Useless Conversation

[Cyrrex]

The texting her thing is basically down to her needing to be in control and just not understanding Google calender (Jesus I had to read her type that, seriously her written English is less than great). At points it's just sad but frankly any sympathy I might have got burned up a long time ago.

Not understanding the tool is one thing.  Having you texting her about those things is the worst kind of petty micromanagment I can think of.  I hate this lady just from this simple statement.

And having someone drive her to Ikea...I can't even think of what to say about that. 

[Ingmar]

Trying to think of a polite way to tell off a user who thinks that having to enter a PIN after 30 minutes of inactivity on his phone makes it 'unusable'.

[Ironwood]

Take the PIN off.

Wait till he leaves it at his desk.

Every 30 minutes send a mail or text or call to his boss saying that he's desperate for spunk in him.

Job Done.

[Cyrrex]

I used to work with a guy who would do exactly that sort of thing with a computer that wasn't locked.  Of course, the boss had the kind of sense of humor that would go along with it, but still.

Also reminds me of the fun we had back in the day with those side scrolling text screen savers.  Good times.

[Merusk]

Heh.. one place had IT disable those scrollers after some execs came through our department.   They didn't appreciate seeing "Kwality is our mane pieority" on several screens when it was the company motto.

[bhodi]

Trying to think of a polite way to tell off a user who thinks that having to enter a PIN after 30 minutes of inactivity on his phone makes it 'unusable'.

Not totally sure on the circumstances on this, but having to put in my pin again and again on my desk phone would drive me crazy, too. Unless it's my job to be on the phone all day, in which case, you really only have to put it in 3 or 4 times a day.

I guess the question is really how often do you realistically have to plugin that number. If it's more then 4 or 5 per day, that's in angry-land.

[MuffinMan]

Unless it's my job to be on the phone all day, in which case, you really only have to put it in 3 or 4 times a day.

If it's your job to be on the phone all day you're going to kill yourself soon anyway.

[Ironwood]

Trying to think of a polite way to tell off a user who thinks that having to enter a PIN after 30 minutes of inactivity on his phone makes it 'unusable'.

Not totally sure on the circumstances on this, but having to put in my pin again and again on my desk phone would drive me crazy, too. Unless it's my job to be on the phone all day, in which case, you really only have to put it in 3 or 4 times a day.

I guess the question is really how often do you realistically have to plugin that number. If it's more then 4 or 5 per day, that's in angry-land.

Wait, I assumed this was a mobile device.

If this is a desk phone, what the fuck ?

[Engels]

You think that's bad, I had a staff member complain about having to navigate 2 folders into a shared drive to save stuff, that that was too tedious, and that's why she had her desktop cluttered with documents. I'm all like, well, why don't you have the folder on the share open as a window on your desktop, and then save wherever you like, then drag and drop to the folder? "That's like, two more steps!" she quipped.

[Sky]

You think that's bad, I had a staff member complain about having to navigate 2 folders into a shared drive to save stuff, that that was too tedious, and that's why she had her desktop cluttered with documents. I'm all like, well, why don't you have the folder on the share open as a window on your desktop, and then save wherever you like, then drag and drop to the folder? "That's like, two more steps!" she quipped.

Sounds like she's in danger of having her hard drive die prematurely. If you know what I mean.

[Ingmar]

Trying to think of a polite way to tell off a user who thinks that having to enter a PIN after 30 minutes of inactivity on his phone makes it 'unusable'.

Not totally sure on the circumstances on this, but having to put in my pin again and again on my desk phone would drive me crazy, too. Unless it's my job to be on the phone all day, in which case, you really only have to put it in 3 or 4 times a day.

I guess the question is really how often do you realistically have to plugin that number. If it's more then 4 or 5 per day, that's in angry-land.

No, this is an 'unlock' PIN on his mobile. Required security policy in order to have email access on your phone at our company.

[Salamok]

How can Stephenson make it sound ultra-cool to have all these paranoid security measures in his novels when in real life they are just another pain in the ass impediment.

[Yegolev]

I think you meant "to live..."

[Lantyssa]

How can Stephenson make it sound ultra-cool to have all these paranoid security measures in his novels when in real life they are just another pain in the ass impediment.

Because in a novel the people who have to use them can remember their friggin' password and type it in without any hassle.

Looking at the security audit event log on any given day makes me laugh at how bad people are at doing so.  Yeah, I'll botch it occasionally, but I have to remember a couple dozen.

[Yegolev]

Cut-and-paste.  Also, ssh keys.  I can't understand why most people don't understand how awesome keys are.

