Address Bar. ADDRESS BAR! (long, as usual)

[jb17kx]

I bought a CRT monitor last week, a 19" flatscreen Samsung model from around 2005 but still new in box. Not overly cheap, but I prefer a CRT to an LCD anyday.

On a OP-related note, I once spent 15 minutes trying to get somebody to open their start menu. They could not find the thing and did not have a Windows key. Turned out they had anchored the taskbar to the top of their screen, dragged it in so you couldn't see anything save for a little blue bar, then enabled auto-hide.

[Polenicus]

Ugh, the Address Bar

Bane of my freaking existence when I worked internet tech support. It usually took me several tries to get people to find it, and that was before Google 'helpfully' made things more complicated. Sometimes telling them to look for the 'http' worked, but for the people who couldn't find the 'START' menu...

Though, that doesn't come close to my ultimate, above-all brain-bleeder. This was back when I worked for a large 3 letter ISP (Not AOL. The other guys. Sounds a little like 'M&M's')

Me: Handsome, stunning, brilliant, suave and all-around god's gift to tech support
NZ Lady: God's punishment to me for the hubris of the above statement

Me: Thank you for calling M&M tech support, my name is Polenicus, how can I help you?
NZ Lady: Yes, I'm having trouble getting connected while installing your software. It keeps giving me an error 22.

(Now, an error 22 in our POS front-end client means an incorrect username and password. I quickly bring up the logs, and confirm the server is registering the wrong password)

Me: Okay, that seems to be a password error that has locked your account. I'll just unlock that *clickety* and we can install your software.
NZ: Okay

(Try again... fail until we lock the account again)

Me: Hmmmm... are you sure you're typing the password correctly?
NZ Lady: Yes, I am. I picked it out myself. It's blahblahblahZEROZERO (The zeros are important)
Me: (Not supposed to hear the password, but okay) Well, we can reset the password, but first let me try that and check on this end

(Log into her account... and it works! Lady DOES know her password! Well, that's odd. So I construct a manual dialler for her... and get an error 691, which is incorrect password. Now a manual dialer is the most basic thing we can have, and an incorrect password error means either an incorrect username, or an incorrect password... damn near impossible for it to be something else without generating a different error)

Me: Well now that's very peculiar. Are you sure you're typing in the password correctly?
NZ Lady: Yes, it's blahblahblahZEROZERO.
Me: And you're sure it's blahblahblahZEROZERO, and not blahblahblah letter 'O' letter 'O'?
NZ Lady: Yes, it's blahblahblahZEROZERO. That's what I'm typing.
Me: Well, let's try a few other things.

(The 'few other things' stretched over nearly an hour. Rebuilding her winsocks, checking for spyware and viruses, turning off unneeded processes... I reset her password, but she simply could NOT handle anything but blahblahblahZEROZERO so I always had to change it back to that)

Me: Well ma'am, I honestly don't know what to say. We've tried EVERYTHING, and the system still says it's an incorrect password. What I'll do is escalate you to our Tier 3 support.
NZ Lady: Oh, wait! When you say blahblahblahZEROZERO, are you using Alphabetical zeroes, or Numerical zeroes?
Me:... Bweh?
NZ Lady: Because I've been using Alphabetical zeros in my password. Should I be using numerical zeroes?
Me: ... I... guh... *SNERF* (Sound of brain cells messily killing themselves off in a frantic attempt to escape the toxic illogic)... *small voice* Yes ma'am... please use numerical zeroes...

Great Ghu... ALPHABETICAL ZEROES?? It hurts my brain to this day! There is a huge scar on my brain tissue in the shape of the letter zero.

[Shabo]

I wonder if she ever figured out if there were no alphabetical O's on her keyboard.

"Why would they put two zeros on the keyboard and no O's? That's pretty stupid!"

[JustADude]

Me: And you're sure it's blahblahblahZEROZERO, and not blahblahblah letter 'O' letter 'O'?

....

NZ Lady: Oh, wait! When you say blahblahblahZEROZERO, are you using Alphabetical zeroes, or Numerical zeroes?

Okay, even putting aside the complete and utter stupidity of the second statement taken by itself, which will take a LOT of doing, would not 'Letter 'O' and Alphabetical Zero be similar enough for people to catch?

Wait... no... nevermind... I did not just go there, did I?

