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Annoying Computer Habits You Can't Live Without

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thain
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« on: July 06, 2008, 08:25:32 pm »

So this is a completely random topic, but does anyone have a computing habit (or program/plugin) they can't live without, but that everyone else seems to think is more annoying than a ten-hour loop of the Hamster Dance?  I need a few more Tongue

To get things started, here are some of mine:

+Mouse-over Tab Switching: To save time in FireFox, I use TabMixPlus's Mouse Gestures option.  No, I don't actually use any gestures, but I have it set to select any tab the mouse points to for 10 milliseconds...effectively, if the mouse brushes a tab, it switches to that tab.  I find this handy because I hate using touchpads, but seem to do most of my computing on laptops...this is one (or 100) less click I have to make with the touchpad.  My wife disagrees and gets thoroughly annoyed whenever she uses Firefox on my computer.  She is an Internet Explorer devotee chiefly because she knows I can't do this on IE, so she knows her tabs are safe when they're in IE. Cheesy

+White Text, Blue Background: To save my eyesight, I set my word-processing software (Word and/or OpenOffice) to display a blue background with white text.  Sure, there's the whole "retro" feel of it (ah...DOS-based text-editors), but I discovered this trick almost wholly by accident while doing a freelance transcription of a 3-hour presentation on Keratoconus (a condition of the eye) and the special contact lenses an ophthalmologist had created to treat it.  About 3 hours into my transcription, the traditional white background with black text used by Word was giving me a massive migraine until I found and enabled this option.  This one isn't AS annoying to most people, but it still confuses them and leads them to ask me how to change it back.  The ingrates Tongue.  This is an option I would enable for every single text box I use if I could.

+Loud IM sounds: I work for a small company.  This small company has to stay in contact with clients all over the country, and we mainly use IM to do this (I also work from home, due to my 72-hour work week, so IM is even more critical for me, as it keeps me in touch with my coworkers).  Even when I worked in the office, I wasn't always at my desk (I hate staying in one place for too long, so I'd get up and walk around the office chatting with people), and I would frequently come back to my desk to find an IM that was 15 minutes old (sometimes more), so I downloaded the ICQ 2002 client, stripped out the IM receive sound (a loud "Uh-Oh"), and set it as the default for all my incoming messages.  This way, even if someone IMs me at 3 AM during my 40-hour weekend shift, I can hear the IM and respond to it.  Quite honestly, this habit annoys even me, because I hate new "Uh-Ohs" coming in as I'm chatting and, more often than not, I'll mute my speakers while I'm in front of my computer just so I don't have to hear the damnable noises.  Incidentally, this caused a very humorous situation when an irate customer was transferred to me by a junior technician, who then IMed me about her issues.  She heard said loud "Uh-Oh" and went absolutely ballistic Grin.
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Hyacinth Belle
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« Reply #1 on: July 06, 2008, 09:29:21 pm »

So this is a completely random topic, but does anyone have a computing habit (or program/plugin) they can't live without, but that everyone else seems to think is more annoying than a ten-hour loop of the Hamster Dance?  I need a few more Tongue
Firstly, the "uh oh" story is really funny!

The main computer habit I can't do without are keyboard shortcuts. Namely Alt+Tab to switch between windows and Ctrl+tab# to switch between tabs in Firefox (you can use this shortcut so you don't have to use the mouse at all... and save your wife a headache! lol). At work, a lot of my jobs are administrative tasks that involve copy and pasting emails or letters and other tasks like that. So at work I also use Ctrl+N, Ctrl+A, Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V like crazy.

When I was training a new employee to do some of these tasks, I just started doing all these keyboard shortcuts and she had *no* clue what I was doing. I tried to explain the shortcuts to her, but she said it was too much new information so she'd do it with the mouse anyway. *sigh* It takes her literally ten times longer to do a lot of these things because she's using the mouse for everything.

I play the keyboard like a piano. Wink

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thain
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« Reply #2 on: July 06, 2008, 09:35:15 pm »

I play the keyboard like a piano. Wink

I actually use the keyboard shortcuts for tab-switching, too, depending on if what I'm doing is more keyboard-heavy or more mouse-heavy.

