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An annoying state of affairs

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  An annoying state of affairs Dnews <dnews@triffid.co.uk> - 2025-04-30 20:33 +0100
    Re: An annoying state of affairs "Alan K." <alan@invalid.com> - 2025-04-30 15:39 -0400
    Re: An annoying state of affairs jjb <jjb@invalid.invalid> - 2025-04-30 22:09 +0200
      Re: An annoying state of affairs candycanearter07 <candycanearter07@candycanearter07.nomail.afraid> - 2025-05-01 16:00 +0000
    Re: An annoying state of affairs Newyana2 <newyana@invalid.nospam> - 2025-04-30 17:22 -0400
      Re: An annoying state of affairs "David E. Ross" <nobody@nowhere.invalid> - 2025-04-30 17:23 -0700
        Re: An annoying state of affairs NFN Smith <worldoff9908@gmail.com> - 2025-05-01 12:56 -0700
      Re: An annoying state of affairs "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2025-05-04 15:00 +0200
    Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-04-30 19:57 -0500
      Re: An annoying state of affairs The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> - 2025-05-04 09:50 -0700
    Re: An annoying state of affairs NFN Smith <worldoff9908@gmail.com> - 2025-05-01 12:48 -0700
      Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-01 22:33 +0000
        Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-01 18:47 -0500
          Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-02 08:00 +0000
            Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-02 05:02 -0500
              Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-03 00:39 +0000
                Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-03 01:51 -0500
                  Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-03 07:43 +0000
                    Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-03 10:44 -0500
                Re: An annoying state of affairs Jeff Layman <Jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2025-05-03 08:31 +0100
                  Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-03 07:39 +0000
                    Re: An annoying state of affairs Jeff Layman <Jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2025-05-03 09:12 +0100
                      Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-03 22:30 +0000
                        Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-03 19:18 -0500
                          Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-04 02:07 +0000
                            Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-03 22:48 -0500
                              Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-04 06:40 +0000
                                Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-04 05:28 -0500
                                  Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-04 05:32 -0500
                                    Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-04 23:56 +0000
                                      Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-04 21:43 -0500
                                        Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-04 21:58 -0500
                                          Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-06 22:42 +0000
                                        Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-05 07:26 +0000
                                        Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-05 07:28 +0000
                                  Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-04 21:41 +0000
                                    Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-04 17:33 -0500
                                      Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-04 23:20 +0000
                          Re: An annoying state of affairs "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2025-05-04 15:02 +0200
                            Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-04 12:44 -0500
                              Re: An annoying state of affairs "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2025-05-04 20:11 +0200
                              Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-04 21:36 +0000
                                Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-04 17:34 -0500
                                  Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-04 23:20 +0000
                                    Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-04 21:48 -0500
                                      Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-05 07:29 +0000
                                        Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-05 05:11 -0500
                                          Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-06 22:44 +0000
                                            Re: An annoying state of affairs Ken Blake <Ken@invalid.news.com> - 2025-05-07 08:58 -0700
                    Re: An annoying state of affairs VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> - 2025-05-03 10:53 -0500
                      Re: An annoying state of affairs Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-05-03 22:33 +0000
      Re: An annoying state of affairs Mark Lloyd <not.email@all.invalid> - 2025-05-02 17:36 +0000
        Re: An annoying state of affairs sticks <wolverine01@charter.net> - 2025-05-02 14:32 -0500
          Re: An annoying state of affairs "Alan K." <alan@invalid.com> - 2025-05-02 17:08 -0400
    Re: An annoying state of affairs Dnews <dnews@triffid.co.uk> - 2025-05-04 07:17 +0100
      Re: An annoying state of affairs Dave Royal <dave@dave123royal.com> - 2025-05-04 07:59 +0100
      Re: An annoying state of affairs Newyana2 <newyana@invalid.nospam> - 2025-05-04 08:20 -0400

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#13227 — An annoying state of affairs

Good day folks,
An annoying state of affairs has presented itself for my dear wife.

She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.

She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  (Crap).

I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config Preferences
to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(

Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?

What might it be?

Thanks
D.

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#13228

On 4/30/25 03:33 PM, Dnews wrote:
> Good day folks,
> An annoying state of affairs has presented itself for my dear wife.
> 
> She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
> couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.
> 
> She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
> to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
> experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  (Crap).
> 
> I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config Preferences
> to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(
> 
> Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?
> 
> What might it be?
> 
> Thanks
> D.
> 
Just playing devil's advocate, but what's the aversion to using Edge for those few sites, 
it's on the pc already.
It would be a simpler bookmarks bar for sure.

