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Confessions of a SysAdmin
Mr.Fork writes "Scott Merrill from CrunchGear has a confession. He really, really hates computers. He writes: 'No, really, I hate them. I love the communications they facilitate, I love the conveniences they provide to my life, and I love the escapism they sometimes afford; but I actually hate the computers themselves. Computers are fragile, unintuitive things — a hodge-podge of brittle hardware and opaque, restrictive software.' Does his editorial speak to all of us in similar IT-related fields? Do we all silently hate the complexities and idiosyncrasies computers have, like error messages and UI designs that make no sense to the common user, which make our tech professions miserable?"
Which make our tech professions possible.
I love computers. I wouldn't have gotten into the field if I didn't love them. The ones I hate are the developers who write the shitty bug-ridden code that gets loaded onto computers that I have to support.
"Does his editorial speak to all of us in similar IT-related fields? Do we all silently hate the complexities and idiosyncrasies computers have, like error messages and UI designs that make no sense to the common user, which make our tech professions miserable?"
No. In fact, some of those things that he 'silently hates' are some of the main motivations I use to drive the software I develop. If I didn't genuinely love this stuff, I would NOT be in IT.
You're nothing but a thing that can think of themselves.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I wish I had never turned a hobby into a profession. For the most part I enjoy what I do as a Sys Admin, but I used to come home from work and hop onto a mini programming project, or maybe i'll try some new software out.. switch from sendmail to postfix, just for the halibut.. stuff like that.
:(
Now I come home and I don't want to look at a computer or I just play some games. Kinda sad
From TFA
Well for one, copper pipe v3.5 is still backward compatible with copper pipe v2.1 and will be forward compatible with copper pipe v5.0 and beyond.
You know how it will fail and how it will age up to the point that it fails.
With computers, you simply do not know. Systems could fail tonight because of some date/time error. Patches next month can break your test machines. But if you don't install the patches, drive by banner ads infections will go up as crackers exploit the buffer overrun. And a million other possibilities.
Sounds like Steve Jobs can claim another victim.
The real shame is that the poster will probably never experience the computing environment that is provided by the Macintosh. Wincrap spoils a lot of people's attitudes concerning computers and they don't try anything else.
Computers are the Toasters of the '00s'. Our users expect them to toast. If they don't toast, they call us.
I spend my day doing many many different computer tasks. I help users, I do some light coding, I work on web pages, email servers, file servers, domain servers, track minor issues with printer drivers or email clients, and whatever else. I can really relate to the article.
The issue is that a computer as an appliance isn't a reality in the everyday world, except to users. They want them to do exactly what they expect them to do, every time, without having a 'burnt part and an uncooked part'. For those of us that spend all day dealing with computers, we come to know that it doesn't work that way. Our problem is that we live in two different realities, and they are not yet compatible.
Of course, once they really do work like a refrigerator or a toaster or a coffee maker, I'll be out of a job. Most days I'm not sure that's a bad thing.
-- I really need to bleed off some of this
Scott Merrill sounds more "fragile and unintuitive" than my computer by far.
I love them because they feed me.
Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
By and large I hate computers when I have to work on them for a living. I am stuck having to use M$ software which has all of the joy of scrubbing a toilet. Being responsible for a Microsoft Windows Server can be akin to slashing my wrists. When I am home I love computing because I get to work on my open source operating systems which return the joy of computing back to the user. Instead of being forced to do things Microsoft's way, I am free to use my computer as I see fit with creative tools that let me see what goes on behind the scenes. I am free to do imaginative things with my computer which brings real joy. My intention is not to bash M$ but to show how openness can make something more fun and imaginative to use.
I know you were aiming for a "funny" mod but in my experience macs tend to be some of the most stable consumer computers (short of custom-built machines where the person who built it spent a lot of time researching the parts and then testing that everything worked satisfactory before beginning to actually use the machine). Compared to the average whitebox OEM Wintel machine (or even Dell, HP and similar desktops) I've had much less trouble with macs, sure there are still problems but when we bought 40+ Dell and Fujitsu-Siemens machines (various models) at work our helpdesk guys ended up having to return almost half of the machines in the first couple of months due to overheating issues, glitchy NICs and other stuff that should "just work". That's what you get when you consistently go with the cheapest possible parts (sometimes a few cents difference on a chip that costs ~$1 can make a big difference) and you're always hopping between different models and manufacturers to always get the lowest possible hardware cost.
