Things are great when they work. In fact, you almost don’t notice that they’re working because, well, they’re working so there are no issues.
But when they stop working – for whatever reason – it is then when chaos may ensue.
And ensue it has over the past few weeks here, with a variety of online ailments, server problems, no internet access … we were suddenly thrust into what felt like the dark ages.
Not everything was inoperable but enough so that it forced us to change how we did things, at least temporarily. I admit to being spoiled by having multiple screens that help me do my job; I can write on one, look at photos on another, be connected to email and have multiple windows open to keep track of everything while sitting at my desk.
That changed a couple weeks ago with no internet here at the office so I had to take my small laptop home and work remotely – something I didn’t even do during the pandemic – and going from three screens to one took a bit of adjustment. It worked, just a little more slowly than normal, with a few more steps required. And luckily, the laptop had access to everything through the internet at home.
Once those problems were resolved, things went pretty smoothly for a few days. Then another bug hit us and we were without email for a time. That might not seem like much but considering the bulk of the legal advertising, columnist contributions, news releases and regular advertising, among other items, come in via email to multiple staff members here again disrupted the flow. Add in the early deadlines we had to meet for our Labor Day holiday production schedule and it made for a few tense days.
Even though my email was gone, I still had access to everything else and – with my three screens – was humming along getting work done. Then our tech support people out of Georgia needed to come in and fix some things so they remotely took over my computer. Something that still makes me nervous, even though they are much more knowledgeable about computers than I will ever be. So, they said “just hold off whatever you’re working on, we will take care of you” and I turned it over to the tech team.
My screen went black and the little message that “Your computer is now being controlled by …” popped up. We were on speaker phone at the time, this being late morning our time on a Friday, early afternoon back east, with everyone trying to get things done ahead of a long holiday weekend. Long story short, and definitely not technical, our computer system was having trouble communicating with itself and the tech support crew had to help it overcome that difficulty. There was something about a firewall and a misinterpretation of a message by one part of the system … I don’t know, it all seemed way too complicated for me. I just kept having visions of HAL, that artificial intelligence computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey, trying to take over our operation.
It took some time, and after my computer issues were addressed, there were several more machines in the office that had to go through a similar revitalization process.
Regardless, the computer issues got fixed, HAL 9000 did not infiltrate 209 Multimedia but we did have to rearrange a few things. Which is why this column, and our entire “Perspective” page for this issue appears in our A Section while normally it is included in our B Section.
If that’s the worst outcome of having three weeks of sporadically interrupted workdays and finding ways to overcome a variety of operational failures, I’ll take it.
Marg Jackson is editor of The Oakdale Leader, The Escalon Times and The Riverbank News. She may be reached at mjackson@oakdaleleader.com or by calling 209-847-3021.