-- 
Linux Mint 22.1, Cinnamon 6.4.8,  Kernel 6.8.0-58-generic
Thunderbird 128.10.0esr, Mozilla Firefox 138.0
     Alan K.

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#13230

On 30-04-2025 21:33, Dnews wrote:
> Good day folks,
> An annoying state of affairs has presented itself for my dear wife.
> 
> She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
> couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.
> 
> She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
> to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
> experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  (Crap).
> 
> I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config Preferences
> to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(
> 
> Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?
> 
> What might it be?
> 
> Thanks
> D.
> 
Add-on user-agent-switcher does wonders for me. The "smoother and better 
experience" is a load of bullshit, Firefox works perfectly if it lies 
about what browser it is.

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#13249

jjb <jjb@invalid.invalid> wrote at 20:09 this Wednesday (GMT):
> On 30-04-2025 21:33, Dnews wrote:
>> Good day folks,
>> An annoying state of affairs has presented itself for my dear wife.
>> 
>> She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
>> couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.
>> 
>> She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
>> to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
>> experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  (Crap).
>> 
>> I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config Preferences
>> to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(
>> 
>> Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?
>> 
>> What might it be?
>> 
>> Thanks
>> D.
>> 
> Add-on user-agent-switcher does wonders for me. The "smoother and better 
> experience" is a load of bullshit, Firefox works perfectly if it lies 
> about what browser it is.


It certainly makes it an "easier experience" for them to ignore non
chromium browsers.
-- 
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

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#13231

On 4/30/2025 3:33 PM, Dnews wrote:
> Good day folks,
> An annoying state of affairs has presented itself for my dear wife.
> 
> She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
> couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.
> 
> She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
> to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
> experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  (Crap).
> 
> I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config Preferences
> to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(
> 
> Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?
> 
> What might it be?
> 

   You can spoof the userAgent. They don't make it easy.
First you have to set thisvalue to true, or add it if it's
not there:

general.useragent.enable_overrides

Then put the new value in this setting:

general.useragent.override

This is a recent one for Chrome:

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, 
like Gecko) Chrome/134.0.0.0 Safari/537.3

   You can try that. Maybe it will work. But I don't think most
of these sites are blocking FF. They're just using jazzed up
javascript, optimized for Chrome. The people you're talking
to have no idea what they're doing. They're just using automated
tools and not bothering to test the code. It's no use talking
to them about things like supporting all browsers. Most of
these people have no idea of even how to write HTML. Some
of the pages areactually javascript software programs, with
zero HTML.

    What I do is to keep a portable copy of unGoogled Chrome.
I use that when I have to, mostly highly interactive sites like
login for my doctor. Otherwise I use FF. I have NoScript in both
browsers.

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#13236

On 4/30/2025 2:22 PM, Newyana2 wrote:
> On 4/30/2025 3:33 PM, Dnews wrote:
>> Good day folks,
>> An annoying state of affairs has presented itself for my dear wife.
>>
>> She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
>> couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.
>>
>> She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
>> to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
>> experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  (Crap).
>>
>> I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config Preferences
>> to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(
>>
>> Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?
>>
>> What might it be?
>>
> 
>    You can spoof the userAgent. They don't make it easy.
> First you have to set thisvalue to true, or add it if it's
> not there:
> 
> general.useragent.enable_overrides
> 
> Then put the new value in this setting:
> 
> general.useragent.override
> 
> This is a recent one for Chrome:
> 
> Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, 
> like Gecko) Chrome/134.0.0.0 Safari/537.3
> 
>    You can try that. Maybe it will work. But I don't think most
> of these sites are blocking FF. They're just using jazzed up
> javascript, optimized for Chrome. The people you're talking
> to have no idea what they're doing. They're just using automated
> tools and not bothering to test the code. It's no use talking
> to them about things like supporting all browsers. Most of
> these people have no idea of even how to write HTML. Some
> of the pages areactually javascript software programs, with
> zero HTML.
> 
>     What I do is to keep a portable copy of unGoogled Chrome.
> I use that when I have to, mostly highly interactive sites like
> login for my doctor. Otherwise I use FF. I have NoScript in both
> browsers.
> 

I don't know if this works for Firefox, but it does work for SeaMonkey.

