" Therehree roamb ling and technicThe most pleasant is with women, the quickest is with gamblingbut the surest is with technicians -Georges Pompidouy friend Len told me about Mag ic Jack for phoningothers He mentioned that hisedson calls himfrom the Philippines, and the cost of the calls isn't different from alocal call Another method of contact is Skype, which is free wiand can be utilized on most computers I don t use it andlimited knowled ge about it buln i know emailedkeeps in contact with her children and grandchildrenpbar Ip pe because she doesn't travelthrough skhoInternet servicebably familiar with Amy You never dated this creation: the oneassociated with getting assistance if you Ask Amy I think shes arobot whose intelligence is beneath that of a swizzle stick toconvinhat, here are a few questions I gave her: Howof 1812? How long did the Thirty Years Warlast? What? When? The real ans wers are: almost three years from812 t0 1815: thirty vears: Ask someone else Ask someone elsemys first two answers were: I am designed to answer questionsne sentence at a fume
Her answersthe same: I'm sorry, I didnt get that Please rephrase youiquestionThe next option is trying chat Herelimited totechnical questions As you can see, Amy isn't that kno wledgeableand asking her anything is a waste of time (wot), which sounds agreat deal like the questioners reply after hearing her answersWhat? Using chat, an agent might helpis Chris On a few occasions, I had relatively easy problems, bie session wound up taking chose to an hour One was aboutch I wanted to remove My idea of thatusy signal Answeringndwhile talking toanother person is do wright ruhe says he'l cathe second caller, returns to the first with same responseup and then goes to the disco
i did get instructions forg-I was toldcould be done through my provider web site or using the phoneChris cautioned me that there was a problem with theaforementioned site I made the change through the phone as weas through the site later bhave call waiting on my phonehich I don't want More recently I did the chat thing and I'llelaborate on getting help in other chapters Besides Amy, whichorks for a few corporatehone for help Iu luck i wonder if chris eveerhaps chat is more he lpful at other web sites, butsomehow I doubt it My credit union has it, but going there Inoticed that the help person was also named Amy Oh, joy! I'mjust kidding Here are the ans wers Meaghan gave to the first tworty vears? I askedtechnical question of her but I dont have the time to applyn so lve the probleworkaroundI'll talk about in a few chapters, mainly in chapter 18lp an todays business world, we have no choice but gettingm companies by these same methods
I doubt that they'llbe any more help ful than the chat Ive experienced, with theexception of my credit union, but I hope I'm wrong You may wantto check if Amy is moonlighting somewylines anotI s whrecommend This applies especially to technical write-ups Fromy dealing with computers, those documents work if you knowhat you're doing, but then you wouldnt need them One of theproblems is that manuals are not penned by writers, but by rockeientists The Buffalo library web site has a manual that will helpu if you are interested in reading ebooks It's fifteen pages longmuch more than I care to read I'll have to read part of it, thoughThere are a few other issues on this almost user-friendly libraryneeds tweak ing, I think thiso ebooks from there without issues and while trthird, couldn't download the book even though the site says it'silable The web designer may have rushed to put the site intorather than analyze his work first It probably wasnhis fault but that of a supervisor or technology itself
Returning to the robot, since amy doesn't kno w much andchat has issues, phoning will have you in a voice maze With adecent site having a know led geable web administrator orcompany that knows what it's do ing, you could get lucky At timesve experienced the good and badI own two PCs: an electronic reading de vice(ErD)and adesktop computer Reading books on an ERD gives you anopportunity to get help Unfortunately, this corporation doesnns wer emails, at least not mine, so far They must know about meWheni first used this erd it had no instructions but i couldmanuaneeded to read it in order to set upnternet access, I could get he lp from it Somehow I went aroundthat,hich mahich i'llater I soon had a more serious problem i set up the de vice butwas never asked for a password
I turned off the erd but latercouldnt log on agait asked for a password Im reallyter 23 is abotec hnothere are sely connections Returning to the problem, it couldbe solved in one of two ways: Going to a particular storereally didnt care to do, or I could solve the problem with anothercomputer device All I had was a single gad get, but fortunately myniece Liz came to the rescueReturning to the erd manual, I triedthat seemedequire more than a daconsidered do ing athe document but since i didnt haat help document, that was impossibleurrender and oneday I may get the help I need -although Im not sure what thenderful?As expected, fromne the erd needs chargingdo that and a few times I see that my reader is 95%0 charged oren 96%0 I stop the charging and turn off the de vice and signlater At that point, I notice that it,s 100% charged The new mathmust be involved here Towards the end of january 2015 i charvith the restWhy didlist that numberinstead of 100% when i turned on the de vice later? math has reaWe are blessed since our ERDs can read just about anybook ever written You can find ebooks in so many places, manytruly free All we have to do is learn how the device works, which
