~!@#$%^&* Technology

[wintergreen48]

One of the great things about my job is that I get to use a cool new-style Blackberry phone.

One of the problems with the cool new-style Blackberry phone is that when I left Capital One last year I took the cell phone number with me (I had been using it for ten years, and everyone knew me through that number), and in order to 'give' it back to Capital One (that is, transfer it from my personal account to Capital One's corporate account), Verizon required us to go through a god-awful amount of hoops. But after a couple hours (no lie) on the phone with them, we got that worked out, and arranged for the cool new-style Blackberry phone to be delivered (I was supposed to have it last week, when I started the new job, but the purchase order was cancelled three times, due to the 'we can't transfer the cell phone number from a personal account to a corporate account' problem).

Well.

The cool new-style Blackberry arrived today. The package includes 'activation' instructions, which are easy enough-- same as with any (Verizon) cell phone, you just do the *228 thing, and you are on your way.

But then… you need to go through 'setup' (so that you can get e-mails and other things, which are what makes a cool new style Blackberry so much fun)… and you hit... The Screens of Death.

The instructions that come with the cool new style Blackberry show you how to start the set-up, but once it starts it just tells you to follow the prompts, which do not do much more than, well, 'prompt' you. After you enter the first prompt, 'set up e-mail,' the next prompt asks, 'do you want to set-up your e-mail?' Well, duh, this is the 'e-mail set up' function, and I just selected 'set up e-mail', so you would think that this would be a pretty good indicator that maybe, just maybe, what I want to do is... set up e-mail. But OK, I can hit the 'accept' thingie, and off we go to the next Screen of Death, which asks me for my e-mail address. No problem with that (except that my business e-mail address is REALLY LONG, and I have very large fingers while the cool new-style Blackberry has a very small keyboard, but eventually I git 'er done. But then, to go to the next stage, it seems that I need a password… but no one here uses a password to access office e-mail (we use multiple passwords to access our systems, but not for e-mail, once you are in the system); but if you do not enter a password, you cannot even set up set up your e-mail on the cool new style Blackberry. I found that you can go on-line, where they actually have a 'setup guidebook' for cool new-style Blackberries, but that just tells you... put in your password. Not a lot of help.

So then you check around with people who have Blackberries, both the old fashioned ones and the cool new-style Blackberries, and you find that none of them has any idea of what this involves, because none of them has her or his e-mail under a separate password. Eventually you find out that there is some kind of 'enterprise activation' code that you need to use, and that Capital One provides this by (non-password protected) e-mail… except that they stopped sending these e-mails YESTERDAY… and didn't tell anyone. Well, we have a techno-geek Help Desk that is available at all hours, so you find a landline and contact the techno-geek Help Desk to get help with it… and the nerdy geek on the line has no idea what you are talking about, and after spending a LOT of time trying to maneuver around the E-Mail Screen of Death, he decides to 'escalate' it to a 'Level 2,' which apparently means 'bring in some nerdier, geekier guy who does not speak English,' who will walk you through the process.

It took the first nerdy geek about twenty minutes to find the non-English speaking nerdier geek (no big deal, gave me time to solve a Ken Ken while I was waiting patiently, and after a lot of programming work, the non-English speaking nerdier geek came up with the super-secret enterprise activation code… which is the lower-case letter a. That's it. a And once you enter this a, you get to/must change it to some new password, but you get to pick the password you want, and the non-English speaking nerdier geek tells you that you can use anything you like as the password, with no restrictions (except, presumably, you cannot use the single lower case letter a as your password)… and so you seek to enter a password... and your first five (five!!!) choices are rejected, because it turns out that there is a password protocol, which involves pretty high minimum number of characters, and a specified complicated mixture of letters and numbers, etc., that you must use, but finally you get it to work. Except that now it won't work after all, because you have been playing with the ~!@#$%^&* thing for so long that the battery needs to be recharged.

Two cans and a length of string, that's all I really need.

[MarleysGh0st]

I'm just curious what was wrong with the uncool old-style Blackberry you (presumably) already had?

[wintergreen48]

I had to turn the old one in when they canned my ass, I mean, when they gave the opportunity to pursue interests outside of Capital One, and when I came back I asked for the old one again (I could really work that keyboard well), but it's been discontinued and is no longer available: apparently, if something works, they stop making it and come up with other stuff. The new one is a lot cooler looking,and supposedly has even more functions, but I don't know about that, since I'm still working on the ~!@#$%^&* email problems.

[kayrharris]

Good luck! It will get easier and better, I promise!

[SportsFan68]

. . . apparently, if something works, they stop making it and come up with other stuff. . . .

LOL! And they discontinued my favorite soap for the same reason, and my favorite instant hot chocolate, and on and on . . .

[ulysses5019]

. . . apparently, if something works, they stop making it and come up with other stuff. . . .

LOL! And they discontinued my favorite soap for the same reason, and my favorite instant hot chocolate, and on and on . . .

I hope they don't discontinue my favorite avatar. Wait, I forgot, I don't have one.