Decay On Net

I don't know why, but PITA always have something with password.

PITA changed his password yesterday when he return from 2 weeks leave. Our company system make password expire every 3 months, so you will have to change your password every 3 months.

What happen was, he forgotten what did he put for the new password today! What the heck? He go change password and can forget what new password did he assign. Clever right? So he came to find me and ask if I know what is his password.

How the heck would I know? Yes, I'm the LAN admin. But I'm only incharge of the IT stuff in our project team, not the entire company. Common sense will tell you that this kind of thing must go find the computer support department.

And my colleague was trying hard not to laugh when she hear him asking me that question. Everyone knows you need to find the computer support department.

Well, everyone except him.

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 10:59 PM | Comments

You know PITA has reach the max power of PITA-ness when he can be a pain even when on leave.

I was rather surprised that our teamlead approved PITA's two weeks leave. He has a very important project that is suppose to roll out at the end of the month. Although he has completed the coding, but the testers are still doing their testing. Who is going to support the testers when there is a problem?

I knew something will surely go wrong during this 2 weeks. Its a very big and important project. It is near impossible for everything to go smoothly without any glitches.

So what happen was, the testers requested for a portion to be improved. Since PITA is not around, my teamlead approached me and ask me to do the change. My first reply to him was "NOW you regretted approving his leave right?".

Actually, I don't mind covering any of my colleagues when they are on leave. Anyone EXCEPT PITA. Why should I be covering his job when he is on leave? He doesn't deserve it. But what to do?

PS: My teamlead forward to me an email conversation between him and another teamlead and wanted me to follow up on the issue. In one of the email to the other teamlead, he wrote something that made me laugh out loudly at my desk.

"My right hand man is out of town currently....."

Hahahahaha...... If PITA is your right hand man, then I think you are crippled.

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 12:29 AM | Comments

After getting so much from PITA, I'm glad to announce that I finally had my revenge today. OK lah... just a bit only.

PITA came over to ask me to explain to him how to run a job. He need to do it on Sunday. I'm the only person in the team who had run that job before as it is quite new. In fact, I've taught everyone how to run the job during the previous team meeting.

So I told him that I've already taught everyone how to run the job. If he got any problem, can refer to the powerpoint slide.

This phrase sound very very familar. Didn't he used that on me before?

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 1:44 AM | Comments

Its been quite some time since PITA strikes. To be fair, he is sometimes a great help. But other time, he is just who he is.... a Pain In The Ass.

I reported the error to PITA. It is his job to verify that it is really a software bug and send the error to vendor for patching. But he asked me to replicate the error in the testing server. It is not the usual testing server we use. Its another testing server... the messy and cannot make it server.

Anyway, I had a hard time trying to replicate the error. Firstly, there are alot of conditions to meet in order for the error to appear. Secondly, I'm not used to the environment. All the script that I've personalised isn't available there and I have to copy them over and edit it to suit this messy testing server. Getting abit pissed off already. Why can't he use the results from the tester? Why can't he regenerate the error himself? I thought it is suppose to be his job?

Halfway replicating the error, he walk over and tells me to write down all the steps that I've taken to create the error. WTF. Can't you tell me earlier? And you know the steps, why can't you write it yourself? I replicate the error, I write the steps? You might as well give the the vendor's email address, let me contact them directly.

OK, I endure..... So when I finally managed to generate the error, I send him the results to ask if it is the error we are expecting. 1 hr later, he reply saying he was testing using another code and the error did not occur. He told me to use EXACTLY the same values that the tester used. That is where I blew my top, slam my chair towards the desk and went for lunch.

If you want me to use those figure, you should had told me earlier. You told me after I've done a testing using another set of figures. Waste my time. If you want exact figure, why not just take the sample that the tester did?

Argh......

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 12:06 AM | Comments

Yes, he did it again.

Remember my colleague was saying he changed the password? Those password are for the development and staging servers. Not production servers. You see, the development servers' user id and password is being shared among many teams, although our team is the owner of the id. So when he changed the password, he only inform our team. And unknown to him, some of the jobs in development server are using that user id and password. So the jobs in development server failed, and everyone got to change the password in their program. Testing was delayed.

In the first place, why did he change the password? That password hasn't been changed since day one when I join the company. That is 4 years already! It is a development server. Everyone knows the user id and password. Why need to change the password? Security purpose? Why would anyone want to gain illegal access into the development server? This is not production server where all the real customer data are in. This is development server. All the data inside are fake and for testing purpose. So what if someone managed to steal the password?

