Since it’s been a few years since I wrote about my podcasting diet, and since easter is coming up at the end of the week, I thought I’d take a new look at what podcasts I subscribe to. I still use Downcast for podcasts; it’s been working well for me, and I see no need to replace it with something else. The podcasts I listen to has changed a fair bit over the years; some have been removed, and others have been added. Here’s the list as it currently stands:
Leave a CommentThoughts on many things Posts
When you work product support on a specific product, you need to have a solid grasp of how to set up the product, as well as the best practices for making things work as you want and expect. This was certainly the case for me when I worked for FotoWare. One of these best practices was not to use the Domain Users group to set permissions.
Leave a CommentI am a big believer in the principle of putting information out there, for the world to see. This blog is part of pursuing the goal of achieving just that. It made sense to me, then, to ensure that the data from my weather station would be made available to as many people as possible.
Leave a CommentI am sure that I am not alone in making an effort to keep abreast of what jobs are being posted within what can largely be termed my field, and am struck by the paradox represented by requiring relevant experience for most jobs, even entry-level positions. For example, I have seen my share of highly educated people cycle through a support department on their way to the jobs they’ve educated themselves towards – usually software development – in an effort to gain “relevant experience”.
Leave a CommentAn important principle of ITIL is that all requests should go through a single point of contact (abbreviated to SPOC). What this means, is that a single channel should be defined for the reception, classification, and distribution of a request or incident. Crucially, it does not mean that all contact with the customer should be done by tier one.
Leave a CommentIn December of 2016, I discovered Bear Writer. At the time, I had been using a number of different solutions for note-taking and organisation, none of which had really done the trick for me. That all changed with Bear. Arriving to critical acclaim, Bear is certainly a very pretty app, and its iCloud sync feature has served me well enough. There has just been one issue; it is only available on Apple devices.
Leave a CommentIn recent years, a number of approaches to taking hand-writing and turning it digital has come to the market. From tablet computers to writing tablets with e-Ink technology, there are plenty of offerings out there, none of which has scratched my itch for hand-written notes. Tablet computers tend to be too slick and slippery, resulting in a less than satisfactory writing experience, and e-ink writing tablets are – at least as this is being written – just not good enough for my use.
Leave a CommentOne of my many roles at work is that of change coordinator for a large subset of our customers. I have learned a lot in this capacity, and have come to feel that, while Incident Management is the natural first step in ITIL implementation, until you start implementing Change Management, the majority of your effort is largely spent firing fires.
Leave a CommentAWorking with process development, I have found that I draw on the lessons I learned in business continuity planning during my studies. In particular, I have found that the actions to take in response to risks, also known as the four t’s, has been particularly useful. These four are:
Leave a CommentEvery so often, a customer will call in, saying that they are unable to access one of the servers that are mapped through their login script. There are generally two reasons for this; either there’s an issue with the network connection, or the drive letter is already being used for another device. To troubleshoot the issue, then, we start by confirming that the computer is online, and then have the customer log off and back on again. ‘
Leave a CommentI am, with surprising regularity, faced with the need to access UNC paths from the command line, as that is perhaps pretty much the quickest way to browse to network shares with a different user than the one currently logged in. There’s just one issue: the Windows command line does not support UNC paths from the cd/chdir command. There is, however, a way to work around this issue; by creating a temporary virtual drive.
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