• anonymous (unregistered)

    haha.... oh wow.

  • Dan (unregistered)

    Meh.

  • (cs)

    Boo

  • MX5Ringer (unregistered)

    Truly wonderous,

    another urban myth perhaps?

    but still very nice all the same,

    My personal favourite is the user who forced two 3 1/2" disks in the drive at the same time as he was only prompted to "insert disk 2" instead of "remove disk 1 then insert disk 2"

    Catcha:- paint (like an expert!)

  • Ben (unregistered)

    No prob, it was still good. Depending on the drive he might have to put it into a new casing; others didn't give a damn about the casing.

  • Michael (unregistered)

    Same level as the people who filed disks in a folder by using the hole puncher.

    captcha: tesla - coil it! coil it hard

  • Wouter (unregistered)

    My colleague experienced almost the same situation. When helping a customer with an email attachment that could not be sent to a third party email address for some reason (probably blocked by our spam filter), he asked the customer to "zip the file and please mail it to me, so I can experiment with the file". A week later, we received a package by mail containing a Zip disk with the file on it. Now, I'm not sure if the issue was caused by the fact that my colleague is native Dutch and was speaking with an Irish customer, or that it was a discrepancy on a techical level..

  • (cs)

    It actually took me a minute because I haven't really had this whole concept of a "floppy" disk in years

  • s|k (unregistered)

    Can you idiots stop with the captcha yet? WE ALL KNOW ALL OF THE WORDS ALREADY. But thank you, thank you for sharing, truly our days are better off. Nobody cares what your damn captcha is.

  • Ben4jammin (unregistered)

    Sometimes, just for fun I will explain to a user how I just fixed their problem just to see the "deer in the headlight" look. For extra kicks I'll explain it to them and have them repeat it back to me...always good for a laugh.

    But seriously, I'm sure most of us here have learned the hard way that you shouldn't assume users know ANYTHING. It will also help sharpen your communication skills because if there is any way they can misinterprete what you say, they will.

  • mav (unregistered)

    Whats a "disk"?

  • Sgt. Preston (unregistered)

    Robert: Take the disk out of the mailer and place it in the drive. Brian: OK.

    (several minutes pass)

    At that point in the story, I thought Brian had gone out to the drive where he parked his motor and placed the disk on it.

  • (cs)

    I would say this is bogus, but in 4th grade and 9th grade, I saw it happen (with different-age computers of course). So why is someone with this little knowledge about computers operating the "company computer", presumably while being paid for it?

  • Alan (unregistered)

    A customer at an internet cafe I worked in called me over saying that his disk wasnt working. I looked at the drive and I could see the end of the 3.5 inch disk in the drive, but the door hadnt closed and the eject button wouldnt move when pressed.

    One drive dissambly later, turns out they got the floppy all the way in, but upside down. I have no idea how.

  • (cs) in reply to MX5Ringer
    MX5Ringer:

    My personal favourite is the user who forced two 3 1/2" disks in the drive at the same time as he was only prompted to "insert disk 2" instead of "remove disk 1 then insert disk 2"

    I know a software developer which found the solution for this, his software came on 5 1/4" floppies (this was in the early 90's, I think):

    • Instead of telling the user to "Please insert Disk 2" his program told to "Eject disk 1 and insert disk 2".
    • Added stickers showing the correct way of inserting the floppy.

    This solved a lot of problems with the installation.

  • (cs) in reply to MX5Ringer
    MX5Ringer:
    My personal favourite is the user who forced two 3 1/2" disks in the drive at the same time as he was only prompted to "insert disk 2" instead of "remove disk 1 then insert disk 2"
    Or, telling someone to install the new version "over the old one" resulting in them putting the new version's CD (or floppy or whatever) directly on top of the old version's disk, and then putting them both in the drive together.
  • Maclee (unregistered)

    This really reminds me of this image:

    [image]
  • ben curthoys (unregistered)

    i used to have a single sided 5 1/4 inch drive, and a stack of double sided disks.

    so i would open the casing, carefully put the floppy to one side, cut a new "write protect" notch with scissors, drill a new index hole, put the floppy part back in, sellotape the sides down, and then use both sides of the disk by putting it in "upsidedown" when i wanted the other side. double the storage space for free.

    and it worked.

  • (cs) in reply to ben curthoys
    ben curthoys:
    i used to have a single sided 5 1/4 inch drive, and a stack of double sided disks.

    so i would open the casing, carefully put the floppy to one side, cut a new "write protect" notch with scissors, drill a new index hole, put the floppy part back in, sellotape the sides down, and then use both sides of the disk by putting it in "upsidedown" when i wanted the other side. double the storage space for free.

    and it worked.