What you need is a preference in the form
	user_pref("general.useragent.override.xxx.yyy", "zzz");
where xxx.yyy is the basic domain of the Web site causing trouble and
ZZZ is the complete user agent string of the browser you want to spoof.
This means you will always spoof when visiting xxx.yyy by claiming to be
the browser with the UA string zzz without having to enable the spoof
beforehand and disabling it afterwards.

Using SeaMonkey, I spoof an old version of Firefox when visiting the Web
site of the U.S. Postal service with the following:
	user_pref("general.useragent.override.usps.com", "Mozilla/5.0
	(Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101
	Firefox/75.0");
	// make USPS think I have Firefox 75.0
I put this in user.js, not prefs.js, because I can notate settings in
user.js.  The // indicates a comment for such a notation.  Remember, the
semi-colon (;) at the end is required.  Having set a preference via
user.js, it is necessary to terminate and then relaunch the browser.

-- 
David E. Ross
<http://www.rossde.com/>

President Trump wants all Palestinians to leave Gaza and
relocate elsewhere.  How many will he accept to relocate
in the United States?

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#13258

David E. Ross wrote:
> I don't know if this works for Firefox, but it does work for SeaMonkey.

As an aside...

I have found that almost anything that works in Seamonkey via a pref set 
in prefs.js will work identically in Firefox.  Firefox may have removed 
the user-facing control, and it may be difficult to find in 
documentation, but if you know of a specific setting that you can find 
in a Seamonkey prefs.js, you can usually use an identical setting (and 
behavior) in a Firefox prefs.js.

I do UA spoofing in Seamonkey, and once in a great while, also in 
Firefox, and no difficulties there.

One other specific thing that I found is that the ability of 
auto-exporting bookmarks at the end of a session is controlled by 
setting browser.bookmarks.autoExportHTML to true.  In Seamonkey, it's 
can be done with a user setting, but if manually entered in to Firefox's 
prefs.js file (or via about:config), it works fine there, too. The 
capacity hasn't gone away, just that it's been removed as an option in 
the config settings.

Smith

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#13308

On 2025-04-30 23:22, Newyana2 wrote:
> On 4/30/2025 3:33 PM, Dnews wrote:
>> Good day folks,
>> An annoying state of affairs has presented itself for my dear wife.
>>
>> She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
>> couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.
>>
>> She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
>> to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
>> experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  
>> (Crap).
>>
>> I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config 
>> Preferences
>> to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(
>>
>> Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?
>>
>> What might it be?
>>
> 
>    You can spoof the userAgent. They don't make it easy.

It is trivial by using an AddOn.

For instance: "User-Agent Switcher" (autor: Linder).


-- 
Cheers, Carlos.

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#13237

Dnews <dnews@triffid.co.uk> wrote:

> Good day folks,
> An annoying state of affairs has presented itself for my dear wife.
> 
> She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
> couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.
> 
> She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
> to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
> experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  (Crap).
> 
> I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config Preferences
> to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(
> 
> Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-reset-default-user-agent-firefox

This used to work more successfully in the past when web sites were
merely detecting which web client connected to them, and using decision
blocks to decide which code to use with which web browser.  However, as
web sites have adopted more advanced HTML and scripting, and because the
User-Agent header is deprecated (sites are supposed to test what the web
client supports instead of assuming their feature set from what the web
client purported it was), this trick has gradually become ineffective.

The about:config setting you are looking for is:

  general.useragent.override
  
Its value is what gets put in the User-Agent header sent by the web
client to the web server.  As to what you specify for its value depends
on which web client you are trying to pretend is Firefox.  A list of UA
strings can be found at:

https://useragentstring.com/pages/useragentstring.php

You probably want to use one for Chrome.  However, you need to use a UA
string that reports a recent version of the web client.  Web sites will
also place restrictions on visiting them with too-old web clients.  If
you use a UA string reporting an old version of a web client, the web
site may figure that is really what you are using, but they don't
support back that version; i.e., they require a later version.

Unfortunately spoofing the User-Agent header won't work if the problem
is the site using code that doesn't run well or at all under Firefox.
My ISP's web site runs excrutiatingly slow, because Firefox has a
problem running all the scripts.  Meanwhile, Chromium-based web browsers
(e.g., Brave) run much faster.  The ISP's site is still slow, but I'm
waiting a few seconds in Brave or Edge rather than over 5 minutes in
Firefox.  The lag is so long that usually I figure the site is dead or
otherwise unresponsive.  My health provider's web site won't paint some
screens with Firefox, but work fine with Brave or Edge.  My bank's web
site is not fully usable with Firefox, but works fine in Brave or Edge.  

