Hard to believe this was in the Wall Street Journal
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I think you over-estimate the ability of the average Windows user by a great deal. My experience is that most windows users can open their web browser - if it's in exactly the same place as last time. Anything beyond that quickly becomes increasingly unlikely. On the other hand, it is surprising what a completely clueless person can learn to do if it lets them get around security and policy restrictions.
"Your typical day is full of moments where you ask for a cup of coffee and someone hands you a bag of nails." - Scott Adams
standgale wrote:
I think you over-estimate the ability of the average Windows user by a great deal.
Perhaps. Usually, when I run into these people I try to help them actually learn to use a computer. Maybe that is why I am not to popular with IT departments. :)
My Blog A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
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I always did like that rag... :)
JimmyRopes wrote:
It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures.
You do realize, for many people the phrase "security procedures" is just another name for "arbitrary rules bored bureaucrats use to make my life difficult"? Trust me. When a sales person calls up, irate because the proposal he spent the night putting together was stripped out by someone's email system, he's really not interested in hearing about the email worm or rash of image forwards that caused the restriction to be put in place ten years ago when the average work document was much, much smaller. He just wants things to work. If IT people would stop acting like petty dictators and actually work with the people who they're hired to serve, "reputable publications" wouldn't be publishing work-arounds...
every night, i kneel at the foot of my bed and thank the Great Overseeing Politicians for protecting my freedoms by reducing their number, as if they were deer in a state park. -- Chris Losinger, Online Poker Players?
My 5 ....mainly because I work for a company with strict IT security policies. I've had attachments stripped out of e-mails sent me by suppliers, my e-mails from home to myself at work get blocked (don't ask me why or how) and yet...I still get spam. Security, eh? (OK, I know security != spam filter, but honestly, if they could only try to do half as well as a free service like Gmail, we'd be getting somewhere). At least they were willing to unblock CP when Websense arbitrarily decided to block it...Websense's reason for blocking? CP was in that set of dangerous websites belonging to the 'Uncategorized' category.
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I always did like that rag... :)
JimmyRopes wrote:
It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures.
You do realize, for many people the phrase "security procedures" is just another name for "arbitrary rules bored bureaucrats use to make my life difficult"? Trust me. When a sales person calls up, irate because the proposal he spent the night putting together was stripped out by someone's email system, he's really not interested in hearing about the email worm or rash of image forwards that caused the restriction to be put in place ten years ago when the average work document was much, much smaller. He just wants things to work. If IT people would stop acting like petty dictators and actually work with the people who they're hired to serve, "reputable publications" wouldn't be publishing work-arounds...
every night, i kneel at the foot of my bed and thank the Great Overseeing Politicians for protecting my freedoms by reducing their number, as if they were deer in a state park. -- Chris Losinger, Online Poker Players?
That's partially true. IT departments are not "self-made": they are organization belonging to structures whose activities are decided by the company "tecnocracy" that basically say what an employ of a given department should or shouldn't do. And that's valid for IT as well, that are explicitly required to contain the IT costs in certain budgets and to assure that a given activity that shouldn't be done cannot in fact be done. The "arbitrary rules bored bureaucrats use to make my life difficult" don't come from the IT itself, but from per personnel department, that ask the IT to find out the technical way to implement such rules. I perfectly agree that "When a sales person calls up, irate because the proposal he spent the night putting together was stripped out ... ", but if the IT has a limited spending capabilities, it cannot continuously buy hard disks to store the "infinite history" of the company employees life inside the e-mail databases. Even Google gmail has a limit about attachment sizes. The real problem is -probably- that who fixes such limits (the "spending limits" not the mailboxes: personnel, budget and control etc.) is not really aware of what the activity of the people are and what the kind of resource they are required to use are. These problems will probably self-disappear after certain "paper generation people" will left certain key position in the companies. By me, the reason I've to invest in managing comapny PC owned by people tha tare perfacly able to manage their home PC themself is an overkill. I'll probably spend more in infrastructure letting the user self-manage their own end let themselves pay for assistance if they require. But this is a completly different culture about the relation between company and technology.
2 bugs found. > recompile ... 65534 bugs found. :doh:
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My 5 ....mainly because I work for a company with strict IT security policies. I've had attachments stripped out of e-mails sent me by suppliers, my e-mails from home to myself at work get blocked (don't ask me why or how) and yet...I still get spam. Security, eh? (OK, I know security != spam filter, but honestly, if they could only try to do half as well as a free service like Gmail, we'd be getting somewhere). At least they were willing to unblock CP when Websense arbitrarily decided to block it...Websense's reason for blocking? CP was in that set of dangerous websites belonging to the 'Uncategorized' category.
Don't get me started about retarded mail filtering... :mad: Once place I fortunately don't work at any more had the most ridiculous email filters. Any external emails containing the word "joke" or "blonde" and many other words were classed as jokes, and therefore blocked (incoming or outgoing) But wait, it gets better... Anything with the word "spam" in it must have been.... yep, you guessed it. Spam. So it was deleted, without any notification. Complete genius.
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Ten Things Your IT Department Won't Tell You[^] I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. :sigh: This is irresponsible. X| It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures. :rolleyes: 1. HOW TO SEND GIANT FILES 2. HOW TO USE SOFTWARE THAT YOUR COMPANY WON'T LET YOU DOWNLOAD 3. HOW TO VISIT THE WEB SITES YOUR COMPANY BLOCKS 4. HOW TO CLEAR YOUR TRACKS ON YOUR WORK LAPTOP 5. HOW TO SEARCH FOR YOUR WORK DOCUMENTS FROM HOME 6. HOW TO STORE WORK FILES ONLINE 7. HOW TO KEEP YOUR PRIVACY WHEN USING WEB EMAIL 8. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR WORK EMAIL REMOTELY WHEN YOUR COMPANY WON'T SPRING FOR A BLACKBERRY 9. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONAL EMAIL ON YOUR BLACKBERRY 10. HOW TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE WORKING
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopesIf you sell your newspaper to Rupert Murdoch then this is what you get.
'--8<------------------------ Ex Datis: Duncan Jones Merrion Computing Ltd
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JimmyRopes wrote:
I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. This is irresponsible.
A bit melodramatic don't you think. There is nothing remotely new or novel about any on the items described. I'd figure any windows user with half a brain could figure most if not all of these items out on their own.
My Blog A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
Chris Austin wrote:
any windows user with half a brain
Ah, well, there's your problem. "User" and "brain" don't usually appear that close together.
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Ten Things Your IT Department Won't Tell You[^] I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. :sigh: This is irresponsible. X| It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures. :rolleyes: 1. HOW TO SEND GIANT FILES 2. HOW TO USE SOFTWARE THAT YOUR COMPANY WON'T LET YOU DOWNLOAD 3. HOW TO VISIT THE WEB SITES YOUR COMPANY BLOCKS 4. HOW TO CLEAR YOUR TRACKS ON YOUR WORK LAPTOP 5. HOW TO SEARCH FOR YOUR WORK DOCUMENTS FROM HOME 6. HOW TO STORE WORK FILES ONLINE 7. HOW TO KEEP YOUR PRIVACY WHEN USING WEB EMAIL 8. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR WORK EMAIL REMOTELY WHEN YOUR COMPANY WON'T SPRING FOR A BLACKBERRY 9. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONAL EMAIL ON YOUR BLACKBERRY 10. HOW TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE WORKING
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopes:laugh: none of that works here, there all to smart its the old saying "you cant kid those who have kidded thousands" number 10 is brill, alt tab so the boss looks at your task bar, even worse if you have duel screens and it only sets focus to an app in the other screen :laugh: though i do think it teachs bad working habbits and its a bit shocking for the wall street journal X|
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Ten Things Your IT Department Won't Tell You[^] I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. :sigh: This is irresponsible. X| It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures. :rolleyes: 1. HOW TO SEND GIANT FILES 2. HOW TO USE SOFTWARE THAT YOUR COMPANY WON'T LET YOU DOWNLOAD 3. HOW TO VISIT THE WEB SITES YOUR COMPANY BLOCKS 4. HOW TO CLEAR YOUR TRACKS ON YOUR WORK LAPTOP 5. HOW TO SEARCH FOR YOUR WORK DOCUMENTS FROM HOME 6. HOW TO STORE WORK FILES ONLINE 7. HOW TO KEEP YOUR PRIVACY WHEN USING WEB EMAIL 8. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR WORK EMAIL REMOTELY WHEN YOUR COMPANY WON'T SPRING FOR A BLACKBERRY 9. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONAL EMAIL ON YOUR BLACKBERRY 10. HOW TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE WORKING
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopesSometimes people do such mean base things to solicit and gain cheap publicity. :)
Vasudevan Deepak Kumar Personal Homepage Tech Gossips
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Ten Things Your IT Department Won't Tell You[^] I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. :sigh: This is irresponsible. X| It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures. :rolleyes: 1. HOW TO SEND GIANT FILES 2. HOW TO USE SOFTWARE THAT YOUR COMPANY WON'T LET YOU DOWNLOAD 3. HOW TO VISIT THE WEB SITES YOUR COMPANY BLOCKS 4. HOW TO CLEAR YOUR TRACKS ON YOUR WORK LAPTOP 5. HOW TO SEARCH FOR YOUR WORK DOCUMENTS FROM HOME 6. HOW TO STORE WORK FILES ONLINE 7. HOW TO KEEP YOUR PRIVACY WHEN USING WEB EMAIL 8. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR WORK EMAIL REMOTELY WHEN YOUR COMPANY WON'T SPRING FOR A BLACKBERRY 9. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONAL EMAIL ON YOUR BLACKBERRY 10. HOW TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE WORKING
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopesI can't even access Proxy.org site :( So there is no chance to access other sites... Not a good option... My 1 -- modified at 5:04 Thursday 2nd August, 2007
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JimmyRopes wrote:
I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. This is irresponsible.
A bit melodramatic don't you think. There is nothing remotely new or novel about any on the items described. I'd figure any windows user with half a brain could figure most if not all of these items out on their own.
My Blog A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
Chris Austin wrote:
I'd figure any windows user with half a brain could figure
Sure, but it was in Wall Street Journal. Thats a publication for carefully selected extra-brainless people. :)
Failure is not an option - it's built right in.
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Ten Things Your IT Department Won't Tell You[^] I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. :sigh: This is irresponsible. X| It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures. :rolleyes: 1. HOW TO SEND GIANT FILES 2. HOW TO USE SOFTWARE THAT YOUR COMPANY WON'T LET YOU DOWNLOAD 3. HOW TO VISIT THE WEB SITES YOUR COMPANY BLOCKS 4. HOW TO CLEAR YOUR TRACKS ON YOUR WORK LAPTOP 5. HOW TO SEARCH FOR YOUR WORK DOCUMENTS FROM HOME 6. HOW TO STORE WORK FILES ONLINE 7. HOW TO KEEP YOUR PRIVACY WHEN USING WEB EMAIL 8. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR WORK EMAIL REMOTELY WHEN YOUR COMPANY WON'T SPRING FOR A BLACKBERRY 9. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONAL EMAIL ON YOUR BLACKBERRY 10. HOW TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE WORKING
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopesI see your company IT policy, which you haven't subverted yet, includes TYPING IN CAPITALS. (You do make a slight point though. Companies need to change but through proper process not through subversion.)
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Shog9 wrote:
And with that, Paul closed his browser, sipped his herbal tea, fixed the flower in his hair, and smiled brightly at the multitude of cute, furry animals flocking around the grassy hillside where he sat coding Ruby on his Mac...
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I think you over-estimate the ability of the average Windows user by a great deal. My experience is that most windows users can open their web browser - if it's in exactly the same place as last time. Anything beyond that quickly becomes increasingly unlikely. On the other hand, it is surprising what a completely clueless person can learn to do if it lets them get around security and policy restrictions.
"Your typical day is full of moments where you ask for a cup of coffee and someone hands you a bag of nails." - Scott Adams
standgale wrote:
On the other hand, it is surprising what a completely clueless person can learn to do if it lets them get around security and policy restrictions.
Absolutely.
Upcoming events: * Glasgow: Mock Objects, SQL Server CLR Integration, Reporting Services, db4o, Dependency Injection with Spring ... "I wouldn't say boo to a goose. I'm not a coward, I just realise that it would be largely pointless." My website
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That's partially true. IT departments are not "self-made": they are organization belonging to structures whose activities are decided by the company "tecnocracy" that basically say what an employ of a given department should or shouldn't do. And that's valid for IT as well, that are explicitly required to contain the IT costs in certain budgets and to assure that a given activity that shouldn't be done cannot in fact be done. The "arbitrary rules bored bureaucrats use to make my life difficult" don't come from the IT itself, but from per personnel department, that ask the IT to find out the technical way to implement such rules. I perfectly agree that "When a sales person calls up, irate because the proposal he spent the night putting together was stripped out ... ", but if the IT has a limited spending capabilities, it cannot continuously buy hard disks to store the "infinite history" of the company employees life inside the e-mail databases. Even Google gmail has a limit about attachment sizes. The real problem is -probably- that who fixes such limits (the "spending limits" not the mailboxes: personnel, budget and control etc.) is not really aware of what the activity of the people are and what the kind of resource they are required to use are. These problems will probably self-disappear after certain "paper generation people" will left certain key position in the companies. By me, the reason I've to invest in managing comapny PC owned by people tha tare perfacly able to manage their home PC themself is an overkill. I'll probably spend more in infrastructure letting the user self-manage their own end let themselves pay for assistance if they require. But this is a completly different culture about the relation between company and technology.
2 bugs found. > recompile ... 65534 bugs found. :doh:
I was once asked to block certain pages (read: porn) to all the users in a factory (1200+) because they were absorving a large amount of bandwidth, **except** for the 6 executives' computers. Those had full free access to anything. After performing the task, logs showed a decrease in 4% to the amount of hits to those pages. That is, those who where so worried that their employees lost time watching porn where the ones actually causing the trouble! No more comments :P
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JimmyRopes wrote:
I didn't say any of this was new or novel in any way for an IT professional. I am just surprised at the Wall Street Journal advocating something like this.
To me this is no big deal. Hell, I was a user that did stuff like this when the pricks in the IT dept refused to do something silly like allow the devs to browse MSDN. The problem isn't the users, the problem is the IT departments like this. Rather than doing their job and meeting their users needs they become a self serving wanna-be programmer elitist group.
JimmyRopes wrote:
As I said before, it's irresponsible.
I still maintain that you are being melodramatic. [EDIT]
JimmyRopes wrote:
I didn't say any of this was new or novel in any way for an IT professional.
BTW, I am not an IT professional. I am a software developer.
My Blog A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
Chris Austin wrote:
The problem isn't the users, the problem is the IT departments like this. Rather than doing their job and meeting their users needs they become a self serving wanna-be programmer elitist group.
Surely you're aware that company computer networks exist solely and only for the benefit of the SysAdmin staff! If it weren't for all those blasted users, messing around and requesting things that a system adminstrator would never need or use, every company would have a perfect intranet. Get with the program, eh?
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My 5 ....mainly because I work for a company with strict IT security policies. I've had attachments stripped out of e-mails sent me by suppliers, my e-mails from home to myself at work get blocked (don't ask me why or how) and yet...I still get spam. Security, eh? (OK, I know security != spam filter, but honestly, if they could only try to do half as well as a free service like Gmail, we'd be getting somewhere). At least they were willing to unblock CP when Websense arbitrarily decided to block it...Websense's reason for blocking? CP was in that set of dangerous websites belonging to the 'Uncategorized' category.
Stuart Dootson wrote:
At least they were willing to unblock CP when Websense arbitrarily decided to block it...Websense's reason for blocking? CP was in that set of dangerous websites belonging to the 'Uncategorized' category.
CP has now been categorized? I wondered why there were tears coming to its eyes.
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Ten Things Your IT Department Won't Tell You[^] I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. :sigh: This is irresponsible. X| It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures. :rolleyes: 1. HOW TO SEND GIANT FILES 2. HOW TO USE SOFTWARE THAT YOUR COMPANY WON'T LET YOU DOWNLOAD 3. HOW TO VISIT THE WEB SITES YOUR COMPANY BLOCKS 4. HOW TO CLEAR YOUR TRACKS ON YOUR WORK LAPTOP 5. HOW TO SEARCH FOR YOUR WORK DOCUMENTS FROM HOME 6. HOW TO STORE WORK FILES ONLINE 7. HOW TO KEEP YOUR PRIVACY WHEN USING WEB EMAIL 8. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR WORK EMAIL REMOTELY WHEN YOUR COMPANY WON'T SPRING FOR A BLACKBERRY 9. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONAL EMAIL ON YOUR BLACKBERRY 10. HOW TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE WORKING
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopes -
I can't even access Proxy.org site :( So there is no chance to access other sites... Not a good option... My 1 -- modified at 5:04 Thursday 2nd August, 2007
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If you sell your newspaper to Rupert Murdoch then this is what you get.
'--8<------------------------ Ex Datis: Duncan Jones Merrion Computing Ltd
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Ten Things Your IT Department Won't Tell You[^] I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. :sigh: This is irresponsible. X| It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures. :rolleyes: 1. HOW TO SEND GIANT FILES 2. HOW TO USE SOFTWARE THAT YOUR COMPANY WON'T LET YOU DOWNLOAD 3. HOW TO VISIT THE WEB SITES YOUR COMPANY BLOCKS 4. HOW TO CLEAR YOUR TRACKS ON YOUR WORK LAPTOP 5. HOW TO SEARCH FOR YOUR WORK DOCUMENTS FROM HOME 6. HOW TO STORE WORK FILES ONLINE 7. HOW TO KEEP YOUR PRIVACY WHEN USING WEB EMAIL 8. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR WORK EMAIL REMOTELY WHEN YOUR COMPANY WON'T SPRING FOR A BLACKBERRY 9. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONAL EMAIL ON YOUR BLACKBERRY 10. HOW TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE WORKING
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopesAsk yourself why it is that users are so intent on bypassing IT security. I would submit that it is because IT is viewed as a tyranny with no regard for end users. In the eyes of many end users, IT has siezed power and used it to try to control workers, rather than serving the common goal. Mind you, I'm not saying this is the way it is, only that it is perceived as such by office workers. In such an environment, it is only natural that employees would use any opportunity to circumvent IT policies and procedures. If you want to address the problem, address the perception first, particularly the power perception. Start by distinguishing between legitimate security concerns and simple paranoia. Communicate the 'why' to end users of the systems. Then you might start getting buy-in from line-level management and workers.
David Veeneman www.veeneman.com
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Ten Things Your IT Department Won't Tell You[^] I find it hard to believe this was in a reputable publication like the Wall Street Journal. :sigh: This is irresponsible. X| It basically tells you how to bypass your company's security procedures. :rolleyes: 1. HOW TO SEND GIANT FILES 2. HOW TO USE SOFTWARE THAT YOUR COMPANY WON'T LET YOU DOWNLOAD 3. HOW TO VISIT THE WEB SITES YOUR COMPANY BLOCKS 4. HOW TO CLEAR YOUR TRACKS ON YOUR WORK LAPTOP 5. HOW TO SEARCH FOR YOUR WORK DOCUMENTS FROM HOME 6. HOW TO STORE WORK FILES ONLINE 7. HOW TO KEEP YOUR PRIVACY WHEN USING WEB EMAIL 8. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR WORK EMAIL REMOTELY WHEN YOUR COMPANY WON'T SPRING FOR A BLACKBERRY 9. HOW TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONAL EMAIL ON YOUR BLACKBERRY 10. HOW TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE WORKING
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopesDon't blame the WSJ, as sources of the information reported in the article came from -- IT people themselves! Now, IT admins & staff will have to deal with the aftermath.