    That's just...well genius! Even more so than my trick of actually typing umop apisdn. Go ahead, flip your monitor over to read that one.

  • TeaBag (unregistered)

    Many moons ago, a customer with a Mac (old style) came in to the shop complaining that a floppy was jammed in the drive. After extracting the floppy drive from the chassis, we discovered that there had already been a disk in the drive when he inserted a second. Like many Mac users of that era, when the disk stopped, he slapped it into the drive. Since there was already a disk in the drive, the new floppy slammed into the top drive head, splitting the it into several pieces and jamming both disks in the drive. Mac floppy drives weren't cheap...

  • Unomi (unregistered) in reply to sir_flexalot
    sir_flexalot:
    So why is someone with this little knowledge about computers operating the "company computer", presumably while being paid for it?

    I think because time is money and knowledge is not omnipotent.

    Think about little offices in little towns. They don't want their expertise divided equally over all their offices, because that means IT-skilled people doing nothing most off the time.

    But when something needs to be done on a computer system, it needs to be done as quick as possible. Many times with nobody around knowing what to do by experience.

    So, the office manager is put in place to do the things a sysadmin would normaly do. These people wouldn't care less about such systems, because most of the times it only makes noise in a closet far far away.

    So, knowledge is at the headquarter, but time is money so the office manager has to do the things to do. It would cost more if some IT-guy has to go to the office and do the five-minute task by himself.

    • Unomi -
  • el jaybird (unregistered) in reply to ben curthoys
    ben curthoys:
    i used to have a single sided 5 1/4 inch drive, and a stack of double sided disks.

    so i would open the casing, carefully put the floppy to one side, cut a new "write protect" notch with scissors, drill a new index hole, put the floppy part back in, sellotape the sides down, and then use both sides of the disk by putting it in "upsidedown" when i wanted the other side. double the storage space for free.

    and it worked.

    I used to do this, except I didn't bother taking the disc out or anything. I just cut the notch with scissors, very carefully.

    And, yep, it worked.

  • igitur (unregistered) in reply to Michael
    Michael:
    Same level as the people who filed disks in a folder by using the hole puncher.

    Bit off topic, but that's how many condoms are distributed here in South Africa. They staple them to a safe sex pamphlet!

  • Gruff (unregistered)

    I'll be dating myself here, but anyways...

    I had a client that needed some 8" disks labeled and sent to branch offices. Having just hired an intern but not really having much for him to do, they set him to the task with the instructions to take each disk from it's sleeve and label it, label the sleeve (and to, of course, write on the label BEFORE placing it on the disk or sleeve), then put the disk in a cardboard mailer, address it and, finally, send it off.

    A few days later, calls began to pour into the main office. It seems that perhaps the instructions weren't quite detailed enough -- they had neglected to mention that the disk should remain inside the black "wrapper", that the disk should go back in the sleeve before being put in the mailer, and that the label shouldn't be attached using paper clips.

    captcha: "riaa" <- The world's nastiest 4-letter word

  • stil (unregistered) in reply to MX5Ringer
    MX5Ringer:
    another urban myth perhaps?
    Quite a few of these so-called computer urban myths really do happen when the stupidity of a user is involved. When I was young and deluded, early in a support career, I actually had a customer say to me: "It's telling me to press any key to continue - which key is the 'any' key?"

    I heard later this was supposed to be an urban myth, but this didn't happen to a "friend-of-a-friend" from my pov... :)

  • Loren Pechtel (unregistered)

    Back in college a couple of guys found an old 8" floppy disk. They did all sorts of things to it, seeing how much they could do before it quit working. The disk read properly when inserted into the drive sans casing. (It took some care to get it in properly.) I don't remember what all they did, I do recall it finally died when someone took a bite out of it.

    As for double-siding a floppy, it was easy. One hole punch, one cardboard template of what it should be. Put the template over the disk, punch, punch, turn the disk over, punch, 30 seconds at most. You just had to be careful not to scratch the disk with the hole punch when you stuck the bottom in between the casing and the disk.

  • Corporate Cog (unregistered)

    wtfs from the 19th century; sweet!

