An all round, good result

[canetoad]

I've just spent a couple of hours on the phone to babylonsister, during this time we set up a remote connection to her computer whereby I could access her desktop and take virtual control of her computer.

To reach this stage of trust and co-operation there were a few dozen emails, four or five phone calls and a big heap of 'trust me' on both sides. But rather than jump in halfway through the problem, let's go back to the start; babylonsister, despite having Office installed on her machine, could not access Word.

You all know babylonsister from the Lounge, GD and LBN. She is not a frequenter of the computer forum...until she needed help. I personally found it mortifying that a long time DUer could be dismissed in the computer forum as a pest.

It needs re-iterating that those of us who are computer savvy need to read very closely the calls for advice from other DUers. There is absolutely no point in giving 'advice' that is beyond the understanding of those that need help. There is no glory is appearing to be a computer expert if your advice is incomprehensible to the person seeking help. I therefore ask all you good folk who respond to computer questions to consider the proficiency level of the help-seeker and endeavor to pitch your response to a similar level.

Back to our MS Office problem: Office is not forgiving of other versions present. Compounding problems were babylonsister paying for Best Buy to sort out her computer glitches. For everyone's information; do not try to install MS Office over another version. Or say, an updated Publisher over a previous office version. It just does not work. I cant say why. Just remember that Office and the MS operating system have a strange set of dependencies that it's best to live with rather than explain. OK, that's a bs way of saying that much of what MS does is beyond me, but take it to heart, folk.

Oh, I forgot to mention that I only became involved in babylonsisters problems when she sent me a PM because she had already been roasted in this forum for asking silly questions. That message went to two of us here (hands up the other party, You Know Who You Are). Why? Because we don't put down the folk asking basic questions.

I ask you to accept this post in the spirit it's written. babyonsister and I are celebrating a good result which was; identifying problems with Windows & Office installation; presenting various solutions; seeing it through until a solution was reached. Result: Sis now has Word, Excel, PowerPoint all working properly on her machine. The intent is to share the satistaction of a job fulfilled. As you give help and support in this forum, you are empowering folk to administer their own access to digital information. SHARE WELL, HELP OTHERS, LIVE IN PEACE.

[BlueJazz]

1. Yep...People soon forget what it was like when THEY were unschooled about...

...all the thousands of possible problems regarding computers.

I went to school and then did the A+ and MCSE thing plus years of tech work and I STILL run into stuff that (almost) causes me to lose sleep at night.

Good example of ah..weird tech crap (that I just learned): On 3 models of asus motherboards, Windows 7 build 7000 and 7600 will
freeze up with certain brands of DDr3 Memory unless you lower the Frequency of the Memory.

I mean, Where are ordinary people and Techs suppose to learn THAT kind of shit?? :) :)

[canetoad]

2. They're not

and I didn't know it either. You have far greater specialised knowledge than I have.

It improves all of us to absorb the opinions of others. :)

[BlueJazz]

9. Oh...I'm sure there's tons of stuff that you could teach me. I mean, when it ...

..comes to everyday use of/installing programs and troubling-shooting there's always programs that don't get along with each other.
...and unless you've seen the problem before, you're sitting there thinking "Now What"? :)

PS: What the hell is up with HP printer software now??
Jeez...I remember when installing a printer and it's software took 5 minutes...now you put in the disk and it loads 640 megs of
crap....and it takes 1/2 hour. :) :) (Thank you for installing the "Customer Participation Program) IE: We want to try to sell you everything we make plus bug the hell out of you. :)

[RoyGBiv]

11. If you find out, let me know ...

I went over to my uncle's house the other day because his HP printer had suddenly stopped working. He doesn't think he did anything to it, and that I could see, he hadn't. But, as far as the computer was concerned, the printer drivers had disappeared.

So, I just decided to go ahead and install it again to see what was what, and I sat there for damn near an hour waiting for all that crap to finish. Admittedly this was an older computer with only 1GB of memory, but still. It was especially frustrating because my uncle and I don't generally have a whole lot to talk about, and I was trapped there listening to him ramble about politics and relatives that died fifty years ago.

Reinstalling the drivers made everything work again, and then getting the network to recognize the printer didn't take much doing, but that was a frustrating exercise.

[canetoad]

13. Bloody HP drivers!!

Something I found out the hard way is that some HP drivers (certainly our office DesignJet 610) can play havoc with Windows.