Another thing I don't understand. After changing the password, he email everyone in our team and also our director. Why would our director want to know the password for our team's user id? He has his own user id with super user privilege. Why would he want to use our id which has limited privilege?

One of the job in production fail on Sunday. The job requires to login to the staging server. But the password has been changed by our good friend. So the job failed and some codes aren't promoted.

I'm surprised that nobody is holding him responsible for this mess he created. In the first place, why did you hand itchy go change the password? For what?

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 11:55 PM | Comments

Saw this on my colleague’s blog today.

To DK

Why is it that whenever u are on leave, i sure kena something one huh? Maybe we shld take leave together leh. Really!! This is the 3rd time liao lor. Haiz..

From: xxx

Sorry lah. Not I want 1. But you know lah, when you take leave, it just means that you don’t need to come to office. But work will still continue to pile up. I already cleared most of the things on hand before going for leave. But I can’t stop more issue from coming in when I go on leave. Some things can wait for me to come back then do, some things cannot. And some things actually can wait for me to come back one, but the person handling it is a Gan Jiong Spider, so no choice lor.

No prize for guessing who that Gan Jiong Spider is.

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Another thing she wrote on her blog made me laugh loudly in office just now.

Ur best friend today very funny lor.
Say the database password very long liao need to change. Ask me got suggestion not.
So current pw say is this: apple123
Then i suggest: apple456
and he say why not change to orange456. Then i say also can lor.
In the end he change to apple456orange.
For what? Why change till so mafan. Stupid leh. Think he very free lor!!!!

Once again, no prize for guessing who this guy is. Yes yes... it’s always him. Nobody else lah.

I want to say first hor, he is NOT MY BEST FRIEND. Don’t anyhow say. I don’t know him one.

PS: I should really create a label just for him. Thinking of using PITA. (Pain In The Ass)

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 10:36 AM | Comments

Been formatting PC for the whole day in office.

Like I mentioned, it's really a no brainer job. Just time consuming as there are quite a number of steps to do.

Everything went on smoothly until one of the PC prompt me for password when I turn on the power. Argh. Someone set the bootup password and never remove it.

The problem is, I didn't label the PC when they return it to me. So I don't know exactly which PC belongs to who. Most people in my company don't put a bootup password cause we already need a login password in order to login to the company network domain. I do know a few colleagues who set bootup password. But they removed it before giving the PC to me for formatting. They knew that I can't format the PC if there is a bootup password. So they auto remove it by themselves. Everyone did that except one fellow.

Damn... I should had made them label their PC. Now I need to hunt for the owner of that PC. Maybe I should just ask the 20 person 1 by 1 to see who has bootup password which they forgot to disable.

Suddenly for no reason, a song came into my mind.... it goes something like this....

Something's telling me it might be you
Yeah, it's telling me it must be you
And I'm feeling it'll just be you

And yeap... it's really you.....

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 1:38 AM | Comments

Our team has been sharing one login account to 1 of the system. The person who owns the login id has resigned for quite some time, but we didn't unregister his id until recently.

So another colleague went to apply for an id to share among the whole team. When he got his id, he mass mail to the team to inform everyone the user id and password.

When I look at the to list, something seems to be wrong. The number of recipient seem abit too little. We have 10 people in our team.... but there are only 7 people in the recipient list.

I don't know why was he thinking. The easiest way to mass mail everyone is to take an email from our teamlead copy the list of recipient. Our teamlead always mass mail to the whole team to inform us important stuff. If he use our teamlead's email as a guide, he won't miss out anyone. Simple thing like that also can make mistake.

And one look you know that the number doesn't tally. The list is too short, its obvious that someone is missing. And he didn't even bother to do a quick count to see if he missed out anyone. What the heck was he thinking?

Oh, no need to guess.... it is our fave guy again.....

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 11:51 PM | Comments

This is actually a grey area.

This is what happen. Colleague A used to be assigned this task in the team. There is a re-org in the team and A's task has been handed over to B. Few months down the road, someone discovered that there is an error in 1 of the item A did before handing over to B. In fact, from the beginning to the end of the task, it was all done by A. Although the task is now under B's responsibility, B didn't touch it because it was completed before B took over the task.

Now, who should fix the problem?
1) A fix it since he was the one who made the mistake.
2) B fix it since he took over the task from A

I would say it should be 3) B fix it with the help of A.

But that is an utopia which never exist... or at least never exist in my team.

I spotted a small error today. Wanted to get the person who did it fix the problem. But he said that he has already handed over the item to another person, therefore it should be fixed by the another person. He didn't even bother to explain or guide the other person. Just merely say its no longer under his charge.

