Saturday, October 23, 2010

The Internet Burglar

Plugging in...

The client came home from work on a Friday. The computer was left on overnight. The desktop was completely changed, no icons, a swirling gray and black background, never seen before. The culprit? The Internet Burglar!

Who you ask? The client so deemed the intruder, though the client also conceded it may have been the dog walker. The dog walker? Doubtful, but as we all know, anything is possible.

What really happened was a series of WINDOWS automatic updates, scheduled for, you guessed it, on Fridays. The apparent mix of updates reset the Windows Welcome screen to the original screen, right-out-of-the-box, vanilla, no nothing on the screen.

The client didn't exactly panic, but did express severe distaste for what the "Internet Burglar" did to the screen. The background image of the client's son? Gone to gray. Every icon and shortcut? Gone to gray. Clean and uncluttered, an organizer's dream, a client's nightmare.

The quickest solution was to use Windows restore which placed the computer back in time, the day before the visit of said "burglar" also known as Windows Updates. Sometimes those needed updates do wreak a bit of havoc. But without them, the dangers are FAR worse.


ALWAYS REMEMBER: before calling for help - is it plugged in, was it the "internet burglar", and is it turned on?

Unplugged

Monday, October 18, 2010

Most Interesting Gadget

Plugging in...

Though it's almost the end of the golfing season (yes, you did read GOLF there), the Tutor was called upon to aid and abet a user with a brand name golfing GPS (global positioning system) unit that legally aids the golfer in golf shots, golf distances, golf green aerials, everything short of hitting the ball or carrying the clubs!

The unit needed to be setup via the manufacturer's website. And with all things electronic these days, the manual for using the helpful unit were, of course, not in the box, but on the website. The setup and registration were straight-forward, the use of the GPS not so much.

No electronic hand-held gizmo is intuitive to master no matter what Mr. Steve Jobs says. Ask the Tutor why so many questions about iPhones, iPads, and iPods... But not to pick on those devices. An instruction manual is key to lowering blood pressure and the urge to throw gadgets out second story windows.

Once the owner of the GPS had a basic understanding of what to do with the knobs, arrows and push buttons, the GPS looked like it would do exactly what it claimed: everything but shoot the ball and carry the clubs.

ALWAYS REMEMBER: before calling for help - is it plugged in, did you read the manual, and is it turned on?

Unplugged