tjw@cisunx.UUCP (TJ Wood WA3VQJ) (12/07/88)
In article <230@taniwha.UUCP> paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) writes: >In article <2343@ddsw1.MCS.COM> karl@ddsw1.MCS.COM(Karl Denninger) writes: >>In article <573@dover.uucp> waters@dover.UUCP (Mike Waters) writes: >>>The first version of VMS (1.0) came with ann account FIELD, password >>>SERVICE !!!!! DEC's field service got upset if you changed the >>>password. >>What's worse is that DEC ships VMS with a "SYSTEM" account, with the password >>"MANAGER". This firm neither changes that password nor tells others to do >To be fair the System Manager documentation tells you to change these passwords >as part of system installation (also the password for UETP). It was always . . . >isn't doing their job!! Field Service only complained once, I just showed them >the manual ... This is rather interesting -- seeing a customer's point of view! I worked for Digital Equipment Corp in the Pittsburgh office for 3 1/2 years as a Software Specialist and was on site 95% of the time. I would *NEVER* have "complained" to a customer as this was a sure way to catch H*LL from my manager. The philosophy was that a customer's machine was his/hers to configure the way they pleased and you worked around their needs. Maybe not all offices are that flexible. The Philly district (which Pgh was a part of) won the customer service awards, year after year, though. Terry -- (UUCP) {decwrl!allegra,bellcore,cadre,psuvax1}!pitt!cisunx!cisvms!tjw (BITNET) TJW@PITTVMS (Internet) tjw%vms.cis.pittsburgh.edu@vb.cc.cmu.edu (CC-Net) CISVMS::TJW
paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) (12/08/88)
In article <14188@cisunx.UUCP> tjw@vms.cis.pittsburgh.edu (Terry J Wood) writes: >This is rather interesting -- seeing a customer's point of view! I worked >for Digital Equipment Corp in the Pittsburgh office for 3 1/2 years as a >Software Specialist and was on site 95% of the time. I would *NEVER* >have "complained" to a customer as this was a sure way to catch H*LL >from my manager. The philosophy was that a customer's machine was >his/hers to configure the way they pleased and you worked around their >needs. This is as it should be ..... To be fair I should have said that the system (and field service) I was talking about was not in the U.S (it was the most southerly Vax in the world at the time and hence logisticly a long way away from DEC US) our town had only one DEC person (field service and sales), he was REAL happy to actually have a Vax to look after .... Paul -- Paul Campbell ..!{unisoft|mtxinu}!taniwha!paul (415)420-8179 Taniwha Systems Design, Oakland CA "Read my lips .... no GNU taxes"
bga@raspail.UUCP (Bruce Albrecht) (12/08/88)
> This is rather interesting -- seeing a customer's point of view! I worked > for Digital Equipment Corp in the Pittsburgh office for 3 1/2 years as a > Software Specialist and was on site 95% of the time. I would *NEVER* > have "complained" to a customer as this was a sure way to catch H*LL > from my manager. The philosophy was that a customer's machine was > his/hers to configure the way they pleased and you worked around their > needs. On the other hand, you're a software specialist, and not a field engineer. I think a lot of the FE's would complain if passwords were changed, etc. If you were to solicit DEC FE horror stories, I'm sure you could get several megabytes worth (I know several). The point still remains, there are a lot of people out there who don't care about or don't understand basic security measures like changing default passwords, and feel that it impedes getting their job done. I think that problem is one of lack of training, compounded by an attitude by vendors (your company and mine included) that security is totally a user problem. Our vendors provide things to help maximize secure access to our systems, but don't force people to use them, and in general, make it easy to bypass the security features.
tjw@cisunx.UUCP (TJ Wood WA3VQJ) (12/10/88)
In article <1087@raspail.UUCP> bga@raspail.UUCP (Bruce Albrecht) writes: >On the other hand, you're a software specialist, and not a field engineer. I >think a lot of the FE's would complain if passwords were changed, etc. >If you were to solicit DEC FE horror stories, I'm sure you could get several >megabytes worth (I know several). Actually, I *was* a software specialist. I now work for the University. Although, I very often worked with field service to debug the more "strange" hardware/software problems. Here at Pitt, we change all the passwords and set the field service accounts to "disuser" after DEC has left. DEC, in Pgh, is very concerned about customer satisfaction. The last thing they want to hear is that the customer has made a "KO" phone call. -- (UUCP) {decwrl!allegra,bellcore,cadre,psuvax1}!pitt!cisunx!cisvms!tjw (BITNET) TJW@PITTVMS (Internet) tjw%vms.cis.pittsburgh.edu@vb.cc.cmu.edu (CC-Net) CISVMS::TJW