Persistent Distraction

Market Gap

I need to order a laptop, but none of our approved vendors carries the one I want.

Extreme Makeover, Office Edition

Part One

As someone who came to IT from a non-technical background, sometimes I feel a bit as though my house has just fallen on a pointy-shoed witch.  I'm just not like these people with their technicolor eye-candy and their passion for telecommunications devices. 

And in this building full of geeks and gadget-lovers, who have they recently put in charge of hardware?  Moi.  I who have exactly one computer at home.  I who could not tell you the names of two current FPS games.  I of the second-generation, toaster-sized iPod.  I with my 2002-model cell phone, which has exactly three duties:  1.  Phone calls.  2.  Text messages.  3.  Waking me up in the morning since my alarm clock broke.

Don't get me wrong; I would be lost without my one pc at home.  But that's exactly what I need:  ONE.  I do want to connect to a few million others, but I don't need any of them to reside at my house, nor am I truly interested in making them function for their own sake.  The only thing I really want to do with computers is use them.

So, with the exception of a smaller iPod or, speaking of toasters, a Hello Kitty one, I cannot think of a single gizmo that I would covet for its own sake.  Maybe this was actually a clever move on the part of management.  It's not exactly the mouse guarding the cheese...

Still, though I have no great love for the things themselves, I do get an almost parental joy from seeing my colleagues' faces light up on those occasions when I can provide them with the sparkling object of their desire.  Unfortunately, given the state of the storage room I have just inherited, when a technician  comes to ask for testing equipment my response has often been something like:  "Network card?  Uh, check in that box labelled 'Blank Disks.'  If there's none in there, then we're out."

So I am in fact quite motivated to perform the triage necessary to save what can be saved, bury the rest, and relocate the refugees.  For the Sake of the Colleagues.

Many of my colleagues, in addition to home networks and accounts at  I Want One of Those, also seem to have separation issues with beloved objects of technology past (and the boxes they were shipped in).  Do these people NEVER throw anything away?

Yesterday as I waded through the murky depths of the testing lab's storage room in search of things to get rid of, I tripped over a Compaq Prosignia--or perhaps the cobweb that attached it to the neighboring shelf--and, had my fall not been broken by a box of unopened Windows 3.1 Resource Kits, I probably would have lost a tooth.  A dear colleague who witnessed the incident showed admirable presence of mind.  Throughout the three phases of the action (Aaagh!, Crash!, Whump!), he didn't spill a single drop of coffee, despite the fit of laughter that doubled him over.

I have had to become brutal.  Recent experience has taught me no longer to ask people whether there is a use in keeping something.  They will spend ten minutes telling me "probably not;" then, as they turn to leave, they will add, "Of course, you never know; the day after you get rid of it, someone will need it.  You'd better ask Whatshisname first."

Forget that noise, I decided.  I'm in charge here.  So, drunk with power (or reeling from the concussion), I crafted a policy for determing what stays and what goes.

SOFTWARE / DOCUMENTATION:

• If the enclosed media is 5.25" disks:  Buh-bye.
• If the company displayed on the box no longer exists, has been bought by Microsoft, or has since turned from making stuff to "providing solutions"  (and a side rant:  why was the word "problem" banned from IT management-speak just as the word "solution" was embraced?)  Bin it.
• If the product itself no longer exists:  Later!  (Exceptions:  sweet, simple, useful non-geeky applications à la WordPerfect 5.1.  There is something so touchingly forthright about a program that invites you to Reveal Codes. . .)
• If the system requirements for installation state:  Pentium II with 32 MB RAM:  Hello Happy Hunting Grounds.
• If it's our company's product but has not been supported in the four years I've been here, then I'm sorry, but I'm recycling the 5 extra copies of the docs in Portuguese, Russian and Hungarian.
• If it only runs on OS/2, people, work with me! 
• If it's our company's product and I've never heard of it, and even the guy upstairs who's been here since he worked for the company we bought seven years ago hasn't heard of it, it's gone, baby.

HARDWARE:

I mercilessly condemn all of the following:

• Desktop machines that bear a sticker boasting, "Designed for Windows ME" or "Y2K-Compliant"
• Laptops that would trigger an extra carry-on charge on Easyjet
• Any of the approximately 93 cadavers of former servers whose various organs have long since been harvested, and which bear sticky notes declaring "DEFECT," "BAD HD," "BURNT," "FRIED," or "KAPOT."
• Anything that prompts me to muse, "Hmm... I don't know what this *is,* but it sure is heavy!"

PERIPHERALS / ACCESSORIES:

• A good rule of thumb is to keep no more than 75 spare serial mice. Even in case of the most dire emergency, it's hard to imagine needing more than that.
• 10BaseT Transceiver Thingies:  I'll keep TWO.  Apparently, they're expensive to replace.  And they're small.  I'm not a Nazi, after all.
• 56K Modems:  here's where the choir is singing my hymn.  Nobody objects to chucking those suckers.
• Vintage SCSI cables in assorted widths:  just these two boxes.  Nobody wants to see a grown engineer cry.  Anyway, Whatshisname says we should keep them.