Tag: ID10T

RTFM!

Today I had the simplest of tasks to do. Make some software available for some users.
I always test out the software first to see if there are any issues etc.
I was given a CD with a piece of software on it, a single exe with a Username and Password to run it.
That didn’t work? After several attempts, I paid a bit more attention and realised that the Username and Password details were printed in reverse. I skim read the CD and see that it said Username and Password but didn’t notice they were the wrong way around!
So I swapped the Username and Password around and tried it again. Still no joy!

I left it for a bit as I had other stuff do and came back to it just before lunch.
I had a quick read of the manual and that told me a Username and Password combination the same as what was on the CD but the other way around! However, I had already tried it both ways!

I copied the exe onto my desktop and popped the CD out of the drive and run the program again making sure that I had typed the password in correctly. This time it worked? WTAF?
I then put the CD back in and tried it again only to get the same error as before?
I then loaded up the manual to have another read only to find a sentence saying that you have to copy the exe onto your computer for it to work? Err I guess I must have missed that bit. Ooopps!

Being an IT Pro! I never read the manual 😉 maybe I should try that from now on!

How do I create a blank Excel spreadsheet?

So today I got the first support call from the Silver Fox for this year, and boy what a corker!

Apparently, he had been trying to create a blank Excel Spreadsheet for the past 2 days and had resorted on opening an old one, deleting all the sheets and then saving it as a blank!

I asked him why he hadn’t called me after 30 seconds of not doing it? He said it was late and didn’t want to call. Fine, I said, but you could of emailed so I picked it up in the morning.
Anyway, I remoted on and set about showing him how to create a blank Excel Spreadsheet.

First and easiest way, Click Start > Microsoft Excel 2010 and errrr there we go!
Or right click in a folder and select New > Microsoft Excel Worksheet and there you have a blank sheet.
However, when I clicked Start > Microsoft Excel 2010 he said to me
“Wo Hold on there a second, where did that Microsoft Excel 2010 shortcut come from? It wasn’t there 2 days ago”

After explaining that he is the only one using his computer, either it was there and he didn’t see it or he put it there without remembering, I was extremely rude and hung up on the old duffer 😀

Dodgy Recruitment – Update

Today i received a message on my website, interestingly from someone kind of detailed in one of my blog posts.

The blog post was Dodgy Recruitment which detailed my issues trying to get my details removed from a recruitment company that i never signed up with or wanted any information from.

It was a ridiculous trail of just how stupid things can get and just how much some of these people do not care about peoples personal data.

The message i received was polite and asked me if i could remove my blog post, as it have been over 2 years since it happened and that working practices had changed to put a stop to the issues i had experienced. Apparently my post was finding its way to the top of a search engine – number 2 on Google by the looks of it. While it was good to hear there had been changes, i want the original post to serve as a warning, after all once my email address get used and abused i stand no chance in getting it removed.

A new take on a scam!

Today I woke up to find a Skype message from a ‘female’ asking to add me to their contacts. I had a quick look at their profile which was some burry pixelated picture, no doubt a thumbnail taken from a social media website somewhere and had a quick check of their email address.

So, as I normally like to have a bit of fun I played along for a bit. Asking questions, answering questions, making out that I was rich and single, asking them what they were wearing etc.

I was however surprised when said contact then tried to video call me! Again I thought I’d play along so I disabled my camera and mic and asked them to call me again, telling them to hurry up as I was about to get in the shower.

So they called me and I accepted, ‘she’ asked why she couldn’t see me, to which I replied that I couldn’t see her either.

On closer inspection, the picture of the ‘female’ was the same for 1m 39s even though they were typing and sending me messages.

I’d had enough by then, knowing full well that I was not going to see any boobs, so I sent a quick message saying thank you for the IP address and pointing them to a website that details scammers and their email address, declined the add request, blocked them and reported them as spam.

Cheap crappy scams! If they want money out of me then I need to see the goods first!

SCCM upgrade from 2012 SP1 to 2012 R2 + CU

So, finally I have finished upgrading all of our clients to the latest version and CU of the SCCM client.

To say it has been a challenge is an understatement.

You would think that given what SCCM is used for that it would be easy and quick to do, but no.

There were just over 400 machines and once I upgraded the server form SP1 to R2 and then updated it to the latest CU I had to deploy the R2 client and then deploy the update to CU4.

The R2 client seemed to get deployed quiet easy, there were a few machines that for some reason had really really old SP1 version on them. For those, there were a few that didn’t like the upgrade, so I had to uninstall the old client and then deploy the new one.

I then set about deploying the CU4 update to all machines. There was a bunch that wouldn’t update, no matter how long I left it and no matter how many times I forced an Application Deployment Evaluation Cycle it stayed on the old version.

I had a SQL query listing all the machines on the old version, the started off about 49.

I found it easier to remote on and manually uninstall the client, wait for all processes to terminate, rename the old SCCM directory and then reboot the machine. I figured that out after a bit of trial and error trying to get things off and on again!

So, thinking I had it sussed out, I was somewhat surprised when I refreshed my query one morning to find the number of machines had increased. Looking closer it was a few machines from the Labs.