True.... it is no longer his duties. But the mistake was by him. Shouldn't he take some responsibility and help fix it? After all, it just take mere 10 minutes to resolve the issue.

Pissed off by the way he shake off his responsibility.

No prize for guessing who is the person I'm talking about. It's always him....

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 12:57 AM | Comments

Continue to help setup the new PC for some of the colleagues who are on leave on Friday.

So as usual, I connect the new PC to a network point, help my colleague map to the shared drive and ask them to copy their data to the new PC.

Then one colleague asked me this question:

"So I copy everything in C drive to the new PC C drive huh?"

WTF..... For goodness sake, if this question is being asked by someone with non-IT degree, I can still understand. But this fellow has an IT degree. Does he has any basic IT knowledge? You just need to copy your data over. Your software need to be reinstalled onto the new PC manually. It will not work if you just copy your program folder over to the new PC. This is basic IT knowledge that even non-IT people would know. Does he really have a IT degree or is it bought online?

And my reply to him was:

"Which university did you graduate from?"

---------------

Few hours later, another colleague walked pass me and saw me setting up PC for other colleague. He came over and had a short chat with me. He said that being a LAN admin in a IT dept is actually quite an easy job since everyone here has a IT diploma or degree.

I told him that story and both of us laughed for 5 seconds before continuing our work.

--------------

I know, I sound rude. No matter how stupid the question is, I shouldn't be insulting the person by asking him which University he grad from.

But it is the same person who didn't restart the job, didn't setup the laptop, anyhow promise deadline, didn't inform us till last minute, arrow me to cover his meeting and give excuse saying he don't know.

I think heaven will forgive me for being so rude.

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 12:00 AM | Comments

Me is pissed again today at work.

I was 'dragged' into the error checking meeting again. I was already filled with things to do already, but no choice. Got to go. The checking went on till after office hours. As I have lesson today, I couldn't stay too late. So I told them that I need to leave at around 6:30pm. (My knock off timing is actually 6pm)

The director ask me to get another guy from my team to come in take over my role. So I went over, told him that director wants him to go help check for errors. But he don't want to go, saying he has no background information about the issue. And he don't know this and that things that we are doing.

Feeling pissed, I just told him "Actually, I also don't know the things that you mentioned" and I left for my lesson.

------------
I hate it when people give the excuse "I don't know". If you were to tell me you are busy or need to leave office early, I won't be pissed off. If you tell me you need someone to teach you, I'm more than happy to explain to you. Nobody is born into this work knowing how to do everything. You need learn. And the best way to learn is to do it. Just like you can never learn how to swim without going into the water.

And seriously, the things that he mentioned are things that I also don't know before hand. But I went around asking people how some of the things work. It is common. The system is too big and complicated for anyone to know everything in details.

If "I don't know" is a valid reason not to do things, then I think I can sit at my desk and shake leg everyday.

-------------

And just in case you are guessing who is the fellow, well...... no prize for guessing the right person.
Its him again...... the same person who didn't restart the job, didn't setup the laptop, anyhow promise deadline, didn't inform us till last minute and arrow me to cover his meeting.

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 11:55 PM | Comments

I is pissed.

One of my colleague cancelled a weekly job that is suppose to run during the weekend as it has some impact to what he is doing. This is perfectly fine. Except he didn't inform us till last minute.

He knew he need to cancel the job since few weeks ago. He actually emailed all the sub teamlead and ask if there is any impact to them. Don't understand why the heck he didn't email the rest of the team. There are only 12 person in the team. Is it really that hard to inform everyone last week?

He informed the rest of the team on thursday at around 11:30am. As he will be canceling that job, we need to get our things done before friday 9am. Less than 24 hours warning. Might as well don't inform us.

Sometimes I wonder what the heck he is thinking.
---------------------

He need to attend a meeting regarding the error. But he has another meeting at the same timing. So he ask me to go on his behalf. Since I knew about the case, I agreed to cover him for the meeting.

So he went for his meeting. I was informed that the meeting on the error will be delayed. So I waited at my desk and do my stuff. By the time he finish his meeting, the error meeting haven't started yet.

So I thought he would attend the error meeting. But no.... he asked me to go instead, claiming that he got things to do. Fine, I'll go....

Didn't expect the meeting to last from 3.30pm to 7pm. And worst still, the meeting is to be continued next morning. By the time I reach my desk, everyone in my team has already left. Including him.

And I OT until 10pm trying to clear the backlogs. Told him that there is a part 2 tomorrow, and ask if he is going. He told me to go because he got things to do.

