[H-GEN] Email auto-forward and auto-respond utility wanted

Edwards_Ewan_B at cat.com Edwards_Ewan_B at cat.com
Wed Apr 14 00:47:26 EDT 2004


On Tuesday 13 April 2004 12:44, Greg Black wrote:

<snip>

> inboxes, the standard Unix utility for this is vacation(1) and
> it's trivial to set it up, as per the man page.

Trivial for you and I, but for most of these people it isn't.  As I 
wrote previously;
<quote>
[1]  Most of the users have trouble with the concept of using telnet 
or ssh to log on to the server to change their password. :-(
</quote>

If the task involves more thinking than opening a gui application and 
clicking a few buttons, then they just won't[2] cope.  Sad but true.  

<rant>
A year and a half down the track, about a third of the users still 
haven't changed their email password from the default I set their 
accounts up with.  A number of those who did change their email 
password had to have me stand beside them telling them step by step 
what to do.  :-(  

The saddest thing about all this is that most of these people are 
tertiary educated professional computer programmers.  AND, wait for 
it, they have the audacity to call themselves software "engineers".
</rant>

Regards,
Ewan


[2] This was originally written as "can't".  Then I realised it wasn't 
true.  Whether or not they can cope is not relevant.  Most will 
choose not to cope, as they will see it as too difficult.







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