may not be that bad butreadinga book bCoraghessan Boyle and was a third of the waythrough it when suddenly the size of the print changed I,'m notsure how that happened but the ebook wasnt supposed to be in bigprint It shouldnt be hard to find the person to contact since theproblem is either with the ERD, the Buffalo Public Library orverdrive, i don't like the latter since no one should read whiledriving This might convince you why people would rather readbookof theA good thing came out of this situation I called the libraryand was told how to remedy the snafu I tried what she said andlearned some tech pertaining to the erd, bi1gprint I experimented a bit and behold, I had the book backstandard print size as beforeed the librariane solution Before communicating with her, I wondered if i couldrecall how i did it
but i remembered and she thanked me La tek I showed my sister ho w to modify the print to normalie,but there was a problem Is that surprising? After moreattempts, I could utter, voilaa few months ago i had a new furnace installewith a different thermostat and an accompanying manual I readthe latter and fo llo wed the instructions but it seemed that theheating system wasn't working the way it should, or I didn't reade help booklet properly, Peop le do make mistakturned into 2015, the heating guys were over and I almost askedfor a ne w thermostat They enlightened me and previously I maynot have pressed the right buttons on the regulbe working the right way In the Arctic winterthat Western New York and the rest of the nation was experiencingIn earlym thank ful for the visit as winter turned intoin 2015 I noticed that the thermostatcomp letely freef software busecond occurrence in march verifiedlunch, but the heating system works wManuals and warrantees go to gether and right along withIfmeans you should have bought it when a product breaksdown it means the warrantee expired a month or two ago Besidese fact that manuals don' t really help, if you need to refer to one,you'll discover that it,s gone On the other hand, a manual that yo
wn probably won't be needed The missing manual happened toa few cases When I was out shopping, someone must havebroken into my house and stole it In any case manuals are muchtoo long, implying that the devices and software may have tooWhatabout this help problem? It reallyshouldn't be hell, but help Firing amy is not an option since shedoesnt have a job she doesn t exist or if so is a robot just likehat, when something respondsquestion, What is the color of my car? with, Is your question,what is the color of your car?, theres no way that the chat thingis alive Both awho is a virtual assistant who i think isvirtually and realisticallless and the chat robot should berecycled in the metal bin
A company should use real people frome United States with intelligence that truly understand Engd have technical know led ge as well If the phone lines and webites are jammed with peop le waiting for answemeans that the corporation and its products need an overhaul Theystem isn't workingSalesmen and barely trained responders shouldn't workthe help desk Companies need to be more responsible Yeah,that ' ll happen I'll talk about a site that thinks it kno ws my nameand other ones that need to hire people with computer
back groundsto deshem, sad ly, twowell Humans should be paid to compose the manuals- teachersare a great choice, maybe even Manuel Chat needs modificationshelp customers, not frustrate them Finally dont hire anyonenamed Amy unless peop le in the know interview herPure Prairie League re leased a song with thethis chapteralbum, Bustin 'Out It was spelled differently: " AmiePaul Peterson had a truly minor hit in 1963 with"Amy" Eachong is about love, whichf us feel when trying to obtaihelp for our computerorporate q uestionsThe system of nature, of which manrt, tends to be self-balancing, self-adjusting, self-cleansing Not so with techno logyEFDuring one of his monologues on the program, Seinfeld,Jerry discussed the wedding ceremony, mentioning the words ofe minister: Doe this man to behusband? Note that the question didn t mentionthe men in the bridal party were spiffy in their tuxedsome reason theabout to be married backed out and didntappear at the church, why couldn' t the best man stand in and marrythe bride a great deal of planning took place and money was spentto get to thiwaste any of it? I ve wo ndered why thebride didns buddy in the first p lacbest man This approach is nothing more than one of backupThe backup thing has been employed by women for someime Mary andare almost engaged but Mary senses thatohn, based on his behavior could abandon her From time to timeshe goes out with Tom as well as with Ron
This is her back upaction It never hurts to employ one since they seem to be a goodthinsthe world of techno lo gy, backups are a good idea tooFor my desktop computer, I try to do them every six monthsTheres nothing worth saving on my eRD- probably not even thedevice-so i dont bother with backups At first files were saved toapes and floppy disks- those that actually flopped and then thsmaller ones that didn t Now you can copy files to other devicessuch as cds and flash drives, i understand thatud could beused but not for me since Ired of heights When used, therewere problems with either type of floppies Using CDs improvedmatters, but not all the timeSometime in late 2014, I needed a file from my backuptaken at the end of 2013 when i openedonly files listedwere JPEGs, mostly photos I had savedfiles and word processing files, so I wondered where they went
CDmight have all the files I backed up at leme of the files were on that jpeg CD, but more than once mybackup CD was void of data completely I wonder if they went toe same place that the spots on pinto beans go after cookingChecking the properties of the CD, it showed no files using up zerospace with no space available Since i cant put any data on theseblank devices, the CDs are ready to be recyc led since theyre allCD-R, meaning read only Had it been CD-RW, I could haveleared it and wrote data tofor a while arhouldmention that contrary to what shouldn't happen, I copied data tone CD-R, read it and later could write to it Maybe it was a CDRW after allappears that the backup idea doesrk every timely theessThat’ s whatI thought until the middle of the 1980s Despite all precautionsven the best intentions can resultajor screw-ups
