Comment by carlesfe | Hacker News Reader

Comment by carlesfe | Hacker News Reader

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Exercise, though others have said that.

Personally, I'd say that the thing that changed my life for the best has been Not Giving Tech Support.

When I was a teenager I was kinda miserable because some people abused me for tech support. You know, it's nice to give favors, but at some point you're fed up of reinstalling every computer in your block every 6 months. People stop you on the streets and the first thing they say is "you know I think my computer has a virus...". Yeah, f* you.

I guess not many people in HN do this anymore, probably because we're kinda old, however, if that's your case, learn to say no. It's fine. You can still oblige for some people. However, never do it for free. With close family and some friends, they probably have had more deferences towards you than you can ever repay. For others, just say "I do this for a living, it'll be $XX, at friend's price"

Once I started charging, only a few people took me up on it, and they've always been happy with the result. Those who want tech support for free should give something in return besides a beer "for your inconveniences".

I could expand but I'm afraid it would be an ugly rant. If anybody wants any help on how to say NO, just ask :)

As for me, I stopped giving tech support by saying "I don't use Windows anymore, probably I forgot how to do it; if you want to install Linux, I'm happy to help".

That's exactly what I started saying! They always see me on a Linux desktop, too, so it's quite believable and has some truth. Like carlesfe said, it saves sooooo much time. The ridiculous thing is that people think having tech knowledge means we should spend hours solving their problems but they with their skills sure aren't going to spend hours on my transmission, running my retail operation, planning my estate, & so on. Ridiculous the expectation is so common for tech skills.

It doesn't work. I've been playing that game with Mac for the last eight years, and now I get "and I use a Mac" in my tech support requests.

"It doesn't work."

Mac != Linux

Worked reasonably well for me. My realatives support requests went down to about 1/10. Now they are only the serious requests left, like my backup stopped working.

Removing Windows Administrative Access from everyone's computer's whom I "managed", allowed them to never call me again. Now I just get bugged when they want a new computer! :D Switching everyone to Chromebooks helps too.

Because most of the people around me are on Windows, I simply say "I don't know your operating system, if you were on (GNU/)Linux I could have helped".

I am still in college (not so old) and I can relate to this.

A new variation is "I/My friend have this awesome app idea and we need a IT guy to code it out. Can you help?"

Someone in the family does this whenever I see him. Many ideas have some potential, given you put in enough hours of course ("1% inspiration, 99% perspiration"). So I respond positively and tell him I'm open for helping with it, never to hear about it again. Next birthday party we meet again and there's a new topic.

Lesson learned: just because you're family (or friends) won't mean they're going to uphold their end. Let them work for it first.

Agree. Apart from spouse and kids, the only others that get tech support from me are my parents (hey, they raised me and put me through school) and my in-laws (because I'm not an idiot).

I'm not sure… when I still helped out family I found often I would get blamed for things not working right. Ending that was beneficial.

> when I still helped out family I found often I would get blamed for things not working right.

I used to get this from family too but it's been a lot better in recent years. My advice: install the most recent version of their favorite OS and let them stick with it until the end of extended support (so 10 years or so). My people still have Windows 7, are perfectly fine with it and know what to click and what not to click.

Focusing on the technical side, yeah that’s not a bad approach. Mind you, my Dad’s PC just seems flakey that often… bloody Windoze. It died recently with an error message that meant basically, “you’re hosed, do a rescue install,” after which I pretty much had to reinstall and configure all the apps. Contemplating that, I decided there is probably an install of Linux in his not too distant future. 90% of what he uses should still work - and he is already using VirtualBox for an old business program that only works on XP, so there is precedent.

UltraVNC Single Click[1] makes a pretty good remote support solution too.

I’m seriously considering buying a chromebook, just so I can play with one and figure out how good it might be as a future replacement PC (I’m thinking mainly for my Mum — mind you, I set her up with Linux over five years ago, and it has run so smoothly ever since…)

[1] http://www.uvnc.com/products/uvnc-sc.html

All families are different, and if it was a big source of stress for you, then it sounds like you made the right call.

I don’t get blamed, but whenever my Dad has a problem there is a strong, unspoken pressure for me to drop everything and help him out. Have to work on managing expectations there just like with clients from my freelancing days.

I think I prefer unclogging people's toilets than providing technical support to your average Windows user. Pay is probably better as well

Same here!

Linux support though, I'd stay up all night for someone who's curious enough to use (or try using) Linux without being a computer guru already. Windows people bought a product, they can call the support hotline.

There's the benefit with toilets that they realise it's obviously shit that's the problem....

Related, when I started responding "I don't really have practice fixing computer problems other than the ones I've had." or similar, it's done a fantastic job of getting people to understand that "guy who works with computers" != IT.

> we're kinda old

I'm curious, what do you think the average age on HN is?

Not that I have the facts, but I don't think HN is such an old audience.

I think ~38.

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