Changing the User-Agent string only works if the site looks at the
header to decide whether or not to support the purported web client.  If
the code or scripts don't like Firefox, lying that Firefox is Chrome
won't resolve the problems.

Used to be I found about 5 sites in a year that would not work with
Firefox.  Now I'm finding about 1 per month.

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#13312

On 4/30/25 5:57 PM, VanguardLH wrote:

> Used to be I found about 5 sites in a year that would not work with
> Firefox.  Now I'm finding about 1 per month.

Mostly I can use an old version (can't install newer) of chrome for 
those sites, but Drudge has started linking stuff from archive.is that 
neither FF (latest beta) nor Chrome can see, although FF claims that 
"nginx" was installed.  Unwilling to go to any more trouble to read a 
few news stories that I will probably find elsewhere, but it's worrisome.

-- 
Cheers, Bev
    You're such a loser that if there was a contest for losers
    you'd come in second.

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#13257

Dnews wrote:

> She's been using Firefox on MS Windows for many years, and recently a
> couple of sites she uses will not work with firefox.
> 
> She's communicated with them and they say their sites have been tailored
> to work with 'MS-Edge or Google Chrome for a smoother and better
> experience for the users', and so she should use one of them.  :-(  (Crap).

There's different varieties of "not work".  One is that the site does 
browser user agent sniffing and decides that that's reason to refuse a 
connection.  Although they will insist that their preferred browser (and 
version) are essential, that's not always the case, and spoofing the UA 
string can sometimes be sufficient to get through.  Over the years, I've 
found that with a lot of financial institutions.  For that, the 
motivation tends to be driven by user support considerations, where the 
site either wants to make sure you're using a version with current 
security patches, or more likely, where they want the user using the 
same version that the customer rep has on their own desktop, especially 
where navigation of config settings is identical.

The other "not work" (and more likely) that the site has been developed 
for Chrome, and uses scripting or HTML that Firefox does not (yet) 
support.  This is much more common for trailing-edge Firefox forks, such 
as Seamonkey or PaleMoon, but I've definitely seen sites that will not 
work with the most current version of Firefox, even on a profile with 
entirely default settings.

For those sites, the developers so strongly assume Chrome as a universal 
standard that their attitude is essentially, "if it works in Chrome, it 
works".  If it doesn't work with something else, then they expect you to 
switch to Chrome, they neither care (or possibly even know) about the 
presence of other browsers, especially ones that aren't some derivative 
of Chromium. For them, Chrome is sufficiently dominant that it's not 
worth the cost or effort to bother with anything else.

> 
> I have a vague recollection there is a setting in About:config Preferences
> to spoof/make Firefox appear to be another browser, like Edge.  :-(
> 
> Is there a setting I can use to fix this for her?

As noted elsewhere, in about:config, you can create 
general.useragent.override to show a different User Agent String, such as:
	Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, 
like Gecko) Chrome/135.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 Edg/135.0.0.0

(That one happens to be what Edge is reporting on my own computer). 
That will change setting globally.  You can also do it by site, where 
the entry is general.useragent.override.example.com to show that UA 
string to just example.com, and leaving Firefox showing for everything else.

However, if the site uses features that are unique to Chrome that aren't 
in Firefox, there is no amount of spoofing that's going to make a 
difference.

The reality is that those of use that prefer Firefox or other browsers 
are going to be forced into using Chrome (or similar) at least some of 
the time.

Although I'm not positive that there might not be a very few sites where 
it's "Chrome or nothing", there are other options that will give you the 
capacities of Chrome without having to interact with Google. When I need 
that, I tend to go with either Edge or Brave.  Both of those take a 
little effort to review all the privacy settings, and for me, if I'm 
using an alternate browser, besides support for ad blocking, the thing 
that I want most is the ability to flush all user history when I close 
the browser, and when I re-open, there is no history or accumulated 
cookies. Both Edge and Brave do that.

