Tales from Tech Support

It wasn't my purpose at first but I think Jimmy's stories might actually become an ongoing series.

You might rembember me from the first one:

https://lemmy.world/post/36801269

Well, so basically he's doing good with the leadership for other non-IT related reasons. But, as I could always tell, he tries to be competitive with me regarding IT subjects and doesn't realize how much he makes a fool of himself.

Like I said, I usually develop small apps to help our day-to-way workflow. He always downplayed what I did like it was the easiest thing ever. That LLM's can do all that in a second. At first I thought he was just playfully messing with me. Now I realize not.

So, we have a section where our coworkers have to deliver and receive a specific type of equipment. The records where basically sheets of paper that people put the time and signature. It was all very confusing since the sheets got often mixed up.

Jimmy basically asked chatGPT to make him a solution for that. So he came up to me, all proud, showing me an HTML file with some Javascript. It had authentication (lol) by way of using a pin code hardcoded in the JS code itself. The data was saved in Chrome itself. When I tried to show interest on what he did and ask him to explain the code to me he was suddenly very busy. The higher-ups were very impressed how it looked, not realized it didn't work. And he never used it...because it wouldn't work for obvious reasons. Eventually I started developing something using Laravel and he actually warned me not to steal his code.

My Laravel version took more time than expected since I was busy with other things. Eventually I had to postpone it for later. The other day he came to me and told me he wanted me to put his version on the server. The server is basically a Debian machine I use for some of my stuff on nginx, that doubles as a info screen kiosk. Knowing how "his" app worked (better than he did) I tried to understand what is it he wanted. He already knew it could work locally on a single PC (not in the safest manner, but whatever). He told me he wanted it to be available on the network on any computer by using the machine IP (the way my Laravel apps work). I tried to explain to him that his version stored the data locally and he would have to find another solution for network access to the data. I offered to help him know what he needed but, as usual, as soon as it was obvious how little he knew he rolled his eyes and just said "I'll solve it".

The other day I was passing by the TV that has my info screen/server connected and found he was messing with it. He had closed the full screen browser and was messing with some of the settings on the DE (he doesn't have the sudo password though). I scolded him and immediately put things the way they were. I knew, as I expected, he probably asked chatGPT for a solution and was trying to implement it on that server, not knowing nginx doesn't even have a GUI there (I always connect with SSH). He had no clue what he was doing.

Later, when I calmed down, I tried to understand what it was he was doing. He was being vague and avoiding any details. The more he talks the more obvious it is he has no clue what he's doing. He doesn't know how a server work. He doesn't know what PHP is or the difference between server-side and client-side. After a bit of prodding he told me he was installing this program called (and he spelled it) X-A-M-P, like it was this super-advanced software I wouldn't know anything about. XAMP on a server...for outside access...yeah. Jimmy and ChatGPT strike again.

This pisses me off because one of these days he's going to actually break something. And until that happens, the bosses actually think he has a clue.