As a phone support computer technician, however, my favorite shortcut of all time is Windows Key+R.  It seems like every other person I speak with either has a hidden "Run" icon or is just too blind to find it.  With Windows Key+R, it doesn't matter, and that makes me happy Grin.
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« Reply #3 on: July 06, 2008, 09:40:53 pm »

As a phone support computer technician, however, my favorite shortcut of all time is Windows Key+R.  It seems like every other person I speak with either has a hidden "Run" icon or is just too blind to find it.  With Windows Key+R, it doesn't matter, and that makes me happy Grin.
lol. That Run thing is kind of hard to find! This shortcut is one I'll have to remember.
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« Reply #4 on: July 06, 2008, 10:30:42 pm »

As a phone support computer technician, however, my favorite shortcut of all time is Windows Key+R.  It seems like every other person I speak with either has a hidden "Run" icon or is just too blind to find it.  With Windows Key+R, it doesn't matter, and that makes me happy Grin.

Win+R?  That does nothing on my computer ... as I run Linux.  Of, it will work if I'm running XP in VirtualBox and have a Windows app as my active window.  Grin  Otherwise Alt+F2 brings up a run gnome dialog or I can just type in a terminal window. Zsh rocks.
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« Reply #5 on: July 06, 2008, 10:34:53 pm »

Win+R?  That does nothing on my computer ... as I run Linux.

Ah...we don't support Linux.  Once I get out of tech support, I'm going to have to get an Ubuntu box running.  Can't afford to let my Windows skills rust just yet, though.
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« Reply #6 on: July 07, 2008, 07:07:40 am »

Ah...we don't support Linux. 

I used to unintentionally mess up Windows Tech Support people who depended on Windows being standard configuration as my Windows setup was anything but standard. Keys did what I wanted them to, etc. Standard programs were often replaced by better, but non-standard, non-MS versions, etc.

One of the wonderful things about my current ISP/phone/cable company, Grande Communications, is that their tech support people assume that I know what I'm talking about -- especially when they hear I'm running Linux. No suggestions that I reboot or wipe my disk and reinstall because a traceroute is showing problems in their network. Nothing like I would get in San Antonio (where I was on dialup with a national ISP) where I would call their tech support to report that their San Antonio POP was doing the Ring No Answer bit again and every time would be told if I would just reinstall windows it would probably fix my problem. Fortunately, there was a check box on the tech support person's screen for "RNA" so the problem would apparently show up on some network engineer's screen and get fixed anyway, but I bet there were people who believed the ISP's tech support people and reinstalled windows because the ISP's modem pool was having problems.
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« Reply #7 on: July 07, 2008, 07:19:13 am »

Nothing like I would get in San Antonio (where I was on dialup with a national ISP) where I would call their tech support to report that their San Antonio POP was doing the Ring No Answer bit again and every time would be told if I would just reinstall windows it would probably fix my problem.

 Shocked

They jumped straight to reinstalling your operating system without trying anything else first?  Are you serious?  That's...  that's a special kind of special.
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« Reply #8 on: July 07, 2008, 07:26:02 am »

So this is a completely random topic, but does anyone have a computing habit (or program/plugin) they can't live without, but that everyone else seems to think is more annoying than a ten-hour loop of the Hamster Dance?

Hubby gets annoyed at my tendency to use a wireless mouse with my laptop despite its having a perfectly good touchpad.  I loathe touchpads.  On the flip side, he insists on leaving my touchpad active even with a mouse connected (my computer also serves as our home media server most of the time, so he uses it some), which annoys the hell out of me when I'm trying to type something on the keyboard and my hand accidentally brushes the touchpad.

Other than that, I don't know of anything I do that particularly annoys anyone but myself.  In the "annoying myself" category...  I use a Windows machine at work and a Mac at home.  The keyboard shortcuts (which I couldn't live without either) are extremely similar but ever so slightly different.  Which leads to me sometimes not understanding why ALT+V isn't pasting something on my Windows machine, or why CTRL+V isn't doing the same on the Mac.  I also occasionally try to use Expose to switch between applications on my Windows machine, which, it not being a Mac, doesn't typically work.
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« Reply #9 on: July 07, 2008, 08:00:05 am »

They jumped straight to reinstalling your operating system without trying anything else first?  Are you serious?  That's...  that's a special kind of special.

