The Tech Support Generation

prostoalex writes "Newsweek technology columnist Brad Stone is looking forward to the Thanksgiving dinner with his family next week, spending time in candle-lit rooms, preparing holiday shopping lists and... let's admit it - fixing the folks' computer. 'We are the Tech-Support Generation. Our job is to troubleshoot the complex but imperfect technology that befuddle mom and dad, veterans of the rotary phone, the record player and the black-and-white cabinet television set. Next week, on our annual pilgrimage home, we'll turn our Web-trained minds and joystick-conditioned fingers to the task of rescuing our parents from bleeding-edge technology on the blink', Brad Stone writes. In related news, what other products besides Google Desktop Search, Spybot Search & Destroy, Google Toolbar and Service Pack 2 are Slashdotters installing on their parents' Windows machines?"

Surely?

[Sexy Bern]

what other products besides Google Desktop Search, Spybot Search & Destroy, Google Toolbar and Service Pack 2 are Slashdotters installing on their parents' Windows machines

Debian

What other products...

[jalet]

> In related news, what other products besides
> Google Desktop Search, Spybot Search & Destroy,
> Google Toolbar and Service Pack 2 are Slashdotters
> installing on their parents' Windows machines?"

GNU/Linux

None of the above

[Insurgent2]

My parents are smarter than I am.

They have Macs!

Re:they are slooow

[Anonymous Coward]

hey ya young whiper snaper.

just watch me dial that rotary phone.

3 things

[ArmenTanzarian]

AdAware
Firefox
That Gator thing I love so much

While it's good to help family out...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's still a bit embarrassing to see multiple spyware entries of pron sites on your grandpa's rig...

"So, what sites you've been surfing lately, gramps ? "

Re:I usually get flamed for this

[0x461FAB0BD7D2]

I'm with you....just as soon as I move out of my parent's house...

What are we installing?

[Anthony Boyd]

Here is what I'm installing.

• Firefox
• Thunderbird
• AdAware
• Spybot Search & Destroy
• AVG
• Open Office
• Nvu
• Zonealarm (might go by the wayside in favor of SP2, but I won't have tested SP2 enough by the holidays, I don't think)
• Gaim (the idea that one app will log them into 3+ services kind of boggles their minds)
• iTunes (maybe)

Perhaps...

[Durindana]

what other products besides Google Desktop Search, Spybot Search & Destroy, Google Toolbar and Service Pack 2 are Slashdotters installing on their parents' Windows machines?"

PearPC?

Re:I usually get flamed for this

[lachlan76]

I feel for you. I'm 15, and I've gotten phone calls at school.

Be grateful ;)

Re:Ignorance of Windows is the Best Defense :)

[Anonymous Coward]

Man, you're smart, you're really really smart. 8 to 12 languages, that's something! No wonder I can't get a job when there are people like you. I wish I knew how to architect large distributed systems as well.

Re:They're computer's a bit old, so...

[Anonymous Coward]

Your parents are computers?

Re:I've given up Windows support except for my par

[lachlan76]

I wish my parents listened, they just said I'm paranoid, bought a new computer, and won't give me the password.

Re:Change the OS

[TheRaven64]

Getting a Mac is a huge advantage for two reasons:

1. Other Mac users never bug you with questions, since they'd have to admit that their OS was less than 100% intuitive if they did) and,
2. You can happily claim ignorance of every other platform. Saying `Hey, I use a Mac! I don't understand Windows/Linux. See how shiny my Mac is! Shiny!' gets me out of a lot of things (as long as people don't notice the headless FreeBSD box hidden behind my desk).

Re:Firefox & Thunderbird

[Zorilla]

I think I just stumbled upon how to get all of Oklahoma using Firefox now.

Last Straw

[mpn14tech]

After the most recent iteration of fixing problems with my parents machine, I gave them a Knoppix cdrom and told them this will be their next OS if they break their Windows install again.

Re:What other products...

[CoolGuySteve]

pffft Install OpenBSD and you'll never have to see your parents again.

Sure, dad

[ch-chuck]

I'll clean the virus and update your system. While I'm doing that you can change the oil in my car, rotate the tires, and hey, how about freshening up the wax job while you're at it? And don't forget to vacuum out the interior and rub on some armor-all.

I know enough about Windows to not support it!

[tclark]

I tell my family that I won't help them with Windows. Sure, I could help, but I won't. I turn away people who offer to pay me for help with Windows - why on Earth would I do the same work, on a holiday, for free?

Oh sure, they do the same to me. My brother refuses to help me maintain my nuclear reactor, even though I know he could do it with one hand tied behind his back.

Re:Firefox & Thunderbird

[ShavenYak]

Canadians, we're obsessed with the weather.

Why do you need an app on your computer to tell you the weather? Wouldn't a static text box saying "It's cold!" be sufficient?

Re:I usually get flamed for this

[triso]

Easy fix: "Is anybody dead or on fire? No? Then I'll talk to you later.

I find it so damn inconvenient when my relatives are on fire.

Re:I usually get flamed for this

[Rotund Prickpull]

the "mechanics" (i.e. not by profession) in my family really aren't that hot - they're tinkers.

Tinkers are usually quite good mechanically - especially at starting other people's cars without the keys.

Re:I usually get flamed for this

[jacksonj04]

17, and get phone calls from the school's own IT techs asking how to fix things.

THAT's depressing.

Re:I don't know enough about windows to support it

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, that's not enough :(

Just by browsing the web you can get infected.

