This is my world

[featherynscale]

My relationship to computers, as summed up in a conversation between me and kittenpants last night:

I don't actually know anything about how computers work. I'm not educated in the field, I don't know all of the terminology, or have any standardized background in the things at all. I do, however, have a kind of Cargo Cult proficiency with them -- I repeat rituals I have witnessed being successful in similar situations, I pray to them and bargain with them and curse them, and kludge together unlikely fixes based on my limited and probably skewed understanding of principle. I am a sort of computer witch doctor. This behavior is, oddly enough, successful about 75-80% of the time, which is better than you can get from most tech support, so I call it good.

Comments

[capriciouslass.livejournal.com]

Frankly, I would bet that most tech support people are in the same boat you are. They get a small amount of training (which you've absorbed over the years), and then they do exactly what you do. You just do it better because you're intelligent.

[diermuid.livejournal.com]

Heh, I just made a statement to this effect. This is why degrees are not as important as being intuitive when working with computers. People who promote a lot of degrees on their resume were always a warning sign for me, being able to get good grades when studying does NOT equate to having a good head on one's shoulders. But I think many industries are coming to this nowadays.

[diermuid.livejournal.com]

I've done a lot of training... and not much of it really helps with fixing decrepit machines as much as it goes over advanced features and what is compatible with what.

For old machines where the person doesn't have the software nor do they want to loose -anything- and they have little money and they just want something fixed that stopped working "for no reason", I'm in the same boat as you... poke around, try stuff that's worked before, take notes, drink coffee. 8-)

[karinablack.livejournal.com]

I'd subscribe to that!

[ysabel.livejournal.com]

I'll repeat what's already been said. Most tech support folks do the same thing.

Many programmers do it too, with a slightly different set of rituals. I'm constantly amazed at how many people can manage to make a living at programming without actually understanding anything about how to program.

[rfunk.livejournal.com]

First-level tech support and entry-level programming positions exist entirely to be the witch doctor for people unable to be the witch doctor themselves.

If only the latter group of people understood this fact.

SHhhhhhhhh dammit !!!

[orcjohn.livejournal.com]

You're giving away tech secrets here. No one really "understands" computers, they work, or they don't. When they don't, you do stuff (reset stuff mostly), you pray, you cuss, and then about 75-80% of the time it works. Don't tell anyone though *grin*

[fred-smith.livejournal.com]

Its funny, sometimes I feel computers respond well to being treated as entities. The witch doctor approach seems fine to me. Maybe we are both insane.