want more examples of how the BBB is just a token organization that doesnt accomplish for consumers what it is supposedly chartered to do?
why not look at the actual punishments that companies receive when they fuck up in a big way.
As another poster said - vote with your wallet. Well, I do (I havent bought a Nike product in more than 10 years - although I was given a pair of shoes once as a gift) - there are many companies I dont shop with....
the point about Frys is that they sell items that are refurb/return-not-working as IF THEY WERE NEW - and charge the *same price* as the real new item would cost. This should be *illegal*. also - ever notice that frys maintains no website? ever had an experience trying to get a laptop that is under warranty repaired in their "authorized service center" - pain in the ass.
anyway - frys just sucks, but overall good customer service is definitely something the consumer should demand and expect.
but here we see the problem is even more than just bad customer service, neglected policies and unenforced laws. the root of the continuance of these issues comes from the fact that the large majority of consumers are just happy to tolerate these thing and throw up their arms - like we see here, not even noticing that the supposed groups and measures that are already in place dont do a damn thing.... which is why we are even talking about this issue in the first place.
Having spent younger years in the repair industry and since then having paid many people for repair on various items, I have reach the conclusion that having certification has nothing to do with the ability to perform the work. I am not a certified network engineer but have found myself in a position several times in different companies that the certified network administrator was unable to perform the work but had to rely on me to help them understand what needed to be done and how to do it. So, research on the quality of service and capabilities of prospective employees is far more important than relying on certifications.
As long as it takes into account a person's portfolio
:)
I currently am a Graphic Designer (still working and never laid off) that has met way too many people who say "I'm a graphic designer too - look at these stickers I made using this word template".... it's people like that - that make it harder for those of us qualified to get a job to find jobs.
The Adobe certifications are decent, but they don't really look at design concepts, instead they are more of if you can find where the filter menu is and if you know how to USE the program.
USING a program and DESIGNING art is VERY DIFFERENT and it takes quite a bit more to come up with an original marketing idea for a product than just knowing how to take a picture and run filters in photoshop on it.
Heres a hint for all you wanna be graphic designers - this is what steps I take to create a package
1) Research who I am marketing too or who "they" want me to market too as well as who I am doing this for is important - just because a nude car wash will sell doesn't mean the church your working for will like that idea
2) Freehand draw out ideas and slogans (i feel my drawings are shitty compared to some but even still it gives a base to start from)
3) Then I go to the computer and start recreating or scanning - tracing - coloring - touchup etc...
4) I take it to my boss and he puts in his $5 worth - then I go back to step 3 and after that i'm done with that project.
GOOD Design takes time - not a few seconds filling out a word template.
Ave Molech Setting
David, that's an excelent post. You got all the points I wanted to make.
But I'll chime in anyway, with a real-world example that's a little closer to home for some of the Slashdot readers.
Change the question to:
Does the Computer Programming field need to be regulated?
A couple decades ago this question was being asked seriously. A private organization was set up to create a certification for computer programmers. The subtext appeared to be lobbying for laws banning programming for money by anyone who didn't have one of their certifications. Think of an "American Bar Association" for programmers. (I thought the original certification was called the Certified Data Professional or CDP, but see below.)
Of course the certification required extensive knowlege of the languages of the time. Such languages as Cobol and JCL.
This would be convenient for someone in a large corporation's personnel department when hiring for the accounting departments IT operation. (Except when setting salary, of course, since the shortage of "qualified" programmers would drive up the price.)
But can you IMAGINE what effect such a law would have had on the computing revolution?
Would there even BE a Unix, an Apple OS, a Linux, a gnu project, emacs, gcc, Perl, Bison, Java, C++, etc. if everyone had to learn Cobol and enough other stuff to do accounting apps, and get a cert, before they could be paid to hack in C or sell any software they'd written?
====
Interestingly, what appears to be the same organization is still around, as a private-enterprise certification vendor. The web site says its current offering is "Certified Computing Professional" (CCP), and that it still maintains earlier certifications called "Certified Data Processor" (CDP), "Certified Systems Professional" (CSP) and "Certified Computer Programmer" (another CCP).
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
3. Government agency forces recall on Windows OSes, they are unsafe at any speed, fail crash tests and pollute the net.
.
