Punters and Punter's Computers Help Line !

Let's face it,most use computers, and computers are "machines" and machines have issues.
The so caled "help files", to some is a foriegn language, I myself find trying to understand help instructions is often a daunting task. The answers from those "in the know" often seem belittling to say the least, let alone, if we say, "it's for a racing program", or anything related to horse racing, suddenly to a non raceing pc expert/technician,well you just sense it was not the right thing to say, and regretably the plot is lost.
Help files to me, are useless most times. I am more on practicle first, then the help files makes sense.And this takes time. We as punters, just don't have that sort of time. There is a race to contend with !

May I suggest, a section on the forum, where we can ask computer related questions, where we can get our answers because we know ourselves where it's at in this industry.

It should include most popular opertaing systems, and not to become a slanging place to voice opinions. If one wants to get away from the technical help questions, then have another section, possibley called "the ring",and have the "nose bleeds" in there.
But I feel there is a lack of understanding when asking technical computer related questions and the computers we use is for our racing, but anyone outside the horse racing arena, just does not seem to want to "go there"
Comments welcomed

Thanks.

Puntz,

I have a lot of empathy for what you are saying and think your idea for a help line has a lot of merit as I am just an old Luddite. We are not all computer programmers or computer junkies and being either provides us with nil punting prowess, but it would sure help with the bookwork.

Good punters are good punters and vis-a-vis regardless of computer skills [ buying the best recipe books in the world won't turn anybody into a chef ] and having them provide one of many very handy punting tools but does not automatically confer expertize of the many other tools and attributes required to become a good punter.

' Computer skill = big punting profit $$$ ' is marketing hype by program floggers and puter programmers/junkies are their best customers and free promoters but often are the only ones who get much out of them.

If program floggers, including those for Horse racing [ and yes, I know there are some great racing programs out there including PPP ] were half decent salesmen, they would quickly realize the the majority of their potential customers have extremely limited skill with puters and some effort to rectify this would open up a whole new market. I only ever bought one program for racing and found out only after parting with the bucks that DOS [ Dos who ? ] skills were required to use it. It remains to this day unused in a bottom draw. What puter programs can do is one thing highly promoted, but a step by step how to use them, mostly remains a very thin on the ground, grey puddle.

That Bank manager who lost 18 mil. to IAS was obviously good with computers, but what a hopeless punter !!!


Cheers.


[ This Message was edited by: crash on 2004-01-15 11:13 ]

Crash, yeah.
To me, a computer operating system should be like one of those Bathurst Race Cars, where they take car off the production line, into a workshop, and strip off all the cosmetics, add roll bars and heavy duty suspension. But it is still a ...well, won't go into the model of the car, but let's use Monaro just as an example.
The point is, it is re-constructed, as in if there was a "bathurst version of a modified horse racing computer" out goes the cosmetics of the marketed operating system, and fit the "roll bars and suspension" so it sustains the number crunching we need to do.
First, I would change the browser and email dooberlaky to this reccomended software
web browser:
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firebird/

email:
http://www.mozilla.org/mailnews/

Has not let me down, not messing with cookies and all those other humps. PC speed of access to web sites seemingly been constant.
Emails just glides thru the traffic.

Then perhaps,
http://www.openoffice.org/

But I do not expect the office software might be a quick transition for most. There might be a level of commitment at first and away from punting.

The next issue that might be of concern is internet security.
Before this becomes some what a blown out discussion, let me say this, when configuring firewalls and it comes to IP numbers and what they mean and what to simply fill in the blank spaces with, I was once given a url to download a tutorial on IP numbers.
I am not sure if it was a joke, but by the time the printing was done, there were 104 pages printed.

That to remains in my bottom draw.

All I asked for, "what numbers do I use to configure a firewall?"
To some it may not be a issue. But the issue is not an issue to explain in a epic of a tutorial, intended for those who have the knack and comprehend 104 pages of why a number is used on that specific location of a PC !!
A race is getting redy to start as far as a punter is concerned, much time and focus is doing racing number crunching.
Who has time to read 104 pages of stuff ?

[ This Message was edited by: puntz on 2004-01-31 00:23 ]

Puntz,

I like the analogy as doing up cars [ and bikes ] is something I can relate to !

The main problem I find with puter xperts is that most of them still use old operating systems they are familiar with and write programs accordingly and still even in DOS. Step by step info ain't much help [ and hard to find ] when there are so many operating systems around. What you get is usually: ' Well, you just do this and then this and this OK ? '. Whaaaa ...???

Try and find any program written for Windows XP or even a tec. who is an expert with it. I have a mate who is a well paid puter tec. in the recording industry; but boy, what a tentative baby when he came around to put a few of his programs on to this mother. His driving skills were hopeless [ for the first 10 min. anyway ].

Cheers.

Crash,
yeah, but there are programers that can relate to racing needs. The topics here, when written need to be specificly what the problem might be.
For example, if let's say a pc is booting up and freezing on boot-up. Simply saying, "it freezes on boot-up", is not going to help get advice. But I hope the feedback from those that might know what fix to use, they may ask specific steps to try, and feedback again.
Some topics may have to go off-list, fair enough, but giving out email addresses becomeas a issue.
Simply open a free email address, but so to not add more problems using free email accounts full of advertising, there are alternative free email accounts with no advertising to mess with the PC

https://safe-mail.net
https://ziplip.com

[ This Message was edited by: puntz on 2004-01-31 00:27 ]

I could hazard a guess to what The Fat One would say :smile:

just to add my 2 cents ....i do a lot of tech work online with security so if needed i can help out inthis department

Thanks Shaun, appreciated


[ This Message was edited by: puntz on 2004-01-31 00:19 ]

I'm no expert, but if I can help then I'll throw my hat into the ring.

Sometimes the best advice comes from someone who is not computer literate but has had to find out how to fix something and can relate that fix in layman's terms.

Thanks Chrome.
I hope it's seen positively.

Thanks to all in advance.

Just for the record, if anyone has read the above and are wondering what a tutorial looks like for "IP tables"
Be my guest !
All I asked for was a set of numbers to get on-line.
Good try.
http://iptables-tutorial.frozentux....s-tutorial.html


[ This Message was edited by: puntz on 2004-01-31 00:25 ]