when i click on the thingie, it says "bad something. unable to do yada yada"

Somewhat continuing from my last post, another question I get quite often “i’ve got a computer question for ya, can ya help?”. I get this a lot. Their question is usually followed by something like “aw, you’re one of them programmer types so you’ll like this one” or “you’re a ‘computer guy’ so it’ll be a piece of cake for somebody like you”. I only learned how to use a computer a little over ten years ago and the fact that I even develop software and provide solutions for these infernal machines sometimes forces me to give my head a shake, but it always makes me feel very lucky that I’m not a pharmacist. For almost all of those ten years, I’ve taken care of personal computer problems for other people, usually for free. “Others” are friends, family, friends of family, families of friends; some I know personally very well and others I know only by proxy. For those “others”, I’ve reinstalled operating systems, removed malware (without reinstalling operating systems…yay!), fixed Windows Registry problems, cleared up config.sys/autoexec.bat problems, configured Internet settings, figured out Adobe PageMaker without ever having seen it before (and done the same for many other applications) and much more. And then I discovered remote control software…

I’ve seen pcAnywhere, GoToMyPC, their enterprise equivalents and others. Great idea and most work well, but they cost money. It’s been my experience with people that they tend not to like to spend their money. When I’m asked to look at someone’s computer and they don’t happen to be nearby, controlling their computer remotely would be great. I then discovered TightVNC; an open-source (so it’s free) app for remotely controlling computers. The snag is that it requires knowing the IP address of the computer that will be the server (the computer I’m being asked to take a look at). And since most people have dynamic IPs, it’s never the same for too long. Most people looking for computer help don’t know what an IP address is, so explaining to them how they can relay their’s to me will be tedious. I ended up writing a script to automate that as well as launch the TightVNC server on their computer, as part as a solution that I conveniently install on said computers when I’m in front of them. If you’re interested in the source code for my script, it’s here.

I’m a fan of Joel Spolsky’s blog. He definitely knows the software development industry better than most and has the credentials to back it up. His company, called Fog Creek Software, will be offering a new service called Copilot that “…allows people to help their friends, relatives, and customers fix their computer problems by connecting to their computers via the Internet.”. But you have to pay for it. I wonder how it will fare since I’m uncertain how excited people would be paying for such a service. Most people who ask for my help seem to expect it to be free. That’s usually the reason why they’re asking me and not taking their computer in for service. The good thing about Copilot is that it’s firewall-friendly in that there’s no need to open/forward any ports. But there’s other software out there offering that for free. I’m even thinking of trying out UltraVNC‘s SC add-in and toast my TightVNC/script solution all-together…and it’s all free. People love free. Although my student loan’s balance won’t decrease by doing favours 😉 I wonder what other developers and computing professionals do in these situations.