God... I did... I actually went and applied Alternate Frame Logic to something a SC did. I've squandered my talents on proving something is so incredibly stupid, it's stupid even after you intentionally trip your hamster.

[ringo]

Vista

When you type in an address in the start bar menu, it goes to that web page. So when I typed in www.customerssuck.com, it opened up my default web browser and opening the page.

btw: using vista.

[freaktard]

NZ Lady: Oh, wait! When you say blahblahblahZEROZERO, are you using Alphabetical zeroes, or Numerical zeroes?

This sounds like it could have been my mother-in-law!

[cpux]

Windows Vista on 512 MB of RAM? *twitch*
Hey, I know this group of sado-masochists. I think he'd fit right in.

It's people like this that make me want to implement some sort of exam for a license to use a computer. Nothing hard, mind you; just something that demonstrates one's ability to effectively use a word processor, a web browser, etc. Would save IT people a buttload of grief.

[Andara Bledin]

*twitch*

This thread is personally responsible for the death of thousands of brain cells. Thousands!

Now, I can't say the guy in the OP isn't stupid, because he is. However, you might try to use the word "location" to replace address. That probably wouldn't help, but at least it's something different.

Also, if you have Internet access yourself, you could always do a search for the terms 'Lexmark,' 'drivers,' and 'model #' to come up with a search result that would work. I do that to get my drivers because I'm never sure what the exact site is and Google is a wonderful thing.

Alternately, you can tell the guy to look for the part at the top that starts with "http" and have him write over that.

Finally, when asking what browser a person is using: Tell them to read off the text at the very top of the screen, usually with a little picture at the left. The last part will usually be the browser name. (at least that is the case with Firefox & IE)

Great Ghu... ALPHABETICAL ZEROES?? It hurts my brain to this day! There is a huge scar on my brain tissue in the shape of the letter zero.

Buh... wha... huh... ??? *goes braindead*

^-.--------------
(flatlined ^)

[Sonoma]

Oh, wait! When you say blahblahblahZEROZERO, are you using Alphabetical zeroes, or Numerical zeroes?

Ouch! My brain.

This does remind me of an incident with a co-worker years ago. The work computer was an old DOS machine, and when she got the (A)bort, (R)etry, (F)ail message one night, she spent most of the night entering "yes". If she would have only called me after the first few minutes, I could have spared the poor 'y' on the keyboard.

[Polenicus]

Ouch! My brain.

I wish I was making that call up, but honestly I don't think I could imagine something that dumb. I have not to this day encountered anything that even comes close, even the 'Do you speak White Vietnamese or Black Vietnamese?' guy. The odd part was, she seemed perfectly normal and sensible otherwise, and she listened to all my instructions and never escalated into suck. It's just for some reason her brain had a massive logic fault when it came to '0'

After the call (I had told my Sup about it, and those around me, they were all kind fo aghast) I went into personal, walked outside to the (empty) smoke pit, and just screamed.

Then I had to go back in a cheerfully take more calls.

[Trisnic]

I used to get this a lot at least once a week.

I learned to tell people to just hit the Windows Key and R, type in the URL and then click ok

MUCH, MUCH easier that way.

[jb17kx]

Smart idea, Trisnic. Much simpler - untill you find somebody with no Windows key (*cough* IBM *cough*).

[tendomentis]

My brain hurts from that stupidity.

On another note, I don't know if this works in Vista, but in XP you can have them open up any folder and replace the C:\ stuff with HTTP:\\ and it'll go to any webpage.

Actually, this was Microsoft's first push to being "third party browser friendly". If you open a folder in Vista and type an address in the address bar, it will send the URL to whatever your default browser is (which if the idiot in question has the crummy AOL software installed, would open in that program).

This is why all my clients consent to a remote management program, so instead of playing the screen->idiot->phone->me game, I can fix it live.

[ringo]

CTRL-ESC works like windows key!

Smart idea, Trisnic. Much simpler - untill you find somebody with no Windows key (*cough* IBM *cough*).

My IBM keyboard as a window key. But if the keyboard doesn't have a window key, there is always ctrl-esc.

[air914]

My laptop doesn't have a windows key And just after I learned so many handy shortcuts with that key....

Okay in the next version of Internet Explorer I think we need to make the Address bar a BRIGHT YELLOW Bar and the word ADDRESS should be in Bold 14 pt. font..... nah, they'd still miss it......