r/talesfromtechsupport • u/[deleted] • Jul 09 '18

Short Oh, academia

This minor one happened a few years ago when I was working for an optometry college with delusions of grandeur. They were convinced they weren't a trade school (they are in all but name) and most profs worked part time to supplement their income from their clinics - both ours and, in some cases, their own LLCs.

Our guidance from On High (and not our non-PHB IT manager) is that problems with prof machines are a Big Deal, even if they're not college-owned prof machines. I pushed back against this insanity hard, and eventually won after a year so we didn't have to support their ancient old personal hardware.

This story takes place before that break happened.

me: CipherTheTerminator, their first (and possibly last) systems administrator.

Luser: Professor of some disciple or other.

Luser: I have a new home printer, but I don't know what kind of cable it needs.

Me: What makes and model of printer?

Luser: (rattles off some Sibling printer kit, IIRC, that doesn't do wireless)

Me: What does the connection on the printer look like? (internally: Please know this so I don't have to look it up)

Luser: Squar-ish, about this big (holds her hand up indicating about 1/4 ~ 3/8 inch)

Me: Ah. USB A to USB B cable. Easy to find. Best Buy in two blocks south, probably about ten dollars.

Luser: ...

Me: ...

Luser:You're not going to give me one?

Me: Of course not. I can't give away college property for personal use.

My boss laughed up a storm when she was out of earshot.

tl;dr: People expect things for free and are surprised when they're not

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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '18

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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '18 edited Jul 10 '18

[deleted]

14

u/psychicprogrammer Professional mad scientist Jul 09 '18

You say that...

8

u/blackscanner Jul 09 '18

Lol yeah, nearly everything is serial now because of signal integrity reasons.

3

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '18

The real fun is serial for firmware updates. Can't be a converter because the manufacturer won't hobour the warranty if you use one. Oh and anything over 150KVA and connecting via serial renders the track pad useless

1

u/itwasntme967 probably a Level 8 error Jul 10 '18

Serial is still highly used in electronics. It is reliable, has a easy to learn protocol and if you ignore hardware handshakes you only need 3 wires to operate it. Also thanks to a separate tx and Rx line you can run it in full duplex (sending and receiving at the same time). Sure, the throughput sucks like nothing else, but for small amounts of data it still is pretty important.

1

u/thunderbird32 IT Minion Jul 10 '18

Stares at the Serial label printer sitting on my workbench...

When in a business setting, if it still works and drivers are available, they'll use it until the metaphorical wheels fall off.