Wildly Incompetent Network admin post on reddit

[lxskllr]

I know. We've had a ton of problems with it, especially when people email us documents from later versions. Our IT budget is typically $0 unless something breaks, or we're forced to upgrade by our insurance companies.

We were still on Windows '98 until 2006, and still had some 1999 computers with a Celeron 733 processor at that time!

Why wouldn't you use Open Office? It's free, and much more compatible with recent Office versions.

 

[alkemyst]

Why wouldn't you use Open Office? It's free, and much more compatible with recent Office versions.

Free is for commerical use?

 

[lxskllr]

Free is for commerical use?

Yea, it's free for any use. It can also be modified to support their specific needs if they can recode it, or pay someone else to.

 

[Cogman]

Free is for commerical use?

No GPLed application is limited to private use only. Things created with GPLed applications are not themselves GPLed. Its only when an application uses a GPLed code that trouble starts a brewin'.

 

[alkemyst]

No GPLed application is limited to private use only. Things created with GPLed applications are not themselves GPLed. Its only when an application uses a GPLed code that trouble starts a brewin'.

so open office can be deployed by say a 20,000+ commerical enterprise with no fees?

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Good suggestion lxskllr. I'd recommend that anyone running any version of Office below 2003 move to Open Office, especially if you're still running Office 97. That was horribly susceptible to memory leaks, macro viruses, etc. and unless I'm mistaken, you won't find any patches for it these days. Heck, I remember seeing tons of issues with Office 2000 and memory issues with large spreadsheets.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

so open office can be deployed by say a 20,000+ commerical enterprise with no fees?

My last company had 25,000+ users and there was a big project which involved testing Open Office with our apps, etc. to see if it was a viable (and cheaper) option. To be honest, my guess is that the powers to be never really intended to move to it but instead, put on the big dog and pony show in order to scare Microsoft into giving us bigger discounts.

 

[lxskllr]

so open office can be deployed by say a 20,000+ commerical enterprise with no fees?

Yup. I'm guessing you'd see more companies doing that, except there's no replacement for Outlook. It's a good solution for companies that don't need Outlook though.

 

[Cogman]

Yup. I'm guessing you'd see more companies doing that, except there's no replacement for Outlook. It's a good solution for companies that don't need Outlook though.

I agree. Outlook really is quite impressive in its capabilities, no single Opensource alternative really touches it. (That, and the microsoft exchange server has, to my knowledge, no opensource solution that communicates with it without a large headache)

However, for word, excel, powerpoint, ect alternatives. Openoffice does a nice job.

 

[kt]

so open office can be deployed by say a 20,000+ commerical enterprise with no fees?

Direct quote from openoffice.org website:

Best of all, OpenOffice.org 3 can be downloaded and used entirely free of any licence fees. OpenOffice.org 3 is released under the LGPL licence. This means you may use it for any purpose - domestic, commercial, educational, public administration. You may install it on as many computers as you like. You may make copies and give them away to family, friends, students, employees - anyone you like.

 

[kalrith]

I guess I'll be looking into Open Office then . Thanks guys.

 

[ebaycj]

ive spent the last 2 days remoting into machines and upgrading them from office 2000 to office 2003. talk about getting old...i was at work for an hour this morning and wanted to shoot myself.

they have 3 of us doing this, 2400 machines...
/wrists

Really? You didn't think about remote deployment software for 2400 machines? Fail.

 

[Jadow]

lol, I was just reading about the Relics episode.


I learned that lesson early in my career. Double what I think it should take, then add another 20% for safety.

best part of that ep was that when it was all over, they just let Scotty, this seriously old guy was was clearly suffering from dementia, take a shuttlecraft and fly off by himself.

I want to see the follow up, crazy, demented Scotty flying around the galaxy not knowing what the fuck is going on, living in a pile of his own feces.

 

[xSauronx]

Really? You didn't think about remote deployment software for 2400 machines? Fail.

