Work vs. Personal
They’ve been waiting for me.
I can tell that the folks at my company have been waiting for a guy like me to show up. Today, I had three different persona PCs from three different employees in my cube. Mind, I mean three machines that they brought from home to have me look at for them, not machines from the office. Mostly, they just needed to be defragged and have their anti-virus files updated, but, c’mon, three? Obviously, these people have just been waiting for a “real” computer person to show up so that they can get me to do basic maintenance for them. Actually, come to think of it, I need to update my anti-virus signatures myself!
But, that doesn’t mean I have any less work that’s work related, either. Just this morning I was setting up a PC for yet another person from New Orleans. Which is a good thing, I guess, when you consider some of the alternatives. Of course, it would have been nice if they hadn’t promised that same cube to two different people without telling anyone. I was about to try and move his e-mail from the Windows 2000 machine he had in the office to his G4 Powerbook, but then we decided to take a “wait-and-see” stance instead. With all the miscommunication flying back and forth, we thought that was better. The chaos from Katrina has everyone sort of “runnin’ and gunnin'”, if you take my meaning, and that makes things extra challenging sometimes.
So, with all this craziness going on at the office, I find myself asking, “Should I be doing all this for people?” I mean, it’s not really my job, but the folks asking me to do this for them are the top-level managers. Should I be telling them “no”? I’d really rather not do that, since everyone seems to like me and the work I do for them. Granted, I’m not sure that most of them have any idea what I actually do on a day-to-day basis, but still, they seem pleased, so I’d rather not rock the boat.
Oh, and in recent updates, I did finally manage to get the satellite phone working, but now, since it took so long, we’re trying to return one. Not sure if we can do that at this point, but we’re trying. And, I’ve been messing around with all kinds of Windows 2000, NT and XP issues on the network. Getting all the folks from both offices working has been a bit of a challenge. In fact, if not for the DMZ port on my firewall, I’m not sure I could have had the two domains working together, since they’re named the same. I’m sure that would have caused problems if they’d seen each other on the network.
And, I really should be looking more closely at the version of Linux I want to run on that mythical server that I should be getting spec on. I’m leaning toward either Red Hat or SuSE, possibly even SuSE with all the Novell Open Enterprise Server stuff on it. I have to admit, if I were to get good install media, that could be really cool. All the stability and flexibility of Linux with the way cool administration tools from Novell. Those tools are, after all, what they’re known for developing. It’s the best “value added” product for Linux that I’ve seen so far.
Well, I guess I have some time before we’re really ready to do all that, so, while I wait, I’ll probably just read Sams Teach Yourself UNIX System Administration in 24 Hours, so that my skills are sharp when the time comes. But, now, I’m tired, so I think I’ll just go to bed.
As I sit here, in front of a decomissioned G4 laptop…we’re giving the screen to an employee with a G4 with a bad CRT. I’m getting $100 to make the switch, away from work, but there is some crossover there. There’s definitely a gray band which separate work from home here. They even buy jump drives and give them to people…for whatever. They just ask that you stay “billable.”
I think that as long as you do your job, which often means watching a progress bar creep across a screen, you may as well make the “big guys” happy by running Spybot and cleaning up the junk from their late-night web surfing.
Comment by Paul — 9/14/2005 @ 10:04 am
So , what are the benifits of suse pro over Red hat Enterprise ? Management tools ? DO you know if there is a novell client for linux ?
As far as i have noticed from job postings, red had enterprise is mentioned alot more than suse. I cant even remember one mentioning suse.
dood
Comment by im822 — 9/14/2005 @ 10:35 am
Concerning the question , if you should fix the personal computers. Get your bosses signoff. Then its policy and ok. But I would not spend a minute past my eighth woorking on them. Unless your paid hourly. When a higher up comes with a box , just say your going to clear it with the boss , to ensure company priorities are met first. Then let the box sit in the hall for a few days.
Comment by im822 — 9/14/2005 @ 10:45 am
Yes, there is a Novell client for Linux now. No idea how well it works, but it’s there.
As for the benefits of one version over the other… Well, the management tools for Novell’s implementation of SuSE are really nice. Or, they were in the little demo I had running for a bit under my desk.
Comment by the Network Geek — 9/14/2005 @ 11:07 am
I like SuSe, I know nothing about Linux, and I was able to set up a SuSe OES server, configure Squid and some other fun stuff, and add some GroupWise stuffage as well – all with zippo knowledge (and it works!).
As for the extra stuff you’re doing – I tried to stop that at work by telling people I charged $125/hr with a minimum 1/2 hour charge for work, an $75/hr (same min) for clean-ups and defrags. I still get half the people, but it’s some fast cash.
Yesterday I got to stop by a guys house to check on an “internet” problem – which meant his wife was having trouble getting into an online poker site. It was loading the site software in the background, but she didn’t want to wait – so she kept closing the browser. I pulled up the site, waited about 1 minute, then threw my arms out over the monitor and yelled “THE POWER OF TECH COMPELLS YOU!” 5 seconds later the game fired up and they both looked at me like I was a miracle worker. 2 1/2 minutes work, $75, and 2 people who think I walk on water – it’s not all bad.
Comment by stikboy — 9/14/2005 @ 9:24 pm
By the way, as for the Linux client, prepare to go on a wild-goose-chase, rpm hunting expedition – but it does work – minus any kind of login-script fun. I remember seeing a nice article on Novell about configuring for Samba – I’ve heard good things about that method as well.
Comment by stikboy — 9/14/2005 @ 9:29 pm
Well, I’ve gotten used to searching high and low for Linux things. Sure, it may take a while, but it *is* available to the truly dedicated and motivated.
SAMBA is, actually, quite easy to use. You can set it up to emulate a Windows PDC very quickly and easily. And, it’s built in to most Linux distros. When I was playing around with it at work, it took me all of five or ten minutes to configure SAMBA and sign into it.
Comment by the Network Geek — 9/15/2005 @ 6:10 am