It's on a computer, fix it!Follow

So either I'm just ignorant of how these things operate or everyone else is.

Yesterday afternoon we had another crisis that somehow everyone decided involved computers. One of our guys in the Resources dept. is leaving and he also happens to be in charge of some certification program for our production staff. He's the only trainer we have for this and his last day is today. In a scramble to get as many people trained before he left as possible we needed to have a bunch of certificates made up for him to sign. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, we just order them from some company somewhere; however, due to the urgent need to do this now that wasn't an option.

So the Resources guy wanders into my office, hands me a copy of the certificate, and requests that I make it into document that he can edit and print. About 3 minutes later my bosses boss sends me an email with an attatchment of a scanned image of the certificate in pdf format requesting the same. This is followed by my feeble attempt at explaining why you can't take an image file stuffed into a pdf doc and make it editable. There are no fields there! It's a giant picture!

ps ~ everyone here has acrobat reader and no they don't understand the difference

This should have been prefaced by me stating that this sort of work is not what I specialize in. I do backend work mostly, server maint., email, SQL, IIS, light prog duty, routers and such. I don't know all the functions of Excel by heart, can't tell you how to do sorted mailings in Word, and my graphics skills are about as good as Drac's. But for some reason everyone assumes that if you know something about computers, you must know everything about anything that has a CPU in it.

I get the same deal all the time from the guys in the machine shop. We have lathes that are loaded with X, Y coords via serial cable from a PC. When it isn't working right, they get all pissed off when I don't have an answer for them. The people in shipping wonder why their digital scale isn't working right, and don't understand that I can't tell them. The CEO of my company is completely befuddled as to why I can't make his PDA/Cell phone work with his car so he can use the voice activation. The best ones are when I get looks of indignation when I can't tell someone why their internet is acting funny at home, when the only information proffered is 'my internet is acting funny'.

For comparison purposes it would be like asking an interpreter to translate a language they have very little knowledge of, asking a drywall guy to frame a house, or asking a mathematics professor to get into an in depth explanation on anthropology.

Someone please tell me that I have no idea what I'm talking about and that the solution to this problem is overwhelmingly simple.

Edited, Jun 16th 2006 at 10:10am EDT by Jacobsdeception

You have no idea what you're talking about and the solution to this problem is overwhelmingly simple.

Well, if you have photoshop and time you could copy the image in there and then add text fields and such... each time you wanted a new cert the text would need to be edited though. Maybe going into word or something and adding a text field would work there if you don't have PS... but if it is a huge image like you said then word may not handle it well.

i feel your pain. as for the creation of a certificate, if you do not have the experiance working with programs like PageMaker or the replacement to PageMaker, InDesign or the OpenOffice Draw you will have a very hard time making a certificate.

as for all of the other junk, yes that is more then annoying and a shame.

My normal answere to most of those is Let me look into and I will get back to you. things like this can take time to fix.

that is except for the fools who ask about their funny internet at home. for that, i just tell them to call there ISP and walk away as fast as i can without being rude.

good luck.

P.S. if you want to e-mail me the PDF and if you have OpenOffice, or InDesign I can try to remake it for you into something you can have editable.

good luck...

PM me if you want my contact info.

Problems already been solved, I printed up the scanned image and made him use a typwriter yesterday afternoon. Word doesn't like full page images with text boxes overlaid in this latest experiment, ***** up the formatting. I was just irked that:

1. I didn't have an immediate solution to the problem, if one actually existed.

2. It's automatically assumed that I can do anything if there is a computer involved.

Yes, I'm just being *******

I fail to see the problem here. It is a simple case of:

1. Recieve said pdf file
2. ???
3. Finished said pdf file


If you can't see through that you should reconsider your employment as an IT guy...

glad you found a solution, and what you did sounds like the easist.

its called Acrobat and costs between $400 - $750 USD

Yes it's dangerous when people find out you have computing sk1llz0rz; they expect you to do anything involving a mouse and keyboard, until you tell them to f[/Aqua]uck off. Usually stops them asking again.

I also file their names away until they apply for a job and their resume says they have good IT skills.

Then I get to tell them to f[Aqua]uck off again!

When I worked for an auto parts store the boss wanted me to see what I could do with their terminal systems. Since they were ten year old proprietary systems (with green/black monochrome display) the best I could do was take the cases apart and dig out a few pounds of solidified dust. I did manage to install a CD-Rom drive in the office PC, though.

I don't mind helping people when they say their internet is acting funny, or slow. Just means they're clogged to the gills with spyware/adware. I did my neighbors' laptop the other day; initial run of Spybot S&D found 50 entries whereas initial run of Ad-Aware found five thousand. Works fine now!

It was a scan that had been saved in PDF format, not a totally new document that had been made into a PDF. Basically, it was a glorified jpg.

Yes, I work in a graphics department. No, I don't do IT.

You make the distinction well Nad. That was my point.

I am sick to the back teeth of people dumping their work on others because

a) they've failed to acquire the skills they need, and
b) they lump anything that uses a computer as 'IT'.

I am sick to the back teeth of people trying to hijack my engineers' time with Word Processing, Spreadsheeting or DTP queries. So all my engineers know that they have my permission to greet such requests with a cheerful 'GFY'.

We don't ask graphic designers to service Exchange servers, fix IP conflicts or configure a new photocopier. Same difference.

[/rant] (Pet hate)

After spending a few months framing houses, my pop asked if I could put together a steel pole barn from a kit. I said sure, why not.

A few mind changes and alot of misguided confidence later and it turned out to be a 40'X 60' 2 storey (30ft @ ridge) stick framed custom building.

At least I refused to do the drywall.