Greylisting is to SMTP as NAT is to IPv4
It seems this guy's issues are ultimately mostly Windows-specific rather than anything specific to computers in general. He even takes time out to say how good OSX and Linux's package management is compared to Windows, yet he clearly still uses Windows as his primary OS.
Basically this guys problems are mostly self-inflicted, as he clearly knows about the alternatives yet still forces himself to keep going with the crappiest option.
Computers know just how you feel about them... and they also hate being anthropomorphized!
But seriously, it is scary how often my wife will complain to me "this doesn't work!" as she is clicking away on a web form, but when I go over and calmly click the submit button, it works perfectly. I honestly have no idea what she is doing wrong.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
I agree with you on some points, but disagree on others.
I agree that most of the problem is crappy software. It does, however, make me appreciate the truly good software even more.
I agree that there is something to be said for understanding how everything works to a fine degree. However, I think that ability to mentally "chunk" systems you don't care about, and just think of them on a high level, is absolutely crucial to progress. I also think that kids today will find the same kind of joys writing XNA games, or iPhone apps, or fooling around and making "cool stuff" in just about any language.
I also think that it's possible to constuct a useful conceptual framework of the underlying layers without needing to know what's going on down the nth degree. Depending on how you look at it, that 16k program that you think you grok completely, depends on the interplay of concepts all the way down to the subatomic level. With respect to understanding how your program works, do you really need to know the specifics?
Likewise, if I'm programming in a language, interpreted by a VM, memory managed, providing frameworks to do things like render graphics, play sound, interpret input, etc, do I really need to understand how an ALU works to fully understand my program? I don't think so.
(Playing devil's advocate a bit, as I'm quite obsessive about understanding things from the bottom up. But I understand that this is a personal quirk, and that it's not necessary, given reliable substrates and effective models)
Why do you think I buried windows and got a mac? if I am going to have a nagging wife she had at least better look sexy even if she isn't any more functional.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
No, I do not "feel exactly the same way" any more than I hate my piano because it's hard to play and took me twenty years to play well.
Absolutely not. If I wanted something I could just turn on and have work, I'd still own a television. I bought a Commodore 64 and an Apple II and Macintosh and then a string of PCs of various brands and flavors because of their "complexities and idiosyncrasies" not despite them. And yes, I worked for several years while going through grad school, fixing computers and supporting end users. It might have altered my view of the intelligence of the average person, but it didn't change my delight with complex, idiosyncratic computers that I could install the software I want and configure it the way I want and use it for the purposes I want. Which, by the way, is the main reason I've lost a great deal of respect for Apple (and Sony).
The beauty of the personal computer was that I could wipe the hard drive and put it together the way I wanted. I could put a different operating system on it, or a newer (or older) version of my current operating system. I could open the box and mess with the noodles. I could download sketchy warez and pay the price if I wanted. I could learn about busses and mac addresses and baud rates and overclocking. I could haunt the back aisles of computer shops buying parts and I could make it MINE in a way that is only seen in ham radio, amateur electronics and certain segments of the automotive culture. Personal computers represented everything that homogenized consumer culture was not.
And, of course, that attitude, that ethic, that weltanschauung is why I started coming to Slashdot. That, and the opportunity to occasionally be shocked with a photo of a man wrenching open his poop-chute. But mainly the first stuff.
"Hate computers"? Not a chance. But I find it sad that the sysadmin in TFA has found himself in a life he hates. I hope he figures out that time is short, and it's best to do stuff you love.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Computers are fragile, unintuitive things...a hodge-podge of brittle hardware
Sounds like Steve Jobs can claim another victim.
Sounds more to me like he's about to get another customer.
And that (the video you linked to) is why the iPad is doing better than us Techno-geeks expected. Indeed, it is why the iPhone and the iMac are doing well.
Computers are mostly brittle - I had my main PC crash last night because of something to do with the graphics card - I still don't know what.