  • (cs) in reply to H3SO5
    H3SO5:
    MX5Ringer:

    My personal favourite is the user who forced two 3 1/2" disks in the drive at the same time as he was only prompted to "insert disk 2" instead of "remove disk 1 then insert disk 2"

    I know a software developer which found the solution for this, his software came on 5 1/4" floppies (this was in the early 90's, I think):

    • Instead of telling the user to "Please insert Disk 2" his program told to "Eject disk 1 and insert disk 2".
    • Added stickers showing the correct way of inserting the floppy.

    This solved a lot of problems with the installation.

    The developer was simply following one of the Golden Rules of programming:

    "Never underestimate the stupidity of the end user."

  • (cs) in reply to vt_mruhlin

    It's sort of like "the old days" when we listened to music on CDs with grooves in them!

  • pweegar (unregistered)

    Several years ago, being fresh out of college and still job hunting, I needed a free/inexpensive email provider. Well, kmart was giving cd away for excatly what I was looking for. Only problem was that my cd-rom was high speed 952X or higher) and didn't like cheap cd's. Wouldn't load the program, the cd just spun. Thought what the hell. I had another useless disk (maybe a free game demo disk from a game mag). I crasy glued them togather!!!!! Let it dry for an hour or so. inserted the new cd and the program began to load. HOWEVEr the noise it made was incredible. Very loud and sounded like something was being ripped apart. After the program loaded, and I was able to eject the cd, it came out in 2 parts. Funny, but true.

  • (cs)

    I guess it really can be used as a coaster now.

  • Feyr (unregistered) in reply to stil
    <quote> I actually had a customer say to me: "It's telling me to press any key to continue - which key is the 'any' key?" </quote>

    working as an ISP, we had a customer looking for the ENTER key once.

  • Marcin (unregistered)

    The real WTF is that the chicken crossed the road.

  • peon (unregistered) in reply to s|k
    s|k:
    Can you idiots stop with the captcha yet? WE ALL KNOW ALL OF THE WORDS ALREADY. But thank you, thank you for sharing, truly our days are better off. Nobody cares what your damn captcha is.
    Wwe also know all your f-ing comments already: how appropriate, mmmmm, do I smell, who is gygax, etc.

    Farktard nerds.

  • (cs) in reply to stil
    stil:
    MX5Ringer:
    another urban myth perhaps?
    Quite a few of these so-called computer urban myths really do happen when the stupidity of a user is involved. When I was young and deluded, early in a support career, I actually had a customer say to me: "It's telling me to press any key to continue - which key is the 'any' key?"

    I heard later this was supposed to be an urban myth, but this didn't happen to a "friend-of-a-friend" from my pov... :)

    I intentionally built on this once in a beta product. The message box popped up for confirmation saying the following:

    Press any key to continue, any other to quit.

    and just waited for QA to bounce it back. It stayed there for three cycles before someone questioned it. No it did not make it into production.

  • Marcin (unregistered) in reply to Unomi
    Unomi:
    sir_flexalot:
    So why is someone with this little knowledge about computers operating the "company computer", presumably while being paid for it?

    I think because time is money and knowledge is not omnipotent.

    Think about little offices in little towns. They don't want their expertise divided equally over all their offices, because that means IT-skilled people doing nothing most off the time.

    But when something needs to be done on a computer system, it needs to be done as quick as possible. Many times with nobody around knowing what to do by experience.

    So, the office manager is put in place to do the things a sysadmin would normaly do. These people wouldn't care less about such systems, because most of the times it only makes noise in a closet far far away.

    So, knowledge is at the headquarter, but time is money so the office manager has to do the things to do. It would cost more if some IT-guy has to go to the office and do the five-minute task by himself.

    • Unomi -

    This is not a good explanation - HQ could put the tech on the phone, thus saving on travel time. This happens because management don't actually think about IT, and assume that it basically runs itself for free.

  • Anonymous Tart (unregistered) in reply to Gruff
    Gruff:
    ... captcha: "riaa" <- The world's nastiest 4-letter word

    Trying to work out if thats ironic :o

  • iToad (unregistered)

    As God is my witness, I actually saw somebody fasten an 8" floppy to a steel filing cabinet with a magnet. At least when I mentioned that this wasn't a good idea, the person responsible instantly understood why.

    By the way, I still have a couple of boxes of 8" floppies (3M single side, single density, reversible) and 5-1/4" floppies. The envelopes for these things aren't easy to tear open without a knife or scissors.

  • (cs)

    AssHole..!!

  • (cs) in reply to Maclee
    Maclee:
    This really reminds me of this image:

    [image]

    Whew.