Sometimes you can find the driver only at http://www.softwarepatch.com without the megabytes of HP imaging crap. Recently, trying to add a driver for an HP printer to a friends machine I kept getting 'The driver you are trying to install is older than the one already present...' but no way could I find the present driver to uninstall it.

I think part of the value of this forum is when we post snippets of information gained through experience and trial and errors. I've learned a lot this way and it really helps when troubleshooting a gnarly problem. :hi:

[ConsAreLiars]

3. Well said.

As a newbie to Linux Mint I read the 'Newbie Questions' section of that Forum, and even though I've used and been mostly rather fond of computers for decades. One nice thing about that forum is that infrequent 'expert' non-help of the "Read the 'Read Before Posting' instructions" get called out, since most of those there realize that those guidelines (do a search first and provide all the specs) will be difficult and likely just a frustrating waste of time for those with less techy backgrounds. and orientations

Thanks for the time you put in helping babylonsister, as well as others here.

[RoyGBiv]

4. Word

:thumbsup:

OnEdit:

No, I can't leave it at just that.

You're an asset to this forum, canetoad, and it's about time someone said that openly and without qualification. There are several others that are as well. As of this posting, two of them have already posted here. I won't go into a laundry list. I'd leave someone out.

But I am going to say this.

I stopped trying for the most part to help people with Windows problems openly in this forum because I was taking far too much shit for doing so, not from the people asking for help, mind you, but from people who *were not helping* but who displayed a kind of arrogance about their supposed expertise that denied anyone lesser than them to express an opinion. Funny thing. I keep getting private messages from people asking for help because of the animosity they receive here when they try to ask.

Let me repeat this. I do not give a single damn what operating system you use. I don't care if you've never used a computer before or have been using one since computers had vacuum tubes. That's it. There's no big explanation there. I just don't care. If I can help, I will. If you ask me an opinion, I'll give it. But I'm not into this fanboy shit. Never have been. Never will be.

I'm glad you were able to help Babylonsister. Her problem was beyond my expertise. I'm far more proficient in Linux these days and have to stumble through Windows problems that go beyond the basic issues. But, ya know, that's why we're all here, and at one time, that's how all this worked. People gave the help they could, and then others came along and added their input.

It's not about being right. It's about trying to help, and to help, you generally have to take off your expert badge and just listen.

[canetoad]

5. Thanks, mate

Much appreciated.

One day we must have a 3-way tele-drinkference :rofl:

[babylonsister]

7. Do you think TeamViewer could support that?

:rofl:

[BlueJazz]

12. I wondered why I haven't seen you around very much. I always enjoy reading...

...your Take on things.
One thing these "experts" have not learned is: A lot of computer freezes, bsod, and other malfunctions depend on so many factors that often what seems obvious is not necessarily the root cause of the problem.

Example: In an earlier post (Above) I talk about Windows 7 freezing up because of the Memory Frequency on some Asus motherboards.
Well...you CAN fix the SYMPTOM by taking out all the memory except 2 or (maybe) 4 gig but that only fixes PART of the problem not the root cause and if you don't know any better you think "The problem is your bad memory".

I guess what I'm trying to say is: I never "Diss" anybodies viewpoint on something.
I MAY not have the whole story on what's really wrong. (And I'm wrong more times than I like to admit) :) :)

[Berserker]

14. BUT I am a fan boy

RoyGBiv. Many years I have read your posts and learn from each and everyone. Thank you for helping this forum you are a great asset.

[Egnever]

6. Nice work!

[babylonsister]

8. I would like to voice my public gratitude to canetoad for

having the knowledge and patience to help me. This sure wasn't a 'short' fix, timewise or logistically, but I now have Office after banging my head against the wall for months. I am so appreciative of her and DU for finding canetoad for me!

There are a few DUers who have tried to help, and I do appreciate their efforts as well, but canetoad got it done for me when I was at my wit's end.

I know I have asked some very basic questions here on occasion, but that is my level of proficiency. Please be gentle with people who don't know as much as you do; I thought that was what this forum was all about.

Hat's off to you, canetoad, and thank you so much!

:loveya:

[blogslut]

10. Hear hear!

We all have things we're good at and things we're not so good at. What made me fall in love with the Internet was/are the thousands of tutorials, lessons and message boards where knowledgible people share their expertise freely. When techies gives newbs the snarky could shoulder, it pisses me off.

[hermetic]

15. To canetoad and babylonsister

:toast:

And RoyGBiv, too, who has helped me on several occasions. I call him Mr. Givins, cause that's what he does. Gives.

:grouphug: