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Comment by arethuza | Hacker News Reader

I've seen very unfortunate things happening when someone doesn't have notifications disabled when giving a presentation so I don't think this is a bad default.

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Maybe the issue isn't with the default notification behaviour in a teleconference program, but with the expectation that someone should always be instantly accessible via zoom/slack/what have you during work hours.

(I mean, yeah, the meeting was presumably scheduled but the manager could have phoned or texed.)

In some places they even push the expectation of being accessible immediately at any time ("being on call"), and it’s not paid hours. Crazy times we live in.

who doesn't pay "on call" though?

Management is never paid for being on call in my experience. It's just expected that you can be called any time for any reason.

I've never been paid extra for 'on call', always been salaried and had it added as an expectation after the fact.

I'll admit I've quit over it.

I am an underpaid (for my area, experience, title, coworkers, etc) software developer who has occasional on call shifts and once a year holiday shifts with no extra pay or benefits

Your argument seems to be that he should be instantly available on his telephone but not on zoom or slack? Seems like you're just shuffling the problem around.

I think that's pretty reasonable. Most people at the end of the day are available whenever via a phone call. But if you use it for something trivial, they will be pissed. Seems like a decent system to me.

In this age of mobile phones, a phone call is the gold standard for realtime business communication. It's pretty reasonable to expect someone to answer their phone if their direct supervisor calls during work hours. Text messages are more fuzzy with the implied expectation of response time. Online messages (IMO anyway) shouldn't be considered a realtime channel.

It was entirely my fault to be over reliant on notifications.

I quit all noisy apps before doing presentations. It's a healthy habit.

It's actually a good argument for integration between screen-sharing apps and instant messaging/status - your status really should go to "Presenting" when you are presenting and for incoming alerts to automatically be hidden.

That's a great idea!

It's how Microsoft Teams works, not my idea!

That's how Teams works and if I remember rightly even Skype for business/Lync had this way back.

Yes, that was the default behavior in Lync/SfB, but could be changed to not go into "Do Not Disturb" status when sharing your screen or presenting slides.

Don’t all apps nowadays send you notifications even if they are not running?

I believe such a horrible misfeature would require support from desktop environment. I mostly use XFCE and believe it doesn't have that feature. I'm not so sure, but believe that Windows is also mostly fine: note that an app minimized to tray is still running, "Quit" is distinct from "Close". Did I miss something in popular desktop environments?

If your job (as I've seen recently) is to give real time support it looks pretty nuts. Traditional landline telephones just ring loud and long enough to just work. In 2020 the laptop needs to be kept awake, the mail client has to be active, the wifi has to be connected. Woah, Reboot? just like that? I might get fired!

Then, in the middle of the daily 8 hour tech paranoia she went to the toilet and the mail notifier was loud- but not long enough. It got flushed pretty much. I had to tell her she got an email. "WOAH? Really??" :rolleyes:

The false alarms are also comical. Things like separate notification settings for different mail accounts is still a puzzle while it should be a simple filter settings. We got volume control in software but we didn't get to adjust it on a per feature-basis.

I guess we are back at: 'Jack of all trades, master of none'

One of the most annoying and bad-taste shocking developments in OS X was when they changed the Messages app so that it still gives you notifications even if its not running, unless you deliberately enable Do Not Disturb.

It's really really glaring and galling how bad that choice is. It's Microsoftian.

The notifications aren't coming from the Messages app anymore, they are push notifications that are delivered over APNS.

A coworker had his work Macbook synced up to his iPhone messages app, and was getting blown up during a meeting by his friends in a group chat ranting about Trump.

It could have been way worse. I've never understood why people sync their personal messages/emails to their work computers. It can and does get watched - gods help you if your friends have a borderline taste in memes and send you something offensive while you're presenting.

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