    At least he didn't destroy anything useful. [/ms-bash]

  • (cs) in reply to Feyr
    Feyr:
    <quote> I actually had a customer say to me: "It's telling me to press any key to continue - which key is the 'any' key?" </quote>

    working as an ISP, we had a customer looking for the ENTER key once.

    What's so strange about that? Some keyboards call it RETURN and some just have the arrow icon.

  • Brady Kelly (unregistered) in reply to Alan
    Alan:
    One drive dissambly later, turns out they got the floppy all the way in, but upside down. I have no idea how.

    I once had a team of three in an Air Force building looking for a terminal fault that I had caused by plugging a D type connector the wrong way. I had about 7 years technician and cabling experience, and I didn't push hard.

  • enharmonix (unregistered) in reply to MX5Ringer
    MX5Ringer:
    Truly wonderous,

    another urban myth perhaps?

    but still very nice all the same,

    My personal favourite is the user who forced two 3 1/2" disks in the drive at the same time as he was only prompted to "insert disk 2" instead of "remove disk 1 then insert disk 2"

    Catcha:- paint (like an expert!)

    Yeah, I think it's an urban myth, too. I remember reading both today's WTF and the one you mentioned when installing an old Sierra game (Quest for Glory, I think) way back in the day. Then again, they say one's born every minute...

    Captcha: 'slashbot' That's just plain spooky! How could it know that?

  • Ken (unregistered) in reply to MX5Ringer
    MX5Ringer:
    another urban myth perhaps?
    I believe it could happen. I experienced first-hand a customer who, when asked to send "a copy of your data", mailed us a (paper) copy of the disk from the copy machine. (I'd say "Xerox[tm] copy", but it may not have been a Xerox, and I don't want any trouble with trademark police.)

    I also saw someone send us a "screenshot" of a problem they were having by taking a Polaroid picture and sending that it. (At least that was actually useful.)

  • wiregoat (unregistered) in reply to s|k
    s|k:
    Can you idiots stop with the captcha yet? WE ALL KNOW ALL OF THE WORDS ALREADY. But thank you, thank you for sharing, truly our days are better off. Nobody cares what your damn captcha is.

    captcha kungfu. Someone's about to open a can. I just could not resist.

  • Brady Kelly (unregistered) in reply to igitur
    igitur:
    Michael:
    Same level as the people who filed disks in a folder by using the hole puncher.

    Bit off topic, but that's how many condoms are distributed here in South Africa. They staple them to a safe sex pamphlet!

    Urban Legend Alert! I've never seen that in 37 years. OK, they haven't been handing so many out for all 37 years, but I've still never seen it in at least 12.

  • Tod K (unregistered)

    When I was in High School and we got a new lab full gasp Apple ][s with gasp 48K or RAM our computer teacher was also teaching computers at the local JC we lovingly referred to as Mt. Mickey Mouse.

    On the first day of class he took things very slowly describing how everything was going to work and then having people come up to the front of the room and get a 5.25 floppy disk return to their seats. He then walked them through writing on the label and attaching the label to the disk. Only after that were they allowed to approach the computer. He then instructed everyone to remove their disks from the sleeves and insert them into the computer. Everyone complied except for one guy who had managed to grab a floppy without the outer sleeve who proceeded to remove the disk's outer shell through brute force and then raise his hand to ask how to get it into the computer.

    I believe there was a materials charge for the floppies as well. That's money well spent.

    =tkk

  • Abscissa (unregistered) in reply to Maclee
    Maclee:
    This really reminds me of this image:

    [image]

    It's hard to tell for certain due to the image's resolution and compression artifacts, but I could swear that screen says to insert the CD "into drive A:". Which, of course, is equally funny.

  • Kev (unregistered) in reply to Brady Kelly
    igitur:
    Brady Kelly:
    Bit off topic, but that's how many condoms are distributed here in South Africa. They staple them to a safe sex pamphlet!

    Urban Legend Alert! I've never seen that in 37 years. OK, they haven't been handing so many out for all 37 years, but I've still never seen it in at least 12.

    I've seen them distributed like that here in the UK.

    Screenshots taken on cameras can be rather handy though - unless they try to send them via MMS anyway...

  • Some Random 5.25" floppy user (unregistered)

    Tucked away in some box in the attic, I have a specialized tool designed to punch a notch with perfectly squared off corners, at the proper height from the top side of the disk.

    Figure if I wait another 10-15 years on that, I can sell it off to an antiques dealer.

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