But this little old lady in that video with the iPad? Brilliant. She can get to use it right away - she does not need to understand drivers, or compatibility or any of the other crap that we deal with on a regular basis. As long as it does email, web, IM and facebook, that is all most people would ever want.
It is when we go beyond those basics that computers start to suck. Like my dealing with a pissy PBX, or a switch that I can't log into from some subnets...
The ipad gets rid of most of those problems (to a very large degree). I remember an old man coming up to me years ago when I worked at Staples selling computers (that was an awful job, but it was a start). He grabbed the mouse, and immediately picked it up in the air, and began waving it about to try to get the cursor to move on the screen. We don't think of it like this, but just using the mouse is a different skill. Using the ipad generally involves using skills that we already have gained outside computing - as can be demonstrated by this lady's use of the ipad.
Hopefully, computers begin to suck less - like the ipad. (Just without the DRM BS behind the scenes).
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!
"...but, in the end, the computer still is that magical logical machine. That's my view -- is it yours?"
No. At some point any sufficiently complex piece of deterministic logic becomes indistinguishable from randomness, and PCs are past that point for me. The beauty of the underlying logical machine is totally obscured by the apparent randomness of errors that go away after rebooting (or sometimes just issuing the same command again). Some days my map prints perfectly, some days it comes out with extraneous pink lines all over Florida, some days it crashes the plotter so badly it needs a hard reset. Logically, I know the problem isn't "luck" or satanic printer gremlins, and that it must be some subtle, deterministic interaction between the source data, the GIS software, Windows, HP's print driver, and their plotter firmware, but damned if I have the time or the skill or the source code to track it down. It's easier to just mumble obscenities about wasting ink and paper and try again (faster, and more likely to result in a correct print, too).
0 1 - just my two bits
So, I replied before actually reading TFA, but I went back to read it and - the guy's right. 100% correct. And I had an epiphany. The iPad is actually something cool, not a fanboy money-grabbing POS. Well, maybe it's that too. But, from my understanding, it is this one piece deal, not a bunch of wires connecting monitor, keyboard and mouse, not something you open up and install new shit in when the old shit runs 10 milliseconds slower now. Just "Here, this does cool stuff, and no, you can't really dick with it." Now, I got no notion about the software, so that probably sucks, but the idea of the hardware is cool.
I know too much about the internal structure of my PC. And I'm still running XP, because it's good enough for my purposes. Did we really need Vista? Is Windows 7 that much of an improvement? Or did MS just want to make another few billion dollars? I suspect most problems with computers is the latter. "Sure, you've got 10 pixels _now_. But wouldn't you like to have _11_ pixels?" No, no I would not.
So wait, how much would 11 cost me?
Everything you know is wrong, Just forget the words and sing along.
I'll grant you that. There is a lot to learn to get started and it can be frustrating. Likewise, getting all those muscles working right to walk can be hard, and all those RULES for driving are a pain. But I love walking and I love driving because I know how and find them fun. If some idiot cuts me off and drives 5 mph under the speed limit, I don't hate DRIVING. I hate THAT GUY. Likewise, if some idiot makes a crappy program or whatnot, I don't hate my computer for it. I get mad at him and move on.
Pulp Audio Weekly - Geek News and Reviews
You mean, they check to make sure their screen is turned on before calling support?
Our culture doesn't get smarter, it just finds new ways of being retarded.
