Jodi Speaks Her Mind

Outline help 4/25/2005

Does anyone know of a basic online outliner? I’m not even sure if something like this exists, so I figured all I can do is ask. At home I can use OmniOutliner, but I’d prefer something that can be accessed anytime from anywhere. Thanks!

Pardon The Dust 3/21/2005

I’m hacking on Jodi’s site tonight, folks, please be patient.

–Steve

Headline: Microsoft partners with IT Departments to wreak havoc 10/27/2004

Excuse me for a moment while I yell awhile.

< Rant >

Our ITS Department, despite their bad attitudes, generally work hard to keep things working for us. However, an increasing number of bad decisions are becoming evident the longer I work here.

A month ago they came through our entire office and “upgraded” our computers. “Upgraded” in the Microsoft world is more akin to destruction and eternal frustration than anything that might be considered beneficial. Here is a basic summary of what they did and the results:

What they did:

• Upgraded most of us to Office 2003 (including Outlook 2003)
• Installed Service Pack 2 for Windows XP users (like myself)
• Upgraded my Acrobat to version 6.0 (hello Fisher Price!)
• Switched out our server from a 50GB server to a 150 GB server
• No doubt other things which we know nothing about

The results:

• MS Word uses this ridiculous “reader view” as the default. stupid stupid stupid!
• Nevermind. Forget the specific annoyances of MS Office. Most people are well aware of the hell that is MS Word. My latest issue is that as of today I no longer have any scrollbars in Word. None. Already tried rebooting my machine. Sheesh.
• SP2. Not sure it’s a good idea to get me started on this one. Too many problems to detail here, but I’m sure there are tech support sites galore covering the problems with this upgrade.
• Acrobat upgrade. Adobe did add some improvements and enhancements but the new user interface is awful. Huge buttons everywhere, and something is screwy with the way Acrobat communicates with printers now, because it takes about 30-40 seconds for the print dialogue box to show up after clicking print (or clicking the print icon). My biggest problem with the Acrobat upgrade is that it was so dramatically different from the last version and I rely on it daily for time-critical work. Trying to work efficiently with new software is impossible. The stress that this caused me is noteworthy.
• The biggest day to day issue I have had since the upgrade is that everything has gotten slower than molassas (no, slower!). Several people in our office have notified ITS about this problem, but they don’t seem interested in helping us become productive again.
• My other constant issue of annoyance has to do with customization. I love the way I can customize everything on the Mac. But with the PC, I just can’t seem to get it figured out to make things function the way I want them to. I’ve tried getting ITS to help, but they have more important things to do than assist me in developing a pleasant tolerable user environment. Instead they spend their time fixing broken machines that are 3-4 years old (which for a PC is about 90 in people years), running upgrades like SP2, upgrading servers from 50GB (which was maxed out on a regular basis) to 150GB. Hello, there are terabyte machines out there, guys! 50 - 150 is like cutting off a half-inch of hair when you need 4 inches taken off. It’s a slight improvement, but, really, what’s the point!? E-mail going down seems to be a regular thing here, so they will often spend a day or two desperately trying to get it up again at a given location.
• Now, while I have your attention, let me complain a little more… Another employee and I are using some special database software that nobody else in the company uses. We have had many headaches using their software, which seems a bit antiquated to me. This fellow employee informs me that the version we are using (SQL-based) is in fact old, and the company is mainly promoting their latest version which is entirely web-based. I asked her why they didn’t just get the web-based version and she said the ITS department didn’t want to do whatever would have been required of them to make it work. Huh!? It’s web-based! Worst case scenario is you have to download a plug-in or two (and no doubt use the latest version of I.E. - oh joy!). ITS also refused to let the database portion rest on the server and insisted it run off her C-drive. So does it get backed up? No. Can I access it from my computer? Not currently - evidently when ITS did the above-listed upgrades, they screwed something up and now it won’t work! We’re told by the company that issued the product that the problem is related to SP2, but our ITS department seems way too clueless thus far to actually help us.

Argh. Sadly, I could go on and on and on. I’m actually getting tired of yelling, so I’ll stop for today.

< /Rant >

Overall I love the company I work for, but their ITS processes and policies leave much to be desired.

Wireless made complicated 10/22/2004

I guess I’ve taken for granted how easy it is to make use of a wireless card on a Mac. Here at work they finally set up some of the laptops to use wireless cards, and they installed those big, ugly, blue wireless routers in the conference rooms so they sit in the middle of the conference tables! But that wasn’t even enough - each router is positioned right next to the piles of ethernet cords that remain plugged in because too many people still don’t have wireless or don’t have it activated or even more likely don’t know how to make it work. The ITS people e-mailed out instructions on how to set it up and make it work on your computer. Said instructions are FIVE pages long and include several detailed pictures along with instructions for the things which have to be turned OFF in order to be turned back on again. Evidently PC laptops are also equipped with some sort of external “switch” you have to engage in order to turn on the hardware itself.

What kind of insanity is this? It’s 2004 for goodness’ sake! You should be able to install the wireless card, boot your computer and GO!

Thank you, Apple, for making our lives simpler and mainly just for making things that WORK.

Browsing Delights! 8/20/2004

I have been so spoiled at home with my Safari web browser that I finally gave in at work and had Steve walk me through switching to Firefox. I have tabbed browsing again! Popup ads will be blocked (more effectively than I.E. I hope), and the Google search box doesn’t take up space where the browser window should be.

I’m quite excited and am reasonably confident that our ITS Department won’t pitch a fit since the U.S. Government suggest switching to alternate browsers due to the security flaws in I.E.