RDPing on showed that the version was indeed the old version. I really couldn’t be bothered to see what the hell was going on as it had been a good few weeks that I had been trying to do this and people not logging off! and machines in locked rooms that didn’t work with WOL were doing my nut in.

So for each of those I applied my fix – remove the old client, wait for processes to terminate, rename the old CCM directory, reboot the machine, deploy the new client via SCCM and then deploy the update. That seemed to work for every computer that somehow managed to downgrade its client version on a reboot!?

Now to package and deploy the growing list of application updated that are needed.

Wine that homos drink!?!?

You couldn’t make this shit up! I done Matraco a favour by fixing his pc that was infected with loads of dodgy shit, one being the Cryptowall 3 virus.

I do not know what the hell happened, but for some unknown reason none of his documents were encrypted. Maybe it was because there was loads of other crapware / shit ware / fag ware on there to clog up the system? Maybe it had too many spring onions or marrows on it, or maybe it was because he was using plastic gloves to type? Either was he is one lucky SOAB.

So, to say thank you for saving his life, he bought me some alcoholic beverages. Not just any alcoholic beverages. It was special alcoholic beverages. Apparently it was, and I quote `wine that homos drink`??? What the fucking hell?!?

That specific aside, I shall enjoy said alcoholic beverages, as its not often that TAB splashes his cash on anything other than marrows.

Cheers Matraco

A reinstall?

Today I heard the words that I dread hearing, especially coming from someone with a technical back ground.

While looking to fix a problem, a problem that seemed to point to a few things as the cause, I heard `if I can’t fix it I will reinstall it`.

To me a reinstall of a computer is the last thing that should be done, and from experience it is only as a result of unexpected damage that is has to be done – like a hard drive failure that corrupts too many files, or as a result of someone getting impatient with Windows Updates and turning the machine off when it says not to! why would you do that?

So, I volunteered to take a look before the reinstall was started and had fixed the problem within a few minutes.

After I returned the computer, I sat and pondered on the thought processes involved in making the decision to reinstall……

Internal Logon Credentials

Today I went into town to a large retailer to order a gift for the wife.
Due to a couple of date issues and unknown factors I thought that it would have been the easiest option, rather than going online to do it myself – which is the way I tend to do things.

So, I’m at the counter wanting to place my order, where the female assistant was trying to log on to the computer. The normal explanations as to why she can’t log on are given, `it’s a bit slow this morning` and `my log on doesn’t seem to work`. She then went off to get someone to log on for her.

She came back and put a piece of paper on the counter and said `I’ll try these`. She then proceeded to log in while looking at what was written on it. I looked down at it and could see that someone had written a username and password on it!

Unbelievable to think that someone would not only give someone else their log in details, but they would also write then down (without encrypting them) and then show then to someone outside of the organisation they worked for.

I chose not to make a mental note of the details and then try them on an internet portal (no idea if there was one) while using the TOR network!

It amazes me what some people will do, given all the things that they must of been told by their employer and given common sense with security?!

Only those browsers? Really?

Well today I see another example of ridiculous browser wars at its best, or is that worst!

While looking at some issues on a CMS system, I picked the page apart find a very old version of a JavaScript component.

As I was using the latest version of Internet Explorer we had to play around with compatibility to get this website to work. After changing the User Agent String we were presented with a page saying that said that our browser was out of date. Fine, yes we may of made it report that it was out of date, which is something that seems to happen on an almost daily basis to some website here and there, but the options that we were presented with on the screen was ridiculous – upgrade your browser to Firefox, Chrome or Safari? Seriously? WTF? BOFW?

Not sure why they had chosen to completely remove Internet Explorer from the preferred list, but given what the website provider does and the sector that they are selling / providing to and given how systems are configured in that sector removing Internet Explorer has got to be one of the most stupid things to do.

I don’t give a shit what the Internet Explorer hatters have to say about that, sometimes there are reasons as to why you can only use certain software to do a job, and no matter what you do you need to cater for those scenarios.

Hopefully when the issue is fixed Internet Explorer will on the list of preferred browsers!

CryptoWall – OH, your fucked

My first dealings with a Crypto Variant today, CryptoWall

Someone that I haven`t done any work for for a few years contacted me to ask for some help as they couldn`t open their emails. So I remoted on and took a quick look for them.

First thing that I noticed when the screen loads is 3 files in the middle of the desktop called DECRYPT_INSTRUCTION. Straight off I knew that this was not going to be a good result.

I had a quick read of what it says and then a quick look at the My Documents folder and then proceeded to tell him, in a non technical way, that he was Fucked. I then explained what had happened and told him that there was nothing that I could do, something that I don`t often tell people. I wasn`t going to suggest paying $500 to get it all unencrypted only to find that it didn`t work.
Ironically the only thing that wasn`t encrypted was all of his Sage Accounts!

He asked how it could of happened and after a quick visual check I told him
Well, you are running Windows XP that has out of date virus protection, that would not of helped, you have probably opened up a few dodgy emails with attachments and looked at them. He did say that he has been getting a lot of emails with invoices in them! Oh Dear

Its not often that I cant fix something, but in this case I couldn`t, so I told him to turn off and unplug the computer and buy 2 new ones to replace what he had as they are well out of date and possibly open to more problems!