[JWIV]

I've started switching over everything to Keepass because I've gotten fed up with trying to memorize twelve billion passwords

[RhyssaFireheart]

I'm the dangerous person who uses the same password in far too many places.  In my defense, I do have several passwords that I rotate through, but yeah.

Also, apparently and completely coincidentally now that the AV program that came on my computer needs to be renewed, I have something on my computer that's sending out random links to my ISP email list.  Actually, I'm not even sure why the particular emails were chosen as I've never emailed some of those folks on this computer (new in November 2010) and it's a very small list - my new work email, my husband's home and work email, and 3 friends from my last job, none of whom I've spoken with since 2009.  It sent out an email yesterday and I couldn't get to fixing it last night and now another showed up this AM to the same group of folks, different link this time.  Here's hoping I can clean it out easily.

[Sky]

Looking at the security audit event log on any given day makes me laugh at how bad people are at doing so.  Yeah, I'll botch it occasionally, but I have to remember a couple dozen.

Yeah, it's abysmal here and we're pretty forgiving about things. I think two of us have systems that lock our after five minutes (my fiancee and I), everyone else is a nightmare. People are shocked that I remember a couple dozen passwords that are 16-24 characters, but it's easy with mnemonic tricks and especially repetition. The BIOS on an old computer? Yeah, I'll have to look that one up. But most of them I use enough to remember the tricks.

Most people don't use good passwords when they need to and if they don't need to, they don't use them at all. So they never get in the habit or develop practices.

And then there's the public. If you knew how many times I've seen people walk away from their computer to pick up a printout...and it's logged into their banking service, let alone facebook. Crazy. The new system I'm working on gives them a lockout screen, but my money is on nobody using it.

[Sky]

Also, I can't type Keepass without giggling.

[Salamok]

is keepass available on a mobile or through a browser?  I sort of keep an ear out for something I can use for a group of people, 3 or 4 admins trying to keep each other up to date on 30-40 passwords many of which are on a 90 day expiration cycle. 

It would be far easier to remember all my passwords if so many sites didn't have such a short or non-existent list of allowed special characters.

[JWIV]

is keepass available on a mobile or through a browser?  I sort of keep an ear out for something I can use for a group of people, 3 or 4 admins trying to keep each other up to date on 30-40 passwords many of which are on a 90 day expiration cycle. 

It would be far easier to remember all my passwords if so many sites didn't have such a short or non-existent list of allowed special characters.

I have it installed on my android phone, and keep the database synced using dropbox between my home computer and phone.  For work, I have it installed on a USB keychain since the office has dropbox blocked.

[Lantyssa]

Cut-and-paste.  Also, ssh keys.  I can't understand why most people don't understand how awesome keys are.

I deal with people who are lucky they can figure out ctrl-alt-del.

I love ssh keys, but not really something that can be used here, either.

[Sjofn]

I'm tired of being an insomniac.

[Khaldun]

I think you guys are underestimated the cognitive load of multiple long non-intuitive passwords. At some point, you want to take the fact that people don't do well with that as evidence of something other than their laziness or your own superiority.

Re: insomnia, my sleep is definitely getting more and more fragile as I get older. A bad night for whatever reason really wrecks me the next day.

[Sjofn]

I've been a shitty sleeper since I was 16. I'm 34 now. The novelty has worn off. 

[Lantyssa]

I think you guys are underestimated the cognitive load of multiple long non-intuitive passwords. At some point, you want to take the fact that people don't do well with that as evidence of something other than their laziness or your own superiority.

I'm referring to the one password they have to remember.  And can't.  Ever.

[Ironwood]

This week has sucked monkey balls.

I mean, horrendously.  I mean, really, really bad.

Christ, it can only get better after this.

[WayAbvPar]

This week has sucked monkey balls.

I mean, horrendously.  I mean, really, really bad.

Christ, it can only get better after this.

Mine has gone from bad to worse as the week progressed. I am forecasting a weekend full of work and vomiting at this point too  

[Ironwood]

I did two days of vomiting this week (seriously) and...worse.

So, yeah, same kinda week I've had.  Must be something in the weather.

[Paelos]

This week has sucked monkey balls.

 

[Ironwood]

 

[Sky]

No wonder the little guy seems so chipper.

[RhyssaFireheart]

Now I'm even more glad I have avatars turned off.

[Bzalthek]

That's just because you're a depressing and all around horrible human being.

[RhyssaFireheart]

That's just because you're a depressing and all around horrible human being.

Who is?