At the time,I worked in the software department full time forcompany in Syracuse My assignment was thawithout commensurate pay I quit the company after about a yeara half when i saw that there seemed to be no future in thisbusiness While I was in their employ, I was asked to create apurchase order system for a department in a local corporationwas gIvenoptions: modify an existing system that thealtwrite one fromspecifically directed to determine my approach with some analysisso I set forth and disco vered that us ing what was there would haverequired more time and effort Nonetheless, my boss insisted that Itse the existing purchase order system rather than starting fromscratch-that wasn't a good ideashould have created the system my way and not told asoul about it but instead I foolishly did as told This approach isacting now and apologizing later if necessary, as opposTcomplained whethan he wanted mewhose fault was that? Eventually the project was complete and theffort was top-notch The clients were pleasedThey used what I produced aluldn t have beenpier with my creation, includ ing the user, with whom I workedlosely
Copyright may 2015
robert s Swiatek All Rights reservedFirst editionNo part of this book may be reproduced or transmittedform or by any means, electronic or mechanical, includingphotocopying, recording, or by any information storage andretrieval syscopyright owner and the publisher of this bookPrinted in the United StateISBN:978-1-63452970ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Table of contentsIntroductio1 Amyst the wall3 Last cal4 Day by day49616Make it easy on yourself6 Function at the iunction327 Classical GGoing Home9 Will It go round in circles0 Jump1 You don't Know me3
Mus ic is the healing force of the world5 On the beach16 Promises, promisesQuestions 67 and 6818 Roundabo9 Too much Stuff20 There's something more to life than Tv23 What's going4 Xanadu5 You talk too much
Introductioever doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed peoplecan change the world Indeed, it's the only thing thaMargaret meadTechnology has brought many advances to civilizationAutomobiles, telephones, television and computers have made ourntion renewable energy and medidvancethat long ago that the ordinary citizen couldhave a book published unless he spent $4, 000 or more Thatchanged with time as I had my cookbook published in the fall of2002 thanks to a self-publis hinsThiswas a print on demand venture so I had to pay, but I didnt need toake out a mortgage Improvements in the book business havereduced costs even further My knowledge of cover design,workinftware made the amountspent even less, but I had to do more workadded to my education because of all the technology asresult, many of my books have come into print The otbooks
All my books are free downloads at my web site, wlisted at the bottom of the introduction i began writing whileching in Binghamton That book was finally published in early2012 becausetheAmathematics for eight years before joining the blpro grammer I retired and then became involved with theself-publishing optionWithout theof the book b usiness I probably wouldntve a web site My math and computer back ground played a hugeart in organizing and writing books Besideslinary treatiseother topics include technology, addictions, the environment,Intelligencec,genealogy, my journey as a writer andnovel about the national lottery Ive always read a great dealfiction since truth is more entertaining than fictionnd this made my research easier Ive ne ver stopped learning oraching All good writed to do bothmentioned veracity and I strive for that in every book Ivewritten My aim is to have a minimal number of errors wheablish a book -its virtually impossible to catch every mistake
An individual found my site and felt that the topics i covered wereeclectic There are a few threads there: humor, hope, education,helping others and social justice My goal from my writing is tove more people read No one can make excuses since my booksually short, not epics Naturally they'rece no trueartist can be anything but I haven't mentioned any of my titles inthis book, but you can go to my web site and see what they 're alnd titleld give you a clue Clicking onformation underofbook will tell youmy bookto protect the author These inc lude individual as we ll ascorporate and software names You should be able to recognize theeal appellations from the boname thats not authentic, feel free to replace it with the name ofur favorite software or company
When I was almost finished writing The ABCs OfTechnology, I read another re lated book by Bill BiStranger Here Myself: Notes On Returning To America After 20Years Away Besides this 1999 book, Ive read quite a few of hisfferings and i recommendhis research insight andof humor ive inc luded a few more books in the re ference sectionfollo wing the last chapterllenges and solutions Each chapter begins with a quote witthe title being either that of a song or words from a song The lastfew books of mine also used song titles for each chapter Here Ivetried to make a connection in each of the twenty-six chaptersbetween the topic andter title the consideratiostlfor televis ion, cars, phones and computers Just asthere are so many connections and some topics embrace manyaspects, I have more than one chapter to coveame aspect oftech, even saying a few things about health careMany people feel that tech is a big failure Some individualexterminating bus iness Dont tell the irs about him Anotherntioned that she a voids the stuffThey seem to be forgetting aboutechno logy has been aroundNonetheless, while solving problems, tech has also created others
heard so many complaints about computers, telephoand te levision that it 's obvious that we have to fix what's broken asoon and as much as possiblbobcooks
com