computers

My troubleshooting rules can really help focus on solving a problem, but maybe first you’d like to not solve the problem for a while.

What?

Well, let’s look at a common sequence of events in creative or constructional work of many kinds:

1. See a problem.
2. Figure out how to fix it.
3. Fix it.

That’s pretty instinctual. Can’t really do those out of order. And once you’ve seen the problem, there is often some amount of urgency to get to the fix.

But the next step, if you’re conscientious, is:

4.. read more...

Sometimes when troubleshooting, you look at the problem very closely as it exists now. But in many cases, you can look back at what things were like before the problem existed. What worked then, and what has changed since that time? read more...

Maybe you’ve been troubleshooting for a while on your own. Or maybe you’ve discussed the trouble with someone else, but not the right someone else. Who could you talk to? read more...

Sometimes you start by troubleshooting assuming something’s broken, when really it’s just not working the way you expected. Put another way, it’s “working as designed” - but you and the designer miscommunicated, or disagreed.

Some questions to ask: read more...