Despite the connectivity question of Microsoft, I find that I like Edge 
when I need a Chromium browser.  It does require a review of all the 
settings, but at least Microsoft is actually pretty good about disabling 
a lot of things.  For good measure, I do recommend for any Windows user, 
whether you intentionally use Edge or not, it's worth going through and 
reviewing the settings, as Windows 10 and Windows 11 will occasionally 
force use of Edge for system-related interaction (and ignoring setting 
of something else as the default browser).  For that, it's better to 
have Edge properly tuned to reflect your own preferences, rather than 
having all of Microsoft's defaults in place when Windows processes force 
rendering through Edge.

Smith

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#13259

On Thu, 1 May 2025 12:48:36 -0700, NFN Smith wrote:

> ... or more likely, where they want the user using the same version
> that the customer rep has on their own desktop, especially where
> navigation of config settings is identical.

Why can’t the customer rep have a range of common browsers installed, so 
they can switch to an appropriate one to match what the customer has?

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#13260

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

> On Thu, 1 May 2025 12:48:36 -0700, NFN Smith wrote:
> 
>> ... or more likely, where they want the user using the same version
>> that the customer rep has on their own desktop, especially where
>> navigation of config settings is identical.
> 
> Why can’t the customer rep have a range of common browsers installed, so 
> they can switch to an appropriate one to match what the customer has?

Training costs.  Each tech rep would not only need a large number of web
browsers installed (not just the root browser, but all variants), but
also be well-practiced in using them.  That takes time, and more time
equates to more support costs.

Do intimately know EVERY word processor to help anyone using anything?

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#13264

On Thu, 1 May 2025 18:47:09 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

> Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
> 
>> On Thu, 1 May 2025 12:48:36 -0700, NFN Smith wrote:
>> 
>>> ... or more likely, where they want the user using the same version
>>> that the customer rep has on their own desktop, especially where
>>> navigation of config settings is identical.
>> 
>> Why can’t the customer rep have a range of common browsers installed,
>> so they can switch to an appropriate one to match what the customer
>> has?
> 
> Training costs.  Each tech rep would not only need a large number of web
> browsers installed (not just the root browser, but all variants), but
> also be well-practiced in using them.

Gosh. How many hundreds of hours do you think it takes to become familiar 
with a different browser?

> Do intimately know EVERY word processor to help anyone using anything?

Yes, I did user support for many years. I was able to help with a range of 
different applications. And still can.

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#13265

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

> On Thu, 1 May 2025 18:47:09 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:
> 
>> Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>> 
>>> On Thu, 1 May 2025 12:48:36 -0700, NFN Smith wrote:
>>> 
>>>> ... or more likely, where they want the user using the same version
>>>> that the customer rep has on their own desktop, especially where
>>>> navigation of config settings is identical.
>>> 
>>> Why can’t the customer rep have a range of common browsers installed,
>>> so they can switch to an appropriate one to match what the customer
>>> has?
>> 
>> Training costs.  Each tech rep would not only need a large number of web
>> browsers installed (not just the root browser, but all variants), but
>> also be well-practiced in using them.
> 
> Gosh. How many hundreds of hours do you think it takes to become familiar 
> with a different browser?
> 
>> Do intimately know EVERY word processor to help anyone using anything?
> 
> Yes, I did user support for many years. I was able to help with a range of 
> different applications. And still can.

How many years has someone used any web browser, and then still comes
here asking for help with it?  Personally I know a handful of
about:config entries in Firefox, and most were found in researching how
to resolve an issue, or satisfy a user's desire regarding behavior or
appearance.

Okay, and without looking it up, how do you create a spreadsheet in
Excel with a table that has a handle you can drag to enlarge the table,
and have a chart automatically encompass the newly added rows?  Since
LibreOffice is absent this feature, what is the workaround?  Without
looking it up, how to you show formatting controls in Word, like the
paragraph marker?  How do you disable Word's clipboard manager, so you
don't see popups above the systray when you copy text in some other app?
How many Word users know they can adjust kerning?  How many times have
you used Reveal Codes in Wordperfect that you've become expert to any
question about it?  When in Reveal Codes mode, do you know all the codes
you can enter to effect formatting?  How intimate are you with Adobe
Acrobat, so you can help others publish PDFs?  How familiar are you with
Serif Affinity Publisher, or Scribus?

It takes more than reading a Dummies book to become intimate with some
software.  So, you think employers should spend the money on classes to
teach the employees about every web browser?  They have to not just
learn the software.  They have to demonstrate proficiency with it.

Of course, if you're talking about first-line "techs" that only recite
instructions from databases of canned responses, you still have to train
the call reps how to use that software.  And who do you pay to enter
canned responses for EVERY web browser?

