Amazingly dumb computing decisions you witness every day

[her209]

Users who sit there and tap the backspace key repeatedly instead of just clicking and highlighting the text they want to remove and then tapping the backspace/delete key ONCE!

 

[Markbnj]

Well, an older relative got a call from "Microsoft tech support" the other day. The caller had an accent that seemed to point to the Indian subcontinent. He said they had detected a problem with her computer, and she let them on via remote access to fix it. Yeah, so that's pretty much my candidate.

 

[Mark R]

Meh. Much easier and more ergonomic to hit backspace a few times, rather than take hand off keyboard, find mouse, select text, put hand back on keyboard.

Even easier and quicker to use ctrl+shift+arrow to select whole words at a time and then type the fixed text.

 

[MtnMan]

Users who sit there and tap the backspace key repeatedly instead of just clicking and highlighting the text they want to remove and then tapping the backspace/delete key ONCE!

People who worry about trivial shit like this.

 

[IronWing]

Highlight text with mouse
Right click
Select Copy
Reposition mouse
Right Click
Select Paste.

I'm not particularly high strung but I all but have to leave the room when people fail to use ctrl-c and ctrl-v.

 

[unokitty]

Emory University server accidentally sends reformat request to all Windows PCs, including itself

A Windows 7 deployment image was accidently sent to all Windows machines, including laptops, desktops, and even servers. This image started with a repartition/reformat set of tasks. As soon as the accident was discovered, the SCCM server was powered off – however, by that time, the SCCM server itself had been repartitioned and reformatted.

All together now "We're from IT. And we're here to help!"

Uno

 

[postmortemIA]

the decisions that Microsoft made are the worsts
- can run any executable from any folder
- any app can store data in any directory (as long as it has write rights), resulting that you have no idea where all the files are
- any app can have any interface in any shape, so every app has learning curve

 

[ImpulsE69]

Users who sit there and tap the backspace key repeatedly instead of just clicking and highlighting the text they want to remove and then tapping the backspace/delete key ONCE!

lol...i do this regularly.

And completely agree with the statement about MS letting programs save files anywhere they want. They should all be self contained in their own folders. Period. If you want a "backup" then make it yourself. At least then you know where it is. The hunt and peck for every little detail of a corrupt or user screw up to reinstall an app is annoying as hell.

 

[mrjminer]

the decisions that Microsoft made are the worsts
- can run any executable from any folder
- any app can store data in any directory (as long as it has write rights), resulting that you have no idea where all the files are
- any app can have any interface in any shape, so every app has learning curve

Clearly, those are Microsoft issues and not issues with the individuals / companies making the software.

I am going with IronWing for the relatively frivolous annoyance. The right-click context menu to copy and paste is so time-consuming compared to how easy and well-placed the keyboard commands to do it are.

My primary answer, though, is choosing any operating system other than Windows.

 

[lxskllr]

the decisions that Microsoft made are the worsts
- can run any executable from any folder
- any app can store data in any directory (as long as it has write rights), resulting that you have no idea where all the files are
- any app can have any interface in any shape, so every app has learning curve

and "Hide extension for known file types". Printermanual.pdf.exe. Fuck it. It's all good, right? We don't need no stinkin' extensions.

 

[MongGrel]

People who worry about trivial shit like this.

+1

 

[mmntech]

Scheduling a major server update during peak use period of our app/website, which disabled several key features for over an hour. The developers didn't appreciate the barrage of angry emails from me. They've now been told by management to only do that stuff during off hours.

 

[reallyscrued]

Users who sit there and tap the backspace key repeatedly instead of just clicking and highlighting the text they want to remove and then tapping the backspace/delete key ONCE!

Y U NO ...HIGHLIGHT WORD?

Please learn to use memes correctly or don't use them at all.


Both are stupid, why remove your hands from keyboard? If you're removing numerous words then Shift + Control + Back arrow > backspace.


Amazingly dumb computing decision? Probably incorrectly using a meme.

 

[Red Squirrel]

People who use cap locks instead of shift. My dad does that, he'll hit cap locks, make his capital letter, then hit the key again. It's actually hilarious to watch as you just see the cap lock light going on and off as he types.