I didnt mention that Im an intern and have *nothing* to do with that decision. The entire IT dept there is about 10 years or so behind the curve. It is fucking *insane*

We only just wrapped up, more or less, the upgrade to XP from win2k, a few weeks ago (my understanding is it was a 3 year project, on ~7500 machines)

I really have no idea why they arent just pushing the office upgrades to machines overnight through....something. Getting anything new or worthwhile done there just doesnt happen, apparently. For images they use some relatively old version of ghost, for applications its zenworks 7 (the backend for novell is 6.5, well before they purchased suselinux, zenworks is at version 10 now) and on and on

fuck, the next project im supposed to be on is service pack 3. THREE! nevermind that they *know* certain updates after sp2 break at least some of the (hundreds of) software applications the place uses, and nevermind that they have a WSUS server that can push out updates as the updates get tested, and nevermind that doing the full install of SP3 on a machine takes anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours.

this is for a large, non profit hospital. i have no idea what it would take to get IT up to using software and hardware thats just 5 years old, but it would require a massive undertaking. that place is scary.

 

[alkemyst]

Direct quote from openoffice.org website:

Awesome...it wasn't always like that AFAIR...and most open-source still sadly is not free for commercial use.

There is so many good free software out there it's amazing people still pirate anything but movies and music. And even those at $1 or less a song and movies for 4-5 for $20 at a blockbuster why pirate them anyway.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

I didnt mention that Im an intern and have *nothing* to do with that decision. The entire IT dept there is about 10 years or so behind the curve. It is fucking *insane*

We only just wrapped up, more or less, the upgrade to XP from win2k, a few weeks ago (my understanding is it was a 3 year project, on ~7500 machines)

I really have no idea why they arent just pushing the office upgrades to machines overnight through....something. Getting anything new or worthwhile done there just doesnt happen, apparently. For images they use some relatively old version of ghost, for applications its zenworks 7 (the backend for novell is 6.5, well before they purchased suselinux, zenworks is at version 10 now) and on and on

fuck, the next project im supposed to be on is service pack 3. THREE! nevermind that they *know* certain updates after sp2 break at least some of the (hundreds of) software applications the place uses, and nevermind that they have a WSUS server that can push out updates as the updates get tested, and nevermind that doing the full install of SP3 on a machine takes anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours.

this is for a large, non profit hospital. i have no idea what it would take to get IT up to using software and hardware thats just 5 years old, but it would require a massive undertaking. that place is scary.

Can't you suggest that they push Office out? Are they going to make you go machine to machine for SP3 too?

Whoever is in charge there is an idiot of the highest magnitude. 50 or even 100 machines is one thing, but manually installing Office on 2400 machines?!?! It doesn't matter if you guys are interns, it is still a huge waste of time and resources. Heck, even if you don't have a software management solution, you could use the Office Admin Kit to build a script, elevate user permissions, and put it in a login script.

I'm frustrated with IT in general. I've seen too many incompetent people get management positions and I'm just tired of it. Like this lady who was appointed CIO of this manufacturing company that split off of my old company -- she has no business or qualification to be a CIO. She's the type that advocates getting stuff off of eBay, using Linksys routers for enterprise wireless access, etc.

 

[Cogman]

Awesome...it wasn't always like that AFAIR...and most open-source still sadly is not free for commercial use.

There is so many good free software out there it's amazing people still pirate anything but movies and music. And even those at $1 or less a song and movies for 4-5 for $20 at a blockbuster why pirate them anyway.

Um.. Yes, yes it is. If they license their software under the GPL, zlib, BSD, or MIT licensing schemes, they are free for commercial use.

Most corporations don't use opensource software because they essentially have no support.

 

[alkemyst]

Um.. Yes, yes it is. If they license their software under the GPL, zlib, BSD, or MIT licensing schemes, they are free for commercial use.

Most corporations don't use opensource software because the essentially have no support.

Well some of the solutions I have tried to look into in the past were restricted from commercial use.

I wouldn't do open-source for big business, but some of my clients need general productivity for 3-4 seats and don't have it in their budgets to throw $1000-2000 of software at it.

I'd be more or less support and I am paid for that. It could open up more business for me until the economy snaps back.

 

[lxskllr]

There's a difference between free and open source. Free can be restricted in any manner of ways. Avira free edition would be a good example. Open source can be used as you see fit, with only minor restrictions which usually have to do with making the source code available if you modify and distribute it. Linux is a good example of that.

 

[seepy83]

Yup. I'm guessing you'd see more companies doing that, except there's no replacement for Outlook. It's a good solution for companies that don't need Outlook though.

