Bypassing Corporate Security or Banging the TV..Same thing
We are pretty ingenious for imitating or creating workarounds in life. Sometimes we shouldn't do it ... But people will fall into a trap of thinking they are "solving" an issue or creating a workaround when they are simply fooling themselves. Its too bad that we do not have enough people looking over our shoulders and asking why we are trying such a silly trick . This can be even more amusing when you find out that OTHERS consider you to be the smart one and they are following you down the same pathway to doom.
A couple examples. Photocopy technology. Still a very complicated process which includes many parts and bits of computer technology. The manufactures try their best to put smarts into these machines to warn you about different problems or issues. How many people have you seen being stuck late at night trying to coax out a bit more toner out of an empty cartridge for that critical report? In some cases the gentle thumping of a cartridge might help, but they are frequently actually resetting certain sensors, timers, reset trips on some machines. So the trick of turning off the warning light might be banging the toner cartridge, or may be something else. However its late at night and you must try all of these things so you can print the last twelve pages of the report! This can be a gentle process or a brutal one depending on the beginning or ending temperament of the user. How many "the copier is broken" notes on copiers that went kaput late at night? So the first person might get away with a few tricks, but the tenth person is certain to have a frustrating experience. Of course no living person or alternate resource! I know most of you in office situations have been there!
I won't bother with the details of fixing the situation. Just that I know that such remedies are probably cheaper than handling picking up the pieces of a copier that did not survive end of month reports!
Banging the T.V. to make it work. This trick may be fading out. However at one time there were some technical reasons that tapping the television could temporarily take care of an issue. The technology has changed over time and the number of certified TV repairman have dropped considerably. Reducing to a great degree that you know what you are doing by tapping the TV to make it work! For some time though... People started tapping anything electronic to make it work! Hey it seems to work! How about mechanical devices! Sure that seems to work! Not sure why.. Uncle Fred did it in the 1950's Maybe it will work for me! That was then .. This is now.
Please explain Corporate Security as it relates to this post?
Check out the Mouse Jiggler
This will be a fantastic gizmo that will fly off the shelves! Many people will buy this because they want to bypass the corporate mandates of screen saver software that is a requirement to auto-run on corporate systems!
There are some applications that will for example pause, crash or halt if screen saver is activated. Some people will request their IT support to remove the Mandated Screen saver or disable it so they can run their application. However this can be a dead end a corporate security policy may not have exceptions or workarounds. So the alternative is to sit around wiggling yourself and the mouse while your app runs rather than walking away and come back to find the application has stopped?
No way!
So the mouse jiggler and its relations will either give the computer the impression that the mouse is being wiggled! So the screen saver stays off. Person at the computer right? Wrong!
The people buying such a device will at first have a chance to get their coffee breaks and IT Security will be happy until they find out that unattended computers are not being protected.
It will be glaring so to speak. Computer screen with a non-screen saver display and human head not nearby to view the screen...
I predict this product will work for a while until the security snoops at the big corporations catch wind and confiscate these gizmos and toss them into the school teacher forbidden items drawer! Then the vendor will have made his $29.00 bucks for a while until piles of these things are stuffed away by the corporate security police! ( Probably stuffed next the the mad-windup-clicking-teeth-toys.)
Its an eternal battle.. So the next round will start again with a new gizmo.
So whats my point? There are reasons for plans. There are reasons for messages. There are reasons for decisions. There are reasons why things work. People who are sufficiently empowered will sometimes take a direct line to "solve" an issue when in reality they are undoing someones plans that were originally intended as a benefit.
So who is at fault? That is a question that surfaces when people try to pick up the pieces after something was "fixed" to death or disabled.
You cannot plan for all contingencies.
Have you planned for the creativity of the human mind to bypass your well thought plans?
Are your instructions geared for your target readership?
Do you still want to wack the Toner Cartridge?
Just do your best!
Dexter