Though the one that gets me the most is people who know more than the average user but don't use any kind of raid or redundancy system for file storage. "I have 10TB!" Yeah, it's non redundant. Have fun restoring backups and rebuilding your file system/structure/permissions etc when a drive fails.

Though lately what pisses me off is how it seems developers keep wanting to change everything just for the sake of change. Everywhere you turn, every program you try to use, there's an update of sorts, and they changed everything, again! It makes no sense to change stuff just for the sake of changing it. I think what's happening is overall everything works really well now days so devs are running out of work to do and get bored so "interface change! Lets get rid of all these buttons that people are so used to, we'll shove them in some other menu that takes 5 extra click to get to, let's move all this around, change the look..." And they wonder why people get mad. Ex: Windows 8. Or Firefox 29. Need I say more? :awe: Yeah, people get used to it.. then they change it again!

 

[WelshBloke]

Well, an older relative got a call from "Microsoft tech support" the other day. The caller had an accent that seemed to point to the Indian subcontinent. He said they had detected a problem with her computer, and she let them on via remote access to fix it. Yeah, so that's pretty much my candidate.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2239129

Hmmmm

 

[BoomerD]

I spend time here. Does it get any dumber than that?

 

[IronWing]

Though lately what pisses me off is how it seems developers keep wanting to change everything just for the sake of change. Everywhere you turn, every program you try to use, there's an update of sorts, and they changed everything, again! It makes no sense to change stuff just for the sake of changing it. I think what's happening is overall everything works really well now days so devs are running out of work to do and get bored so "interface change! Lets get rid of all these buttons that people are so used to, we'll shove them in some other menu that takes 5 extra click to get to, let's move all this around, change the look..." And they wonder why people get mad. Ex: Windows 8. Or Firefox 29. Need I say more? :awe: Yeah, people get used to it.. then they change it again!

You mean like how Google totally bloated up their search page such that the time between the search box loading and page finishing is sufficient to screw up what the user is typing?

 

[her209]

Y U NO ...HIGHLIGHT WORD?

Please learn to use memes correctly or don't use them at all.


Both are stupid, why remove your hands from keyboard? If you're removing numerous words then Shift + Control + Back arrow > backspace.


Amazingly dumb computing decision? Probably incorrectly using a meme.

Incorrectly using a meme is a meme.

 

[Markbnj]

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2239129

Hmmmm

I didn't recall that thread, but I have since heard from two other people who have had the same call. Fortunately both of them are devs and knowledgeable enough to laugh at the caller.

 

[Red Squirrel]

You mean like how Google totally bloated up their search page such that the time between the search box loading and page finishing is sufficient to screw up what the user is typing?

OMG I HATE that "feature". I actually stopped using Google because of that. You can change it, but you have to change it on every computer/browser and when I want to search for something in a pinch on another computer or inside a VM, it just pisses me off to deal with that.

At least wait till I'm finished typing before submitting. It's really too bad because Google's core engine is very good, their stuff works well etc, but they keep fucking up the front ends on everything.

 

[HOSED]

Not truly an every day occurrence but non savvy users who run Windows with administrator accounts then wonder why their system is "so slow"

 

[HOSED]

People who recommend using MSE to "non techies". It is fine to use it if you have never and will never click a questionable link IMO, but http://chart.av-comparatives.org/chart1.php

 

[Ichinisan]

Users who sit there and tap the backspace key repeatedly instead of just clicking and highlighting the text they want to remove and then tapping the backspace/delete key ONCE!

I use [Ctrl]+[BackSp] constantly.

...also [Ctrl]+[Shift]+[ArrowKeys] to select blocks of text.

 

[Ichinisan]

Meh. Much easier and more ergonomic to hit backspace a few times, rather than take hand off keyboard, find mouse, select text, put hand back on keyboard.

Even easier and quicker to use ctrl+shift+arrow to select whole words at a time and then type the fixed text.

Yup.

 

[Ichinisan]

and "Hide extension for known file types". Printermanual.pdf.exe. Fuck it. It's all good, right? We don't need no stinkin' extensions.

This. Thank goodness I got used to Win95A (every version after had filename exts hidden by default).