Today I went to school early, to print the new school time table and put it up... all to find that the computer fell over (screen card died). So, after borrowing a laptop, I printed the time tables in time... and then, nothing happened.
It was Madiba Day, and we were supposed to take 67 minutes an do something good for the community - so the school went out with black bags and cleaned our surrounding neighbourhood. The plan was to come back, clean the classes, and get back to teaching... well, that was the plan.
Meanwhile I became an IT specialist... removing hard drives from computers and putting them in a new one... with a working screen card. All was successful, but something must have happened to the disk, because it was not booting. Repeat hard drive swapping, and booted computer. Now, I was stuck with a windows login screen. Well, this was beyond my skill level, and I did not have internet close by, so that was it for the day.
O, I also installed a new DVD writer for the school into the same computer. So, all in all I think I have done my 67 minutes of good work.
Off to class, and trying to get my class in order. Needed to get long desks and chairs from a classroom, and take the small desks out of my class. After a few trips, with the help of a few learners... those who did not run away... all was in my classroom. Found some more guys to help me pack the chairs, and then all was back to normal.
I spent the last hour arbing about, seeing if there was anything more to do. Finding nothing, I returned to my classroom and waited for 1pm. I then asked permission to leave school, to drop documents at the Education Department. I dropped the documents, and all sounds like it will be sorted out - that being my 2 pay checks that are outstanding. Going through this little exercise made me familiar with who's who in the Education Department's financial office. So, all in all it was a good experience. Now everyone in the finance department knows who 'Mr Snyders' is - literally.
Furthermore, I came home, ate lunch, and looked on the net for ways to get past the windows login screen. Having obtained 3 methods, using different approaches, I feel comfortable in getting into the computer at school, and fixing it.
Somehow it feel like things I try to fix end up breaking... I am not for superstition, but if things have no reason to happen, and they keep happening, then you kind of think about it... well, my conclusion is that I may be less skilled than I think I may be... thus explaining stuff going wrong for 'no apparent reason' (to me anyways).
On another note,
I miss ordering stuff from ebay...
the cheap $1 tech stuff from Hong Kong, with $1 shipping cost...
currently looking for a 3 way Ethernet hub.
My only viable option in SA is to go buy a 5-port switch at the local IT store for ~R120.
It is more a nice-to-have than a must-have... so I can live without it...
Peace :)