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#13275

On Fri, 2 May 2025 05:02:55 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

> Okay, and without looking it up, how do you create a spreadsheet in
> Excel with a table that has a handle you can drag to enlarge the table,
> and have a chart automatically encompass the newly added rows?  Since
> LibreOffice is absent this feature, what is the workaround?

I just did it in LibreOffice Calc, by indeed dragging a handle to resize 
the data range.

> How do you disable Word's clipboard manager, so you don't see popups
> above the systray when you copy text in some other app?

That’s a Windows question. I don’t use Microsoft Windows.

> How many times have you used Reveal Codes in Wordperfect that you've
> become expert to any question about it?

I stick to word processors that don’t use embedded codes. Thankfully 
WordPerfect, WordStar etc are all extinct now.

(I *do* make heavy use of text markup systems, like Markdown, groff etc. 
That’s quite a different kettle of fish.)

> How intimate are you with Adobe Acrobat, so you can help others
> publish PDFs?

That’s “PDF files”, not “PDFs” (the “F” stands for “format”, not “file”).

I work a lot with PDF files, without using any Adobe tools. This includes 
a bunch of task automation for dealing with PDF files in bulk. Not the 
kind of thing your typical Adobe weenie could cope with, I don’t think.

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#13276

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

> On Fri, 2 May 2025 05:02:55 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:
> 
>> Okay, and without looking it up, how do you create a spreadsheet in
>> Excel with a table that has a handle you can drag to enlarge the table,
>> and have a chart automatically encompass the newly added rows?  Since
>> LibreOffice is absent this feature, what is the workaround?
> 
> I just did it in LibreOffice Calc, by indeed dragging a handle to resize 
> the data range.

I would like to know how you created the table in Calc along with a
chart to it (that specifies the data range) to get a handle to drag at
the bottom right corner of the table?  I couldn't do that.  Everyone I
asked couldn't do it.  The workaround was to copy a row, paste it before
the last row (so the new inserted row has all the same formatting and
attributes), and edit the newly inserted row.  Or, add another row, and
go into the properties of the chart to increase the data range.

>> How do you disable Word's clipboard manager, so you don't see popups
>> above the systray when you copy text in some other app?
> 
> That’s a Windows question. I don’t use Microsoft Windows.

But that's the point.  You, as the tech rep, are supposedly to know all
the software your customers call about.  After all, you said they should
support all web browsers, and my point is that costs money for training.
Well, if the topic were about word processor, and you claim the techs
should support all of them, that includes word processors on different
platforms than your personal choice.

>> How many times have you used Reveal Codes in Wordperfect that you've
>> become expert to any question about it?
> 
> I stick to word processors that don’t use embedded codes. 

The you are using word editors.  Even LibreOffice that you say you use
have embedded control codes.

https://help.libreoffice.org/latest/en-US/text/swriter/01/03100000.html

Sometimes it is easier to show formatting marks to delete them than try
to keep reformatting a string trying to achieve the same result.

Does your word processor of choice provide both ens and ems space
characters?  Those are different widths.  And a space character does not
encompass their varying widths.  Or how about an endash versus emdash
which are not the same as hyphen?

> Thankfully 
> WordPerfect, WordStar etc are all extinct now.

https://www.wordperfect.com/en/

>> How intimate are you with Adobe Acrobat, so you can help others
>> publish PDFs?
> 
> That’s “PDF files”, not “PDFs” (the “F” stands for “format”, not “file”).

If I'm talking about a topic, I may not be focused on an instance.  When
I talk about construction methods, I don't need to give a postal
address.

> I work a lot with PDF files, without using any Adobe tools. This includes 
> a bunch of task automation for dealing with PDF files in bulk. Not the 
> kind of thing your typical Adobe weenie could cope with, I don’t think.

But what YOU want to use is not the point.  You would have to support
every PDF tool any of your customers use to cover them all.  Remember:
you are the one saying techs should be familiar with ALL web browsers.

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#13279

On Sat, 3 May 2025 01:51:50 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

> Even LibreOffice that you say you use have embedded control codes.

No it doesn’t. Look at its document format, which is publicly specified as 
an official standard (ISO 26300). Do you see anything resembling embedded 
codes? No.

> Does your word processor of choice provide both ens and ems space
> characters?  Those are different widths.

Of course. Those are just standard Unicode characters, you did know that, 
didn’t you? Along with curly quotes and pilcrows and currency symbols and 
all that other fun stuff.