I think you missed the next few steps:
4. Government decides that OSes that are going to be connected to the internet have to be certified and signed.
5. ISPs are required to run software which interacts with your local PC to decide if it is running on trusted hardware with a trusted OS - otherwise click
6. MS pays off the appropriate authorities and WinXP gets the signature.
7. Big Linux distro also pays to get a sig. However, if you recompile your kernel the sig doesn't match anymore, and you can't go online.
8. Profit! (For MS at least, and some big linux vendors.)
First, you don't need to be licensed to be an auto mechanic. Those certifications the mechanic has up are there to show off. Whether they mean anything depends on the certificate and who issued it, but none of them are required to work on cars. Of course people do make decisions based on them (eg. not taking their new car to a mechanic who doesn't have a certification from the car's maker).
Second, the certificates for hairdressers and such have nothing do to with how well they do their jobs. The certifications are about making sure the certified isn't a hazard to the public (the customers). The certificate says your hairdresser knows and follows the rules about cleanliness of the tools and such, but whether they can cut your hair without butchering it is outside the scope of the certification.
Given those two things, there's not much parallel in the parallels the article's author is drawing. Myself, I think certification would be good, but only if it concentrated on practical tests (ie. no questions to answer, your test is to be given a bench and a broken PC and you have to fix it while an instructor grades you on whether you followed anti-static and other safety procedures, whether the work was done right and (most importantly) whether the PC actually worked when you were done).
"and just let people publish like crazy on the web who is good, and who isn't worth the screwdriver they wave around."
Yeah, we all know that web referrals are trustworthy! Just look at Amazon's review system!
And this doesn't even mention referrals for ways to increase the size of your penis by 135%.
In other places, the licensing schemes have become a way of propping up the unions: the quickest and easiest way to get a license was to join the union. The net effect of this is to restrict YOUR freedom to practice your livelihood based on your membership in some fairly questionable organizations.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
Yes, I know the "ol' Hippocratic Oath," having taken it in the past (my politically-correct medical school also had some new-age versions you could take in place of the original). "Do no harm" is good advice.
That particular phrase, however, is not in the hippocratic oath. The closest phrase is something to the effect of "I will give no deadly medicine, if asked, nor suggest any such counsel"
The "Do No Harm" exhortation has been variously attributed to other writings of Hippocrates, and also to the Roman physician Galen.
Just FYI.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
I think you people are confusing CERTIFIED with BONDED. The fact that someone is a master plumber is not going to help you when he does $50K in water damage to you and your immediate neighbor. The guy's going to have to be insured.
This isn't even getting into what will be involved if some sleazy undereducated insurance adjuster tells you to f*ck off.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Am I saying this was a good thing to do? No. A bad thing? Nope. Was it a policy I agreed with? Not necessarily, not that my opinion of the practice even matters. I'm simply relating my experiences regarding the relative worth of A/Net+ certs as far as tech jobs are concerned.
If I were forced to guess what the implcations are, I'd say that if you're thinking about getting A/Net+ in addition to other certs, don't bother since they won't add much value. If you have no other certs and are thinking of getting one of these in order to beef up your resume, I'd say you might be better off skipping it and spending a little more time/effort getting another type of cert (cisco, MC*, RHCE, whatever). YMMV.
-B
Ash and Hickory, straight-grained and true, make excellent bludgeons, dandy for the cudgeling of vegetarians.
Three Certs for Consultants who fly the sky
Seven for the Kiddies in their parents' home
Nine for Megastore-Techs who often lie
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
In the Land of Redmond where the shadows lie
One Cert to rule them all, One Cert to find them,
One Cert to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of Redmond where the Shadows lie.
paintball
Leave us alone. Don't complicate things. Even suggesting this gives people ideas. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength. - George Orwell or George Bush?
Let's also lump in certs for posting to /. and querying google.
Are we so lost we need to be told what to do?
Keep your packets off my GNU/Girlfriend!
Is how I got into IT in the first place. In fact, it's how a LOT of people I know got into IT. We got sick of the know-nothings at CompUSA and Best Buy jerking us around, maximizing their profits and our downtime. We said, screw this, we can do it better ourselves.
And you know what? By and large, we did. And you can too. It's really not that hard.
Yes, there's a lot to learn. But there are a lot of people willing to give you their knowledge and their time for free if you ask them nicely and show a real interest in learning. Much of the information is freely available online. Most of the documentation these days is pretty accurate and the instructions work if you follow them.