I've been reading Slashdot since '98 and am finally posting something. Personally, I can understand his hatred. I'm 29 now, and at 3 I got my first computer. (Mac 128k) At around 6 I got my first IBM PC. (Packard Bell) At 11 I started volunteering with a program at my school rebuilding donated PCs. With no manuals, swapping cards and guessing jumper settings was always fun. At 13 I started my first BBS. Unfortunately, about 2 weeks later the internet came to my town, I was not pleased. At 16, for the first time I made some money with computers. I reinstalled Windows for a friend of the family, made myself 20 bucks, was quite pleased. At 18 I started college for Network Administration. 4.0 GPA, top of my class, breezed through everything. Got a job writing Access databases for $18 an hour. (!!!) At 19 I was making over $100,000 a year, cash, with my own business. Networking small business, selling PCs and dumb terminals, wiring rich peoples houses in Boca Raton. Dropped out of college, found I didn't have a need for it. At 20, I had 2 businesses, 10 employees, and was the East Coast Tech Manager for a blooming digital photography company. I had to constantly raise prices to be able to make my appointments. I was charging $100 just to show up. Flying to New York twice a month just to go clubbing. Every night was a party, shopping sprees every few days, no money went unspent. Just before I hit 21, I gave the my work cell to a friend and joined the US Marine Corps. If I hadn't, my lifestyle would most likely have killed me. They gave me a job as a firefighter and that's what I've been doing since then. Sure, I'll help someone out from time to time. I ran an ISP in Afghanistan for about a year and a half for the 60 of us in the fire hall plus some neighbors. I built myself a gaming rig (never played anything on it but Spider Solitaire). I read about tech constantly, check Slashdot and Engadget at least 10 times a day. I've never looked back. Computers had been fun for me since I was in short pants. Working in the field, although profitable, sucked ALL the enjoyment out of it. I couldn't take the complaining and the stupid problems any more. I once drove 2 hours each way on a warranty call because the lady was pressing the floppy eject button to try and restart her computer. I hate my job now, much more than working in computers, but at least I can get some satisfaction from playing with my toys now. Tinkering is fun again. In my case, doing what I loved for a living turned out to be miserable. Like the author, I can honestly say I hated computers, and still hate them now. There is always something that doesn't work quite right, some little issue preventing me from doing just what I want to do. At least now, on my own time, I can try to figure out which of the 12 USB devices I have plugged in is causing them all to stop, or try to get the damn sound to come out of the right damn output for my Blu-Rays. I think we all get the thrill from the chase, and when your chasing the same stupid thing day in and day out you just get tired of it. Good on him if he goes and becomes a plumber. He'll probably hate that too, but maybe he'll get his love for computers back, and to me that makes it worth it.
Especially when your ability to use them results in a decent paycheck?
I would much rather have the people who hate computers just stay the hell away from them, while "me and mine" take advantage of their prejudice and earn a living.
Wherever You Go, There You Are
That is why I use Linux.
The bitch is ugly, but she has big boobs and gets the job done.
Also, none of my friends want to "use" her.
I always saw Linux as the smart bookish chick who dresses frumpy, doesn't put too much effort into how she looks and seems kind of plain at first, and she busts your balls a bit when you try to initiate a relationship, but then when you get to know her she lets her hair out and unbuttons her shirt a bit and DOOOINNNGGG! Keeper. And none of your friends know how hot she really is.
Of course she's very sarcastic, it's up to you whether you see that as a good thing or a bad thing.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Ubuntu
lol you may be a geek compared to most, but you still have to learn a lot before calling yourself a geek on tech forum.
Dear Apple fanboy,
Please take your tablet computer and go spam another topic about it, preferably one about your precious consumer product. Really, can't you just go away?
Fanboi?
Well, yes, I am typing this on an iMac. I have a custom-built windows XP gaming machine to my right. I have a Mythbuntu Linux box in the corner, and 2 other Linux machines in my shelving.
Fanboi? No. Realist? Yes.
I am not a mac fan, I ended up with my current one that I am typing this on, a 17" intel iMac because I bought it for my Mom who was having too many troubles with her PC. My tech support calls just went away after I got her this - apart from 2 calls that I would have had to make myself to get appropriate passwords to make things work.
Why do I have this iMac now? because she liked it so much she upgraded to a newer 22" iMac, that is why.
Apple Fanboi I am not.
I use Linux, Windows, Solaris, Mac, *ANYTHING* that gets the job done.
My computers are tools. I use them like tools to do a job. Fanboi status is for idiots. That old lady in the video? She is not a faboi, she is a woman that wants to communicate with friends and relatives. The ipad is a great tool for her for that purpose.
As soon as you lose sight of the fact that a computer is just a tool, they begin to suck even more than they do already.
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!
More than a few times I've asked myself "What have those horrible, horrible users done to that poor, innocent computer now?"