HELLO, I ALSO GOT THINGS TO DO LOR. I OT TILL 10PM, WHILE YOU LEFT THE BLOODY OFFICE BEFORE 7PM. WHO GOT MORE THINGS TO DO?

-----------------------

And in case you are wondering, this person is also the same person who didn't restart the job, didn't setup the laptop and anyhow promise deadline.

I think I can start a label specially for entries about how you piss me off.

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 1:10 AM | Comments

One of my colleague send a email to a requester today. He kept me in the loop because I'm incharge of it now.

Hi

There is one request raised from you since Sep 2006.

Pls let us know if you have plan to migrate it to production by end of the month.

If not, we will drop it (Keep request open status will affect our KPI). You can raise request again when you need it.

This colleague of mine has been assigned to do another task. He has handed over his task (including this request) to me and my new subteamlead. This request has been put on hold by requester.

My question is..... HOW THE BLOODY HELL DO WE MIGRATE THE CHANGES BY END OF THE MONTH???

I have not started working on it. Its already 23 Jan. I have many stuff on hand currently.

Before you go be a smart alex and go suggest a deadline, can you at least come check with me if I can meed the timeline first or not?

I is pissed.
This is the same fellow who didn't set up the laptop and didn't restart his job.

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 10:38 PM | Comments

This is the 64738265274950674 times that I'm complaining about such issue. I'm going to do it again.

Recently, our team has been given a 'new' laptop. I think they reformatted the harddisk before giving it to us. All the setting are gone and I couldn't log into the company LAN. So I went into the setting and do the necessary changes.

I was in a rush. The auditors will be arriving in less than an hour and I need to setup the laptop for the audit session. Halfway thru the setting, I notice something that made me curse and swear at my desk.....

One of my colleague used this laptop before! I saw his login id at the user setting. I saw his ID file at lotus notes. But appearantly, he couldn't login to the company LAN server because the setting are incorrect.

So, what did he do when he couldn't log into company LAN server with that laptop? Put it back into the cupboard and wait for someone else to fix it. How clever.

Bloody hell. If you don't know how to setup the laptop, at least find someone to help out. And not put the laptop back into the cupboard as if everything is working fine.

Who are you waiting for to fix that problem? First, you don't want to restart your job when it fails. Now you don't fix the laptop when there is a problem. WTF. Pay you so much every month for FUCK? Go back to your own country and work in the fields better.

Totally pissed off.

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 2:29 PM | Comments

I know this week is going to be a busy week.

2 request due to be completed by Friday and I haven't started yet.
1 request need to be in development server by next Monday and I'm still clueless on how to do it
Satan Auditor coming on Friday and I haven't start checking the documentations to ensure everything is in order.

I actually planned a few items for today. I remember telling Stella that whenever you plan to do something at work, something ad hoc will surely pop up and ruin your planning. I keep forgetting this Murphy's Law.

There was a power trip again. I've lost count of the number of power trip we encountered lately. The good for nothing building management (except collecting parking fee and conducting fire drill) still couldn't find the cause. They keep saying its one of the electric appliances that we bought in. Why didn't anyone suspect that it could be our computers that is causing the power trip? Or even the wiring?

One of the PC encountered harddisk problems after the power trip. Outlook and some other programs were corrupted. I'm not the LAN admin on duty. But the person on duty is on leave today and the backup is out for meeting. So I went to fix the PC. Tried uninstalling and reinstalling the programs. Can't resolve. Left with no choice but to format the PC. I'm actually quite fine with it. The 3 of us cover each other whenever possible. I quite like this arrangement.

Then I got another handover meeting. I've already lost count of the number of hand over meeting that we had been thru for this project. This is 1 of the most detailed handover meeting I've ever been to. And seriously, I think its over detailed.

China side was having problem with 1 of the job. They emailed to a colleague whom has no idea how to debug. She forward to me and ask if I know how to resolve it. I did some checks and identified that the problem is cause by another job. That job is under the care of another colleague. So I told him that his job has problem and need to be restarted. He told me that he already taught everyone how to restart the job and ask me to restart it. If I have any problem, I can refer to the manual.

Hello.... that is not my job. I'm not encountering any problems because that job doesn't affect me. Its china side that is having problem. I have my own task to do too. That job is under your care. You know how to restart better than I do. Shouldn't you be the person to restart it?

I don't mind helping you restart the job if you ask me in a nice way. But what the hell... You put it in such a way as if it is MY DUTY to restart YOUR job. Heck.... I return to my seat and do my own stuff. Let china side continue to be stuck. None of my business.

54 days to go..... I is pissed.

Labels: PITA

Posted by DK at 10:34 PM | Comments