Regulation will help kill DIY and add to the expense of repairing and upgrading computers, because simple things like installing RAM or PCI cards don't require hardly any knowledge or expertise to do right at all, but suddenly people will be afraid to do it without shelling big bucks out to some guy who read a book and passed the A+ exam.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
TSIA
Now, if your data has a real value, then you either are:
What about cost? If you introduce forced certification, it'll incur a large cost that'll be passed on to consumers
What about enforcement? What if someone performs "illegal" tech work without a cert? What if a cert'ed tech screws up? Will there be government entities to oversee the process and handle complaints? All costs - and unfair, not every user 1) has a computer 2) needs a tech
Tips balance of power - if all techs had to get certed, everyone would focus on Windows - and the issue of "unsupported" systems (like your fav *ix) would get even worse.
Tech support - this involves working on systems, even if you're talking someone through it - will this be subject to cert? You can bet that even fewer will offer free support.
There are plenty more reasons to not force certification, but that doesn't mean it's necessarily bad. Techs/shops can use it to their marketing advantage - like "GM" certified shops can make themselves sound more credible than the "local greasy Joe" shop.
The best thing about a boolean is even if you are wrong, you are only off by a bit.
Becoming a good or expert tech is totally different and no test can do this.
The only way to become good at any technician position where its copiers, cars, or computers is to go out and do it. A year or more is required for full maximum performance. A test will not make you an expert but will be enough where you can start out and learn from your boss or other co-workers on how to do your job.
http://saveie6.com/
And it goes the other way, too. I only know one A+ certified tech (he got the cert. thru a community college training course, but has ZERO hands-on experience outside of that class), and there's no way in hell I'd *ever* let that guy touch my hardware or software. Not only for the lack of experience, but also because he just flat doesn't have the aptitude -- if it's not in the textbook, he hasn't the first clue what to do. Considering the popularity and relatively low cost of such classes, and the frequent outright incompetence I've observed among computer repair techs (especially in chain stores and in small-town shops with no competition), I suspect he's more the norm than not.
OTOH, most of the truly competent techs I know have either no certs at all, or have a fairly ancient CNE but nothing else.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
It's a difficult question for people who don't have a geek community to rely on for references. How does someone who bought a computer at WalMart know if the chain store or local shop with a string of certificates on the wall actually hires competent people? How do they know if the nerdy kid down the street actually knows anything, or just talks a good line? These customers have no basis for comparison, because they have no idea if what the tech did was correct or not.
:)
:)
For several years there was a guy around here, with a regular shop, who always "fixed" every computer he touched the same way, whether it needed it or not. I got most of my regular clients as a result of cleaning up what he broke. (I'd fire up the machine, quickly discover his handiwork, and say "Oh, D. was here!" and they'd think I was a genius.
And personally, I find it easier to manually fix the registry than to reinstall the OS.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Similarly, as long as you're honest about your lack of formal qualifications as a computer hardware technician, if people want to pay you to "fix their computer" good luck to them. As lives aren't at stake, regulation is even less justified in this case.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
The same criteria are missing from the Software world. Real, objective public health issues can be named for beauty salons. The same can not be said of computer issues.
A better start might be to make those who proffit off software responsible for obvious negligence. The makers of Outlook were told that an email client that automatically loaded and executed code sent by third parties would be disaterous, yet they built it anyway. That decision has cost businesses billions of dollars. Such malpractice deserves contempt and punishment. It's not the $200 computer it's the man years of work that gets wiped out, the business and reputation lost by it's failure that counts.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
You say, "I've met lots of people who are MCSE's who are clueless." That's funny because I have yet to meet anyone with one of those that had a clue or were not ashamed of it. Kinda like a pet rock, "Yeah, I got one of those." they say.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
and here's why. It would put the little(r) guy out of commission. Just because a business is big enough to pay hundred of dollars of certification fees doesn't mean it's neccessarily fair or honest. For example, one of my customers had power issues with his computer: it would turn on only intermittently. He said "this is the same thing that happened before (medium wisconsin computer company name removed) replaced the power supply and the hard drive." I took it, found that the problem was actually in the power cable. It had been crushed behind/under a desk, and powered on only sometimes when used. In comparison, my cable powered it on all the time. $10 fix, plus labor. This wisconsin computer company gave this person their "broken" parts back after the repairs. Since this person had no use for them, he gave them to me, saying "you may be able to use them for something." Turns out, they weren't bad after all. The company had ripped off this computer-illiterate person, charging him hundreds of dollars for hard drives and power supplies he didn't need. I, an independent, who would not be able to afford big certifications, found and fixed this and several other problems.