Rebooting came first. Then reinstalling. For a Ring No Answer (or any other problem from what I heard from others).
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« Reply #10 on: July 07, 2008, 08:23:09 am »

One of the wonderful things about my current ISP/phone/cable company, Grande Communications, is that their tech support people assume that I know what I'm talking about -- especially when they hear I'm running Linux.

When I did ISP tech support (in the thankfully shrouded past), I NEVER suggested an OS reinstall unless all other options had been exhausted.  If I told someone their OS needed to be reinstalled, I had made damn sure it wasn't a problem on our end, and I'd usually ask that they wait 2-3 hours and call back, anyway, just in case it was a localized problem (2-3 hours was usually PLENTY of time for everyone in an area to figure out they couldn't connect).  Of course, our techs didn't use scripts, so if I spoke to someone who had already done complete troubleshooting on his connection, I was content to take his notes and send them to the repair department.

If they were getting a Ring No Answer, one of the first tests I'd have them do was to just call the number from their handset to see if a handshake was made.  There are plenty of annoying things Windows can do to screw up a connection, but if you're not getting a handshake, you shouldn't really blame Windows Tongue
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« Reply #11 on: July 07, 2008, 08:23:30 am »

Hubby gets annoyed at my tendency to use a wireless mouse with my laptop despite its having a perfectly good touchpad.  I loathe touchpads.  On the flip side, he insists on leaving my touchpad active even with a mouse connected (my computer also serves as our home media server most of the time, so he uses it some), which annoys the hell out of me when I'm trying to type something on the keyboard and my hand accidentally brushes the touchpad.

Cheesy I need to get a lapboard with a mousepad so I can start using a mouse or trackball...I'm with you on the touchpad loathing.  Fortunately, my notebook has a little button that turns the touchpad on and off, and the notebook itself is large enough that it's really hard to brush the touchpad.  I'll tell you, though, we get more calls about "faulty keyboards" because of people brushing their touchpads than we know what to do with.  I wish every laptop computer had a touchpad lock (or at least a functional "disable tapping" feature).

Our owner is just the opposite..the man is madly in love with touchpads, to the point that he has a special natural keyboard with a touchpad built in.  I would go insane having to use something like that.
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« Reply #12 on: July 07, 2008, 08:26:40 am »

When I did ISP tech support (in the thankfully shrouded past), I NEVER suggested an OS reinstall unless all other options had been exhausted. 

Now, see, that seems like a much saner approach, to me.

I mean, I can see suggesting a reboot as the first step for just about anything, with Windows.  Probably won't hurt, might help.  But a reinstall?  For something that could be any number of things that reinstalling Windows wouldn't fix?  Yikes.
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« Reply #13 on: July 07, 2008, 08:58:22 am »

Hubby gets annoyed at my tendency to use a wireless mouse with my laptop despite its having a perfectly good touchpad.  I loathe touchpads.  On the flip side, he insists on leaving my touchpad active even with a mouse connected (my computer also serves as our home media server most of the time, so he uses it some), which annoys the hell out of me when I'm trying to type something on the keyboard and my hand accidentally brushes the touchpad.

I can understand how you feel.  It took me a while to be able to used a touch pad effectively, and while I sometimes use a touchpad, it isn't sufficient for working with large chunks of text, which I do frequently.  Highlighting, copying, pasting, and other editing tasks really aren't suited to the touchpad.  BTW, I have the same touchpad issue with my laptop.  It is really annoying to be typing away and suddenly discover you have moved to another part of the document.

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« Reply #14 on: July 07, 2008, 09:02:01 am »

When I did ISP tech support (in the thankfully shrouded past), I NEVER suggested an OS reinstall unless all other options had been exhausted.

Except for this one ISP, I never encountered this particular "solution" applied so regularly for internet connection problems. I got the impression the tech support people there weren't doing tech support so much as using a bad script (note problem on form if it fits our categories, suggest reboot, if fails to fix problem suggest reinstalling windows) to clear calls as fast as possible.
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