“FIGJAM, what’s that?”, asks my significant other.

Oh, just an industry acronym.

I’ve worked so long in IT, that I was trained on the 7 OSI protocol layers, as part of a job requirement.  I don’t think people learn it these days, unless you’re doing your Cisco CCIE certification.

Anyhow, there is now an 8th layer, as in “It’s a Layer 8 issue”.  The 8th layer is the person who is causing the ID10T error, all because they have not RTFM’d.

Now IT users are funny beasts.  Often when we see a problem reported though to us, it’s not stated clearly.

“It doesn’t work”

… or in one recent case “My computer is slow”, actually was “I am not able to read emails on my BlackBerry.”

That’ll be because Chucky, you don’t have a BlackBerry Service with us.  “Would Sir like us to arrange one?”

The legendary Roger Forsey* tells the story of the bloke who wanders into a hardware store,

“I want a drill.”
’What kind would you like Sir?’
”I don’t know, I just want a drill.”

The customer actually needs to make a hole in something.  Whether he actually wants a drill to do this, is unknown.

* – The sharpest Active Directory bloke I know.  Some of the Department of Civil Aviation stories he tells are hilarious.