> But what YOU want to use is not the point.

I create workflows for use by my customers, to help them do their job 
better.

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#13284

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

> On Sat, 3 May 2025 01:51:50 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:
> 
>> Even LibreOffice that you say you use have embedded control codes.
> 
> No it doesn’t. Look at its document format, which is publicly specified as 
> an official standard (ISO 26300). 

Someplace other than https://www.iso.org/standard/66363.html were I can
get a copy without having to create an account and go through an
ordering process?

Besides, the topic is not about your expertise in LibreOffice.  It was
the example on which you focused your reply.  You would have to
intimately know all the "common" word processors.  Do you?  
"Why can't customer rep have a range of common browsers installed"

Please define what you think is "common".  If it's the top 3 most used,
and since you chose to focus on LibreOffice, you thought that was a
"common" word processor?  I gave it as an example since "common" is
highly subjective since everyone thinks their choice should be common.

You leave vague what qualifies as "common".  Just the ones with the most
market share?  Well, that definitely disqualifies Firefox.  Just the
base web browser, and all of its variants?  That's a LOT of web browsers
from one base web browser.  Vivaldi is a Chromium web browser, but is
highly configurable, so there's a lot to learn there.  MS Edge is a
Chromium web browser, not nearly as configurable, so a lot less to
learn.  "Common" to you is whatever you chose to use.  You think Firefox
is a "common browser"?  That in itself eliminates techs from having to
bother installing Firefox, and providing support for it, and cause for
why web devs don't bother with such a small userbase.

> Do you see anything resembling embedded codes? No.

Do you see carriage returns or hard line markers?  No.
Do you see paragraph spacing, or paragraph markers?  No.
Do you see soft hyphens, or just hyphens?
Do you see the markers specifying when bolding starts and stops?  No.
Do you see markers for super- or sub-script start and stop?  No.
Do you see code for hard-breaks in paging?  No.
Do you see markers to add to the Table of Contents or Index?  No.

If your word processor permits you to see the formatting markers then
you see them, but the document looks a mess.  Then you'll have to tell
the customer how to show markers, and explain how they are used.  Then
repeat for all word processors, or whatever someone other than you
claims for a word processor that should be considered common.

> I create workflows for use by my customers, to help them do their job 
> better.

And what has that to do with what software is involved?  Nice you help
your customers with efficiency, but do you let them install whatever
they want (perhaps not your choice), and support the top 3 in each
software category, or whatever THEY deem should be common?

And you support EVERY program that ANY of them use?  Remember you said
techs should support all common web browsers.  That means support techs
for word processing must support all common word processors, and support
techs for architects must support all common graphical architectural
software, and support techs for programming have to support all common
programming languages, and so on.  Each category of software has far too
many choices for anyone to become expert on all common ones, and
becoming expertise on whatever is consider the most common ones in each
software category is a hell of a lot of time spent to learn them all.  

Maybe you're now realizing "common" is very vague.  It is highly
subjective as to what it encompasses.  If you measure "common" by most
used, like the top 3 most used, then Firefox won't be supported by
anyone.  But that means you won't have the expertise in other software
that the user considers common to them.

Chrome: 66.21%
Safari: 17.23%
Edge:    5.22%
Firefox: 2.55%

So how many constitutes "common"?  If the top 3, Firefox isn't one of
them.  If the top 20, 30, or 100 then you need to support all of them.
I doubt call centers or Support departments agree on what you think is
"common".

"Why can’t the customer rep have a range of common browsers installed"

Just installing software doesn't make you an expert with it.  So, you
install some program, and you're immediately an expert?  Nope.  Takes
time to learn, time to research, and time to gain expertise before which
you're just another noob struggling with the software just like the
customer calling you for help.  Have you, as an employer, ever had to
pay for the training costs of your employees?  How long during which you
pay their salary until they have learned the product?  Training costs
time and money.  Customers don't want to be calling support techs that
are fumbling with the product as much as they are.

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#13277

On 03/05/2025 01:39, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

> I stick to word processors that don’t use embedded codes. Thankfully
> WordPerfect, WordStar etc are all extinct now.

Nonsense. WP continues to be available as VanguardLH points out.

Embedded codes - and the option to /reveal/ them all - was what made WP 
so powerful and user-friendly. This was especially true when trying to 
solve problems with documents created by someone else.

-- 
Jeff

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