@I#E$ ^E%X$P#L-O=I~T` +N_O&W$

Actually you're infected now :)

Re:I usually get flamed for this

[Alchemar]

Same here! Brother in law with a PH.D. in law just can not understand why he should not open the email with the subject line "Your Virus protection program has detected a virus in this email" if he has a fire wall to protect him from things like that. The last straw was when I spent several hours after work installing a wireless network, with the fun of installing networkcards, fighting with drivers for three different versions of windows, getting the firewall setup, and the WEP configured. He came home at 10 and asked if my nephews computer got a virus could it affect his computer. When I told him yes he said I needed to install software to make sure that couldn't happen. I told him that if he was worried pull the wireless card. He told me that was unacceptable, and that I needed to get the software installed tonight. This is 10:30 at night, I have to be at work at 6 and this is a gratis job for my sister so that my nephew didn't have to get on my brother-in-laws work computer to look stuff up on the net. My lease was up two weeks later. I moved and refuse to tell my family what my phone number is and what town I live in so that they can not call me up in the middle of the night when they do something stupid with there computer. No good deed will go unpunished!

Stumbling across dad's p0rn

[WMammoth]

I've helpted my parents with their Windows box a lot of times, but the worst experience was stumbling across dad's p0rn stash with mom looking over my shoulder, then having to make up lies, like a bribed expert witness about how a hacker probably put them there, and I've seen that stuff happen before etc. Followed up with tutorials on clearing browser cache/history etc. which my dad was overly interested in.

Re:Firefox & Thunderbird

[wo1verin3]

>>Take a look at how IE is being exploited, then
>>talk to me about how your mom needs to use IE
>>for some stupid secondary app

You want to talk back to my mom? Be my guest.

Cleaning off spyware

[RebornData]

This is a little off-topic, but allow me to rant. I do home computer support professionally, which means that these days I'm basically a professional spyware cleaner. I've come in numerous times after techie family members supposedly cleaned up a machine, only to find they didn't do a very good job.

So please, if you are going to clean spyware up for your family, you should know the following:

1. As good as Spybot and Ad-aware are, neither is comprehensive. Run both. And you're still probably going to be missing some things (see #3 below).

2. After getting spybot and ad-aware installed with the latest updates, set a system restore point (if the OS supports it and system restore is working), and then *reboot into safe mode*. Running the cleaners in safe mode is much more effective than with all the junk running, and you won't end up rebooting and re-scanning to get open files. If you get warnings that there are files that can't be cleaned because of a running process, use a boot cd of some sort to delete it manually... much faster than running a re-scan.

3. After Spybot and Adaware *think* the machine is clean, use the "advanced" tools in spybot to examine the BHO, ActiveX, Startup and LSP lists to be sure. Don't recognize something? Google it. Chances are, if it's not in google, it doesn't belong. If it's a startup item, be sure to delete the target file (or files). The Spybot ActiveX deletion feature doesn't work so well... delete those manually from the location referenced. This usually is necessary to get the trojans and viruses that Adaware and spybot won't warn about.

4. Reboot, connect to the Internet, and then go back and check advanced tools in spybot to see if anything got added to the startup, BHO or other lists... changed entries are bolded, so it's easy to tell.

Then, and only then, will you know that the machine is clean. Keeping it clean is another issue, but at least this will get it done.

-R

Re:Firefox & Thunderbird

[aichpvee]

Yeah, I just removed IE and Outlook Express completely by giving my parents Slackware. Done.

Re:Firefox & Thunderbird

[YetAnotherDave]

it's the distiction between "it's snowing" and "it'll snow soon" that we need

Re:Firefox & Thunderbird

[Mashiki]

Why do you need an app on your computer to tell you the weather? Wouldn't a static text box saying "It's cold!" be sufficient?

That's pretty much it, ofcourse we only have two seasons up in Canada. Winter and Construction. To see the effects first hand, drive through Toronto. Summer doesn't exist, it's an effect of the paving machines.

Re:Firefox & Thunderbird

[pisdtal]

Firefox & Thunderbird. Saves you lots of trouble

Unless you have my parents. They trust NOTHING that I do on the computer yet they have always refered to me as the 'little computer nerd', they would send me to thier friends houses to fix problems with a windows box but I was running a vic20 and C=64 at the time, they ask me for phone support, but as soon as we get started they hand the phone to someone else in the house that can 'understand' me, like I speak in some alien language that is completely lost on them I have over 6 yrs of phone support experience, I think I know how to talk to people in non-l33tsp34k.
I have had a computer since 82 and my mother just now let me attempt to show her how to copy and paste, I dont think she paid any attention but was mostly trying to humor me. My father asked me to look at my sisters computer in the mid 90s. It was a IBM PS2 and at the time I was working in a warehouse doing IBM laptop repair. I told him it was either the hard drive or the ribbon cable but since I didnt have any test equipment the cheapest thing would be to get a new ribbon cable,(I tried to reseat it.)if that didnt work, to get a new hard drive and reinstall windows. (I even offered to do all that if he would just buy the parts.) He tells me he thinks that 'I' should take it to a repair shop for him, I freggin work in the repair shop........ sorry started ranting and didnt wanna stop. So now when my parents ask me for help I tell em to take it to the shop or get one of their friends kids to do it for them.

Be glad its only the computer...

[cr0sh]

Be glad you are indoors, where it is nice and warm this time of year, instead of cold, possibly wet/damp - shivering your ass off, scraping knuckles and getting greasy, etc while working on an automobile ("Oh, you know how to fix cars?" - after you tell them about the new brakes you installed on your car - "Well, our car is making this funny noise, and we thought...").