Big isn't necessarily better.
(PS. I'm not of legal voting age in the US. Just to put things in perspective)
I recognize people by their sigs. Is that a bad thing?
If somebody is good at something, you recommend him or her to your friends -- and that person gets more business. If somebody is lousy at something, word gets around and the person has trouble getting work, until he's getting work only from people who are more interested in a cheap price than a quality job.
And so, 90% of the world's personal computers run junk from M$. =;>
The only "certs" I could live with would come from the Free Software Foundation, or some other professional group not affiliated with vendors.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Telent is a service on Windows. MS Terminal Service is not available on any version of Unix-like OSes that I am familiar with.
Just a Tuna in the Sea of Life
Frys does have a website. They are the same as Outpost.com as well.
Just a Tuna in the Sea of Life
However, no one in EE ever bothers to get a PE certification, unless they're designing power plants. PE is a complete waste of time and money if you're going to be working at a company, or doing anything besides power. They don't even have a VHDL section on the PE exam, and that's what most EEs do these days anyway.
I think there are tangible benefits to come of such regulations, however there are also potential drawbacks.
I do All my own maintenance and repairs on my 18 year old Audi, and on my GF's 19 year old Audi. I would definitely NOT trust Joe mechanic at the corner gas station or auto shop to fix it. If there is a task that needs completing, and I find that it's too cold outside, or I don't have time - I take it exclusively to my local independant VW/Audi Mechanic. The guy has no education or certifications to speak of, but he's been working on these cars for 25+ years out of passion for these brands. He knows more about them than any "certified" mechanic I've ever meet or heard of. Point being that a certification is not needed to produce a competant technical worker.
On the other hand, I used to work with a guy who has an MCSE (no I'm not bashing all MCSE's here) who didn't know a screw driver from a bus driver. I mean, this guy couldn't even create a simple DOS batch file, was unable to successfully implement a 2-node microsoft cluster in 2 months time, and was clueless about settings in IIS. I also knew a fellow that was an aspiring auto mechanic. Despite having 8 different industry certifications, he was an awful mechanic - and he admitted it. Point here is that a certification definitely does not equal competancy.
I think however that industry regulations would definitely weed out some of the wannabe's, though if it is an expensive or lengthy ordeal, it may deter potential talent.
Just my 2 cents.
I'd rather be a conservative nutjob than a liberal with no nuts and no job.
I've noticed that when they call a repair shop, no matter what silly little problem they might be seeing, the shop almost always concludes that the person may have a virus, and should bring it in right away (oh, and there will be a nominal $25-$50 fee to check it out). In the past two years I have seen the virus scare tactic used when people's machines:
(1) ran out of disk space -- I've seen that one three times now,
(2) had a dead modem,
(3) had an AGP slot going on the fritz,
(4) had a power switch that was flaking out,
(5) had a spent inkjet cartridge -- my favorite... oh yeah, it's a virus...
So that's seven incidents in two years with responses from everything ranging from CompUSA to the local nerd-on-the-corner. Usually I'd start out just recommending they call somebody else, but when they hit the third or fourth place claiming it was a virus, I'd break down and fix it for them -- and hopefully educate them a little in the process. (So far I've only seen one case where somebody actually had any actual mal-ware, and in that case her moron boyfriend had downloaded a fake porn EXE which proceeded to delete files. Idiot.)
On top of the virus scam, I've seen a number of very minor problems in which the shop told the person they needed a whole new computer, when it was really just a bad video card or something equally simple. I think they reserve the Big Whammy of a new machine for the scary times when the computer doesn't seem to do anything at all when the user hits the power.
These experiences have forced me to conclude that most computer repair people are either fantastically (and improbably) incompetent, or they're just outright con artists looking to scam money from people who don't know any better.
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
Just think, by the time the government comes up with a standard, you'd be certified to support a 286 PC with Dos 3.3. And the certification would probably only cost $200.
What a bargain.
Firstly:
"but they had to replace the first replacement due to a consultant that had no experience or knowledge in that type of system trying to put one in."
This has more to do with the boss knowing what he wants rather than needs.. he wants the system the marketting boys sold to him, and he wants the cheapest possible staff to come and install it for him, which is often not compatible.
Secondly, You have comeback in the auto industry, if a mechanic does work on your car and consequently the affected parts of the car fail, then you can sue him and/or the garage he works for.. And in turn they can sue the supplier of the parts, if these were sub-standard and caused the failure.
However in computing, while you may be able to sue a supplier of substandard hardware, there is no comeback for substandard software.. I can think of very few software products that fulfilled the marketting propoganda, especially before having numerous patches added, whereas those operating with vehicles have to get it right first time, and cars are thoroughly tested before theyre allowed to be sold, and are again regularly tested to ensure they remain roadworthy, A lot of old or damaged cars would still be on the road, cars which while they may still drive.. are often dangerous, noisy, and major causes of pollution, much in the same way that insecure software becomes infected with worms and/or viruses, and then pollutes the internet with furthur worm/virus infections and the associated network traffic, not to mention the danger that a worm might destroy someone`s important data, in much the same way an unsafe car might catch fire or crash.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
Many of my older friends have repaired computers for a living for many years. Being very knowledgable and expirienced, these individuals can repair just about anything a computer user can break. This expirience can not be found in certifications as they are today. If certification is forced, then expirienced technicians will loose money until they can get their certifications and money-seekers will gain the certifications without nearly the ability, knowledge, or expirience of their counterparts and will take valuable customers away, who believe they are a better choice because of the certification and new face.
What I would propose is a certification model based on the current "trust certification" we see commonly. How many technicians advertise purely on word-of-mouth? I know many who get all their bussiness through customers talking to fellow users about who to take the system to in an emergency. This trust is based on completed, successful repairs and the years they have worked on computers. Additionally, are we forgetting what has long been the number one sign of a 'computer expert'; a love of computers, which cannot be put into paper and thus which would be destroyed by regulation.
Certifications should exist, but should not be mandatory. The agency which would give out these certifications, which would not be private corporations as many current certifications, would re-issue certifications every two or three months. The primary reason for this is the "customer satisfaction rating" which consists of customer's filling out special forms which the technician sends in. On top of the normal certification levels that would be given, their expirience could at least somewhat be rated on paper, giving a much better representation of ability than most current certifications which make all who hold the same certification equal, even tho many of them were enthusiastic computer lovers for many years and others never touched a computer before entering their training course a few months before.
Question
http://www.ironfroggy.com/
Often your community college or school district will offer vechicle maint adult ed courses. These are beginner courses and are usualy a lit bit hands on. Vehicle maint is probably not real easy to learn via the web.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
There's a difference though....an incompentent lawyer gets you thrown in jail or executed, an incompetent doctor can kill or disable you, incompetent architects/engineers can make structures that can cause injury or death...
but an incompetent PC repair tech isn't going to do anything except fuck up your computer, maybe cost you a little money. People's lives aren't on the line with the average home PC. Medical, defense, and airport computers, sure, but I'd wager they don't take their shit to CompUSA when it breaks.
I don't think the PC repair industry should have to regulate or certify....that's a field where capitalism can and does weed out the wastoids.
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I don't think they do and the market is not effective yet. Have you seen any large computer vendors selling Linux desktops? I have not and still there is nothing but plans. The one or two that ever did had to make them more exensive than the windoze version of the same machine or face M$ wrath. From the coroprate perspective this makes Linux and even alternate mail clients more expensive than an all M$ set up. There are few companies or institutions that have the flexibility to experiment or impliment known good and published solutions. Dell was started in a college dorm room, but there was no Dell when it happened. Today, it is much more difficult to start such a thing and provide a cost competitive alternative to M$. The practices used to maintain this situation are what got M$ convicted of anti-trust violations.
Also it's very strange that M$ has escaped liability for their obviously defective programs. All manner of manufacturers are slapped with all manner of lawsuits for making obvious and preventable mistakes. I'm not going to defend the practice but I do note that M$ has managed to remain immune to it all.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
If it's something that transmits (except perhaps for very low power devices), then the FCC says you have to be a holder of one of their radiotelephone operator licenses.
If it doesn't transmit then any old idiot can legally work on it, and unfortunately many do.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Of course, the economic cost of the certificate will rise until it eliminates the economic gains of the controlled supply, so it's not very useful. The best example is the cab medallion system in NYC.
The point is, no one really cares about safety. It's a trick for profits.