Not to side-track the thread, but when I was looking into the viability of OpenOffice, I was told by a Microsoft Licensing "guy" (not sure of his real title) that Exchange 2003 CALs included rights to install the Outlook 2003 Client (no seperate purchase of Office or Outlook necessary), and Exchange 2007 or 2010 CALs do not include rights to the full client, but you can allow access through OWA. It's definitely something to consider for people trying to cut back on license costs.

 

[rasczak]

ive spent the last 2 days remoting into machines and upgrading them from office 2000 to office 2003. talk about getting old...i was at work for an hour this morning and wanted to shoot myself.

they have 3 of us doing this, 2400 machines...
/wrists

why not take the .msi files in the office cd and setup a software policy to push the software out to those machines? your way is such an incredible waste of time imo.

*edit mark beat me to it.

 

[rasczak]

I didnt mention that Im an intern and have *nothing* to do with that decision. The entire IT dept there is about 10 years or so behind the curve. It is fucking *insane*

We only just wrapped up, more or less, the upgrade to XP from win2k, a few weeks ago (my understanding is it was a 3 year project, on ~7500 machines)

I really have no idea why they arent just pushing the office upgrades to machines overnight through....something. Getting anything new or worthwhile done there just doesnt happen, apparently. For images they use some relatively old version of ghost, for applications its zenworks 7 (the backend for novell is 6.5, well before they purchased suselinux, zenworks is at version 10 now) and on and on

fuck, the next project im supposed to be on is service pack 3. THREE! nevermind that they *know* certain updates after sp2 break at least some of the (hundreds of) software applications the place uses, and nevermind that they have a WSUS server that can push out updates as the updates get tested, and nevermind that doing the full install of SP3 on a machine takes anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours.

this is for a large, non profit hospital. i have no idea what it would take to get IT up to using software and hardware thats just 5 years old, but it would require a massive undertaking. that place is scary.

nvm, your work is just major FAIL. no offense.

 

[Raincity]

I am 99% sure I know this guy. Unlimited badge swiping privileges in the EDR is nothing to brag about.

 

[SaDiZTiKStyLeZ]

I am 99% sure I know this guy. Unlimited badge swiping privileges in the EDR is nothing to brag about.

Keep us updated on when he gets canned. I'm looking to relocate to Vegas.

 

[xSauronx]

Can't you suggest that they push Office out? Are they going to make you go machine to machine for SP3 too?

Whoever is in charge there is an idiot of the highest magnitude. 50 or even 100 machines is one thing, but manually installing Office on 2400 machines?!?! It doesn't matter if you guys are interns, it is still a huge waste of time and resources. Heck, even if you don't have a software management solution, you could use the Office Admin Kit to build a script, elevate user permissions, and put it in a login script.

the red tape at this place is astonishing. to get even minor stuff done gets either held up or takes ages to go through. i can suggest til im blue in the face...my supervisor even knows this is ridiculous, so does the other SA II on the team....they cant fix it.

bonus: the financial services building, with ~150 wired workstations and almost no visitor has about 30 WAPs in it. no idea why. theyre literally 20 and 30 and 40 feet apart at some points. its insane. and in a cube farm, to boot.

we have novell and zenworks desktop manager 7...and we can add workstations to app groups to get office 2k3, but we have to install it manually, remoting in to each machine. yes, its fucking dumb. no, i dont know why they dont auto install it in some way.

they said management 3 years ago was far, far wosre about getting things done...some other people have moved up and can get things done, but only so much.

as for sp3...i dont know yet, they dont know yet. we start app testing in a couple of weeks (i may request a transfer to another department at that point). they dont know if theyll roll it out via WSUS, through the zenwork app launcher or what. since it can take 2 hours on the old equipment to install, we might actually have to go to some machines to do it (downtime in some departments is a bitch) or we might have to roll sp3 into new workstation images, and re-ghost machines.

no idea, any way they do it, its going to be stupid. someone on the application team already found another job since they announced the project...he wants nothing to do with this crap.

as for me, im an intern, i might be able to get moved...ill decide what to do in march about my internship as to whether i want an extention or just want to work elsewhere during school. this is a huge lesson, 90% of the time, in "what not to do"