D A U S T O R I E S The English Collection Introducing the Dumb User Story List Version 1.0. The editor has tried to identify the source of each story but makes no claims as to the authenticity of some of the more outrageous stories. A friend of mine was on the phone with a tech rep from another company. That tech rep called in to ask some questions about system setup, as the company this tech works for actually sells, installs and warranties systems. While they were on the phone, this tech rep received an incoming call, which he took after. When the caller hung up, the tech rep came back on the phone, laughing like a crazy person. This is the call he took: Caller: "Hello, is this Tech Support?" Tech Rep: "Yes, it is. How may I help you?" Caller: "The cup holder on my PC is broken and I am within my warranty period. How do I go about getting that fixed?" Tech Rep: "I'm sorry, but did you say a cup holder?" Caller: "Yes, it's attached to the front of my computer." Tech Rep: "Please excuse me if I seem a bit stumped, it's because I am. Did you receive this as part of a promotional, at a trade show? How did you get this cup holder? Does it have any trademark on it?" Caller: "It came with my computer, I don't know anything about a promotional. It just has '4X' on it." At this point the Tech Rep had to mute the caller, because he couldn't stand it. The caller had been using the load drawer of the CD-ROM drive as a cup holder, and snapped it off the drive. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * User: How do I send a file to my friend on VAX? Me: Where are you logged in now? User: So I say SEND then what? Me: No...I need to know what machine you're on. User: Okay, so I SEND and it wants to know To:...what do I put there? Me: WHAT MACHINE ARE YOU LOGGED IN ON? User: Oh...I'm on TOPS-E. Me: Thank you. Now, what machine is the person to whom you want to send the file? User: He's on CPWSCA. Me: Okay...you want to go into MM, say SEND user@CPWPSCA.Bitnet, then use ^B to include the file as part of your message text. User: I can't just send it to him as a file? Me: No...for that you'd have to be on a Bitnet node...The TOPSen aren't on Bitnet. User: Well, what if I want to send it to the normal VAX? Me: What is the "normal" VAX? User: You know, VAX-B. Me: Oh, you can't send it there unless you FTP it to there and then on VAX-B (which is really CMCCVB) you can use SEND/FILE/VMS to your friend on CPWPSCA. User: But he's on CPWSCA. See this mail message? Me: I know, but that machine's Bitnet address is CPWPSCA. User: Oh, okay. After all this, the files did get sent, so I guess it was worth it. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * My personal favorite: "Will it help if I read the documentation?" (Probably not if they have to even ask the question.) * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * hahaha... that's almost as good as the person I witnessed trying to cram an IBM PC disk into a Macintosh... Now THAT was hilarious... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "Yes, Professor V------ calling from the Physics Department. I've printed a twenty thousand line listing on our department printer and it's been running for about two hours now - People are starting to complain, and I don't really need the listing anymore. Can you purge it please?" Or the user who had turned off their command line in XEDIT, and had a PF key defined as "FILE". Of course, his disk became full and when he tried to file was stuck in the editor. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * One of my favorites was the user that called me up and wanted to know if he could use his Apple //e to call in to our system. Our system is an IBM3081, so trying to use an Apple is like mixing oil and water (but it is possible). After explaining to him about parity, baud rate, and all the other 'fun' things he would need to know, I asked him what communictaions program he would be using. I needed to know what type of terminal he would be emulating. He then asked me what a 'terminal' was, and what a 'communications program' was. UGH!!!! I *CA LMLY* explained what they were and he was still all confused. He then told me that he tried to call in last night and couldn't get through. OK, a place to start?? I asked him what phone number he dialed. THIS HE KNEW!!! It was the right number. If he got a '#' sign, (our network prompt). He replied NO. I asked him what type of modem he was using. WHAT'S A MODEM?? DO I NEED ONE???? Turns out, this, do I dare say, person, went home, turned on his Apple, and starting typing system commands and kept getting "?SYNTAX ERROR"!! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * This is just what the doctor ordered this week... all these wonderful stories. Truth IS stranger than fiction... Another favorite: Student: "I need to buy a copy of the IBM versus COBOL manual." (Actually, the student was probably more correct than we care to admit, but we sold him IBM VS COBOL anyway... ) * * * * * * * * * * * * * * When I was a student consultant many years ago at Ohio Uni versity, one situation occurred I will always remember. One girl kept coming in expecting the consultants to help her debug her WATFIV program. She seemed to have no desire to try to track down her own bugs. One day she came in again, and as usual, just gave me the listing and silently expected me to tell her what was wrong. This time I just asked her directly, what was wrong with it: She: The answers are wrong! Me: Do you know what the answers are supposed to be? She: Yes. Me: Where did you get them. She: I worked them out on my calculator. I presumed she did her calculator work right. I got up and closed the door, then sat back down. Me: OK, don't tell anyone this, but there is a problem with the computer somewhere. One of the circuit boards is bad, but we have not figured out which one it is, yet. She: I knew it! Me: Well, if we could tell just what statememt was being calculated wrong then we'd know which circuit bo ard it is. The trouble is it works fine on our programs. She: So now what? I gotta hand this in next week. Me: Here's what to do.... I then showed her how to very simply write out intermediate results and just "divide and conquer" the problem until she found it. I was taking a risk that this would not backfire. She then left with a big smile on her face. I guess she thought she had finally beaten the machine and was now out to prove it. The next day she came back to tell me s he had found a mistake in her own program and corrected it and got the right answer. She: There's nothing wrong with the computer is there? Me: No! She: So you just tricked me to get me to fix my own program. Me: Yes. She: Well, I guess it worked, and now I know how to find the problems. That was the only time I ever did anything like that as a consultant. Comments: E: Original tag was FROM: U18323 at UICVM (Bob Bob Johnson <312> 996 -2491) I don't want to be accused of being cruel by perpetuating the stories 'we' find funny - but this one, i feel, is a must. One of our consultants here received a call from a user stating that every time he tried to logon he received a message like syntax error. Well our consultant, being well versed in dealing with these situations, asked where he was trying to logon from. The user stated he was at home and trying to log on from his place for the first time. The consultant asked waht kind of modem he was trying to use, with this the user asked what a modem was, the consultant then asked the user what software package he was using. The user responded with, I don't know what a modem or software is - I'm sitting here at home with my Commodore 64 and I'm typing in "LOGON Uxxxxx" and I'm getting a syntax error....... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * hey folks...someone takin these down...cary must have phd in... patience peace and practicuum stories by now... for those not blest'enuf to have...gotten to the party early... computers...think back a machine generation or more...to eam... or pcam...(punched card) equipment... situation....era late sixties...young lady entering dreaded new area known as...COMPUTER CENTER...hopes that this time the data would finally be correct....on the latest listing....but not so ....having made several runs....she finally...turns for help... result......in the course of her story she explains how she had mo st diligently encoded the punched card...with the appropriate data...at the very specific area required on the card... but...lo and behold.....she did it.....in PENCIL...!!... not really knowing the machine could NOT read it...!! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * I was one of the advant garde foolish enough to start up a users' group in Minneapolis in 1980. I also foolishly gave my phone number out in case people "had problems." The following question occured at least 15 times and all too often by graduate and undergraduate students in computer science, no less!: "The public domain software you gave out at the last meeting doesn't work. every time that I try to boot it I get told that the diskette is a non system diskette." or its only slightly more literate variant: "Every time I try to type GAME.BAS at the DOS prompt, I get told bad file." or for those who got as far as the documentation file on the diskette (full paper documentation also accompanied these early diskettes, which noone calling seemed to read...) "Every time I type "filename".EXE I get told that "filename" doesn't exist." I can understand novices doing things like this and I think that a quiet respect for whatever their discipline is is in order while they respect ours. While I try to be nice to people who come to me with questions, I don't appreciate being bullied by someone who is frustrated and looking for someone to yell at. I am continuously amazed, however, by the sometime lack of common sense employed by some of t he "qualified professionals" who ought to know better. Witness the programmer who wanted to write a series of numbers to a tape: The method employed was to make each number a file, write an assembler program which would interface with a fortran program which would write a number to the tape, rewind the tape, forward space the appropriate number of files, and then write the next number, rewind the tape, forward the tape the appropriate file number, write another single number, etc. This was then passe d to another assembler program which removed file markers. This man took 8 months to write a roughly 500K file to tape. (before PC's). He was also convinced it was the * only * one true way to write to a tape, and is (here is where the horror really begins!) president of his own admittedly struggling software company for IBM PC software. The above story is absolutely true. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * How about this one for you VM/CMS people Users who put IPL CMS in their PR OFILE EXEC * * * * * * * * * * * * * * We had a Dec running two drives with removable packs. As part of our yearly upkeep, a "unnamed" company would come in and certify all the running packs. This certification meant that the company would pay if the pack crashed within a year. Well, the usual inspection time was about two hours per pack. This guy spent 15 minutes - on both packs. "Anything else to look at?" he asked. It just so happened that I had 6 "gift packs" given to me by a friend who trashed their drive. These were "as is", but I figured the inspector might have some fun. Guess what? They passed the inspection and were certified as usable. What would any good computer person do next? Right. Mount them and take a look. My boss had left around five, now it was midnight. Mount new pack one. Hmmm. File unsafe light. WHAT TO DO? Right! Try it in the second drive. Powered up and listened to a good 15 second squeal. Wake boss up. Explain. Listen. Plead for job. Next day, called unname d company. "We didn't certify those packs!" "But they have your company seal." "Read me the date on that seal." "Yesterday" "That salesman's fired." Final total: 4 packs replaced, and 11 heads. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Which reminds me of folks who like to do to poor users of VAX/VMS... Execute the command: DELETE/COMMAND LOGOUT Not to insult another user friend of mine, but I understand that some users fear the the terminal "giggles at them" when the user turn s around... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Well, with all these horror stories floating around, I thought I'd like to toss in my two dollars worth... User comes in and says, "I'm having problems getting the computer to read this disk." SC says, "can I see the disk?" User takes disk out of back pocket and unfolds it... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * And for VMS people: I had a user who had put $ LOGOUT in his login.com file. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Two oldies (but still goodies...): A FORTRAN program C READ A C COMPUTE INVERSE OF MATRIX A END User: Why doesn't my program work? (A real pgm - I kid you not...). ---------- User can't get his program read into the cardreader... Me: Can I see the deck? User: here... And hands me several handwritten sheets of looseleaf. NOW I knew why I kept having to unjam the cardreader and was always finding little pieces of white paper in the works... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Once upon a time, at the beginning of a quarter, a frosh comes in, plops his printout down on my desk (to this DAY I do not know how he got a printout!), and says "My FORTRAN program isn't working." I take a look at his code and say "You know, there is a VERY good reason why your FORTRAN program isn't working. THIS is NOT a FORTRAN program. THIS is a BASIC program. You've shifted everything over seven columns, but this is STILL a BASIC program." The user loo ks at me, and says "I thought that was what FORTRAN was!" * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * I've always tried to believe that when the user couldn't make something work, it was because we hadn't simplified it enough, even though that often implies removing flexibility. Still, we really concentrate on creating commands that generate full-screen menus from which users can just pick what they want. It doesn't always work. A finance prof calls and complains to me that no one over ther e can access the Value-line extract file (we wrote a special report-generating program to access a special extract disk file just for his class.) It seems he was capable of updating one card and sticking it back in the deck and handing it to the operator, but when we moved to CMS a couple of years ago, out went the cards. Learning to use an editor apparently was out of the question, so I went to an analyst and said, "create this guy a one word command that will give him a screen where he just fills in the ticks and years, etc. and his report is generated and prints on the line printer there in the Business building." The day after we give the prof the new command, he calls in raging, complaining that he spent three hours trying to get it to work, but all he got was "command not valid", PF3 not defined, etc. I guess we didn't make it clear enough that he had to log on before he issued his command! And this guy is a millionaire through his expertise in finance!! One more... (These guys get degrees?) We generate a plot for a grad student...outlines of counties, with the names superimposed. Problem is, the names are too large and spill over the county boundaries. No problem, he says. He'll just take it to his departmental copier and reduce it. It took a while before it sunk in that he actually planned to reduce the words, but not the boundaries, with his Xerox! And he teaches the graphics classes in his department. OK, maybe it's not always our fault. But if there were just a way to teach anyone exactly what they needed to know, and no more, in say, 30 minutes, they would be happy. That's all they really want.... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Here at CMU, there are two organizations that have a published telephone number for a "User Consultant" These are the University Computation Center (UCC), and the Pittsburgh Supercomputer Center (PSC) (for the Cray XMP). One day, someone new in PSC didn't know that there were two numbers and was forwarding her telephone calls for the "User Consultant" to the University Operator who was forwarding them to me at the UCC........ below is what transpired. ---------------------------------------------- A user called from out of state with a Cray problem, he stated he was affiliated with PSC. I forwarded him to x6350, the PSC User Consultant. The same thing happened two more times. So I asked, before forwarding the third user, how he got to me. He said he called some 800 number and was forwarded to the Operator (CMU) who forwarded the call to me at x2667. (UCC User Consultant) I then called the PSC User Consultant myself, (x6350) in an effort to straighten out the problem. Apparently the UCON phone at PSC had either been forwarded somewhere else or the UCON was out at the moment, because as I explained the problem to her she said that she had forwarded these people to the Operator (CMU). I told her that this was incorrect and that they should not have been forwarded. She said that she would take care of the problem. I then called the CMU Operator ,x2000, just to be sure. After the woman answered, I said, "Hello, this is the User Consultant over in the UCC." She cut me off and said, "Hold please..." click, (five seconds or so later) click. "I'm sorry sir, that number is busy now." Well, you can imagine how I felt then. Anyways, I explained to this person the problem that there are TWO user consultant numbers in this University, one for the UCC and one for PSC, and she said that she woul d make a note of it. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Perhaps the above pun is not truly appropriate, after all, isn't that what we Consulting people are here for? Much of how dealing with those who have difficulty using our systems is attitude -- if you can keep the user calm, it usually goes much better, for they are more likely to realize that both of us are there for the same purpose ... I am sure you all have heard this sort of lecture before, and there is only so much one can take a single sitting. [I never knew how much patience I could muster until I met a grad student who took me almost 10 minutes to teach how to type a control-Z!] We try to only schedule consulting staff members for a maximum of 2 hours at the "Desk", usually only once per day. The Desk is staffed with at lest 2 people at a time during most of the day, allowing one to take a break to get some "consulting fuel" -- your favorite analgesic -- if the need arises. One of my coworkers had an experience of a user that came to him complaining that he was having troubles logging in to his terminal. The instructions were explained to him very carefully and even written out for him The user replied: "I think I tried that", and went off to try again. He came back a few minutes later saying that he followed the instructions, and even switched terminals to 1 that was just being used with no better results. "Lead me to the terminal, and show me what the problem is", the consultant said. The user then proceeded to take him to a keypunch! Perhaps laughing at them helps to keep us sane ... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Let's now take a look at the user side of the coin... We teach the users about these neat new (expensive!) toys called... C O M P U T E R S The first thing we tell them is that they can't break them. (This is assuming we restrain acts of physical violence, of course.) Okay, now they have to learn to use the Ctrl key...So we tell them it's just like the Shift key. Fine -- they're on their way to being happy computer campers. Then what do we do? We teach them how to use Escape. Escape -- another new key for them. What do they figure out? They guess that they have to hold it down while they press the next key. If they are slow typists, then they most likely get it to repeat a couple times only for the computer to beep at them, or worse, put up a "Mini-Buffer" (Tops-20 EMACS) on their screen. At this point, they have to ask someone what's happened and where did the first part of their file go when this Mini-Buffer appeared. But, living with our guilt, we explain that they didn't break it, they didn't lose their file, and the Escape key is just like a real letter key and they don't have to hold it down. But let's start even a little before this...How many of you remember the first type you saw an IBM PC keyboard? I remember it well -- it was my second day at my new high school. (A residential high s chool as well, if that adds any flavor to the story.) A few of us computer nerds found the fourth floor of Bryan Hall, where the math department and the computers were. There were I B M P C s all around. So, we turn them on and *try* to start playing with them. Lo and behold -- there's no Enter or Return key. There's this one key with a funny broken arrow on it where the Return key should be, but, by golly, every keyboard I had seen up to that time had Return (or Enter from the TRS-80's) writ ten on it, not just a funny arrow. With a little experimentation, we find that indeed we had found the Return key. Then we want to back space. We press the key marked Del several times to find it doesn't do what we want. Who would suspect a large arrowhead stuck to a small line pointing to the left would delete the previous character? I've used DEC equipment...They always said "Del" (which didn't work on this IBM creature) or even "Rubout", which always was a little rough for me. :-) Oh, let 's not forget the Shift keys. They have hollow arrows pointing up. If it weren't for the semi-standard of a keyboard, I'd still be struggling to remember how to correct any mistakes I had. I agree with the users -- the terminals (and PC's) are giggling at us. But it's okay; I giggle back. I can pull the plug. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * How about those folks to try to compile their .LOG files? That's when the batch queues giggle!!! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * My favorite is a tape tale. Like most universities, our site has some locally written tape utilities to assist users in backing up their CMS files to MVS tapes. These utilities, of course, were designed for use ONLY at our installation and not only will they not be available at other sites, but will create tape files that other MVS and CMS sites will not be able to read. One of our users thought he would out-smart us, though. We had warned him NOT to use these utilities to create a tape copy of his files to take with him when he left. Obviously we must not have explained the situation in sufficient detail - He used the utilities to create the tape, then he copied the utilies themselves (using them to copy themselves) to the SAME tape and wondered why he couldn't access his files. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * This bulletin just in ... Got a call in here today from a faculty member who was asking about transferring a file from the word processor on the Admin VAX, which uses All-in-1, to Mass-11 on the Acad VAX. This person was wondering, "will the changes in All-in-1 be saved?" Well, we said, you have to move it out to a standard text file, so you'll lose things like underlining and superscripting, but the text should come through fine . . . one would think. Turns out that, while the Public Relations office was working on this file in All-in-1, the unnamed faculty member was working on the same thing in Mass-11!! So, the question really was, "can I transfer this file into Mass-11 in such a way that it will merge with an existing version, magically changing only those portions which are different in the two versions?" I can't wait for the students to get back. At least then, the faculty will be too busy for such mischief. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Once upon a time in a computer centre a long long way from here... Cambrigde England to be exact a user presented the computer center with the results of their experiements. The computer would not accept them. When printed out (they were on paper tape) they were gibberish. When they asked the user - he said but I used the code you told me to use! Suddenly an older computer expert saw the light an asked - when was that? The user said - well I started the experiments 5 years ago. The data was coded for a machine called EDSAC 1. The computer center was using the EDSAC 2. In the meanwhile they had changed the code for the data. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * This article appeared on our bulletin board recently. It comes from PC Week; that's all I know about it. Micro Manager Shares Vintage Stories About Novice Users' Pratfalls _________ Swapping war stories was a favorite pastime for many of the microcomputer managers who attended an Information Center conference this month in New Orleans. Some vintage tales about user antics were told by Francie D. Mendlesohn, IC manager at the US Food and Drug Administration's Parklawn Computer Center in Roc kville, Md. One user had some trouble with a piece of software. Ms. Mendlesohn suggested the user send a "copy of the diskette" to her office for evaluation. She received neatly Xeroxed copies of the troublesome diskette. "At least he knew it was a double-sided diskette because he sent me two copies - one for each side of the disk," she cracked. Providing telephone support also has its pitfalls. Technicians try to go step by agonizing step trying to teach a new user how to boot a PC for the first time. You tell them to switch on the machine; you tell them to insert the diskette in the disk drive; and then you tell them to shut the {disk drive} door. "Then," she said, "they put down the phone and in a second you hear them slam their office door." Many users have trouble deciphering simple instructions. When confronted with the command, "Strike Any Key When Ready" some users call the IC in a panic, crying "I can't find the 'Any' key!" Some hardware problems are very easy to diagn ose. Ms. Mendlesohn recalls the time when a user called to say that his PC monitor just went blank. She told the user to check behind the machine to make sure that the monitor cable had not shaken loose. "I can't see anything back there," the user responded. "We've just had a power failure and its too dare to see in my office." Then there are some PC spare parts that no IC can stock enough of. This was proved when a user phoned in an unusual requisition. "I want to order a cursor for my new PC." ______________________ Our tax dollars hard at work, eh? It just goes to prove that the government doesn't discriminate on the basis of race, creed, color or ability. School starts in one week... I'm not sure I'm ready to face the huddled masses again. zak 'my screen ran out of ink' A student came over to the basement of AnSci to use the cardreader located near one of the computer operations areas in the basement. Now, since the cardreader was a bit hard to figure out, staff in Operations had made up a high quality poster, with lots of colour and graphics, illustrating the front panel of the cardreader, with instructions on how to get it to work. The student came into the operations area, asking for help since the machine was down. Someone came out to help and he showed them that it didn't work... "See", he said, "it's out of order", as he pushed the button on the poster on the wall... BB: the operator at my last job actually photocop ied the serial number of a 40M disk WITH DATA on it A secrtary came in one day with a question and said - Funny ,I have a different mouse, it has a ball on top. She worked that way for 3 monthes by then !! I had a guy think the film on a floppy was the symbol for where to put your thumb A dude buys a $100 software package for an IBM and the software package is on 5.25" floppies. The poor dude cuts the floppies so that they will fit into his MAC. The p rogram wont work, so he tries to take the software back for a refund! There is this dude that wants to make a backup copy of his hard drive. He looks through his notes. Finally, he finds the instructions for backing up : 'Step 1: Insert disks'..... So the poor dude puts both of his disks in.... Into the same disk drive.... Well, that's the list for now. I will keep compiling these stories for another edition so if you here of more send them to