I'd like to tell a quick story about successful troubleshooting.
A few months ago I rented a scissor lift to install lighting at my new office. When it arrived, the delivery person gave me a quick demo and off he went.
Well, when I went to actually use it - the lift went up by about a foot then stopped and screamed beeps of terror. It was broken!
But the display on the control read "18"
Rather than call the rental company, I searched "sinoboom fault code 18" to see what that meant.
@TechConnectify I think a lot of troubleshooting comes down to curiosity. “Hmm… that’s interesting, why did it do that?” The act of asking and trying to answer those questions can lead someone down a troubleshooting path.
I don’t know if curiosity can be taught, but it can definitely be extinguished if people aren’t careful.
@TechConnectify I had that happen at about 3ft off maximum extension, except the whole thing just stopped without error code. I assumed it had reached maximum extension and did the remainder of the gig lighting install by hand with a ladder, which was truly awful. Didn't find out until the last moment of teardown that the lift could go the full height.
I found a document that explained this meant there was a fault in the pothole protection board.
Not knowing what that was, I then searched for "pothole board sinoboom" and found that there are limit switches which detect that these little side-plates which swing out as the lift goes up have actually deployed. The board wasn't seeing that switch input.
So, I figured out where that switch was and discovered it was sticking. I exercised it a bit and the lift was fixed.
Troubleshooting is a skill. I don't know how exactly it can be taught, but we should absolutely be teaching it.
I have never used a scissor lift in my life prior to this point but I know enough about machines now to realize something is wrong. And with an error code, the machine will tell you what's wrong.
It's up to you to connect these things together - and that's honestly a guiding light in my work.
@TechConnectify Depending on the thing being troubleshot, sometimes even the simplest first steps to fix the problem escape me. Especially when it's a piece of technology where 9 times out of 10 power cycling it fixes the problem. I poke at everything else before considering giving it a drop kick. 😵💫
@TechConnectify As a career-long cause whisperer, I agree that we don’t know how to teach this and we still should.
Depending on the audience platform, a post like this might get replies like “what’s a scissor lift?” And that’s the level of troubleshooting many people are willing to apply (read: not even bothering to search for a term they don’t understand).
I hope we can figure out how to solve that one too.
@TechConnectify Problem solving and critical thinking are two skills that are hard to teach, should absolutely be taught in all public schools, and will almost certainly never be taught.
@TechConnectify my wife has a few days of "troubleshooting" in the analytical chemistry class that she teaches. turns out the instruments they use are broken at least 50% of the time so it's an important skill.
@TechConnectify I wonder the same, but I've started to feel like it's a composite skill. You need to learn things like puzzle solving and maybe enjoying puzzles, learning how to break down a problem into its parts, as generic things. Some of these can be instilled early-on, and some more direct. I think largely though just giving people problems and the like that involve critical thinking skills of any topic are a start, and building that sense of "I can do".
Either that or it's as simple as "more parents need to buy Legos for their kids".
@TechConnectify it can be taught for sure, problem-solving/troubleshooting across many industries/disciplines has been a core competency in Kepner Tregoe's (KT) methods for many years … see https://kepner-tregoe.com/faqs/ for instance
@TechConnectify Increasingly it's difficult to troubleshoot, especially a lot of app-enabled tech. We'd been having problems with a robot vacuum we got for Christmas. It was having problems and kept getting an error where the vacuum would stop and it would make a little tone. The instructions basically just said "if there's an error, check the app for problems" but the app read all clear, even with the robot sitting in the middle of the room undocked. You can't just Google "Roomba D D G chime"
@BasiliskXVIII Oh absolutely, and this is why I'm pretty cynical about "smart" tech like that.
I don't necessarily mind there being an app, but it need to be a layer on top of basic functionality. There has to be a fallback scheme which doesn't reduce functionality in any way or else the app is just another step on the path of enshittification.
@TechConnectify my work colleagues: "it's broken, let's change ten things, try something (that may not be the same as the action that triggered the issue), then when it causes a different issue, change ten more things without putting anything back. Repeat."...
/me screaming: "please, for the love... before you change ANYTHING, figure out what you did to reproduce the issue".
@TechConnectify I think troubleshooting is a subset of deductive reasoning, and that is useful in many different contexts. I agree it's one of the most practical applications, so it might as well be the 101 course.
And later we get to "discerning what you know from what you assume". Other topics: stating a problem clearly enough for someone else (or yourself) to understand it. Distinguishing correlation from causation etc.
About troubleshooting, always remember: sometimes trouble shoots back.
@TechConnectify years ago (eh late 1990’s) I worked for a Sun reseller and as part of getting certified for Sun’s bigger servers I had to take a series of Sun trainings including a week long course on troubleshooting. It was really excellent - covered a lot of pretty universal techniques (along with some specific to Sun - like how to get root if you have physical access)
For the final day/test we had a room of machines to troubleshoot. One was “sticky tape on a connector”
@TechConnectify having taught electrical installation and fault finding..... I find that in some ways there's an innate ability in some people. Others who can just about grasp it and others that can't make the connections.
I don't know if that's because there's nothing being taught at primary school level now or not.
Even trying to teach the basics of
ID problem
Formulate solution
Test solution
???
Profit/repeat
@TechConnectify if I were to create a college program in troubleshooting it would be a double major in library science and either one of the wonkier sciences where they build most of their lab equipment, or technical theater.
Communities could fund scholarships for these kids to create a corps of people good at fixing stuff
@TechConnectify Incentive is often a driver. "Here's a job to do, I've got stuff to do so you're in charge. Get it done in 4 hours and there's a bonus in it for you. And here's the tool you'll need."
"But this tool is broken!"
"4 hours or no bonus! Better figure it out fast!"
Replace "bonus" with "grade" in a classroom setting.
The sense of accomplishment people get from figuring it out on their own can be even better than the original incentive.
@TechConnectify An interesting case study in user experience and error design: if a Linux computer interacts with a real, legacy line printer - which is still possible, because of course it is - it might sometimes display the error message "lp0 on fire." This message was originally written for Linux in 1992 (but still exists today - again, of course it does), but dates back to very early versions of Unix in the 1950s.
@TechConnectify I think the key connection here was your prior knowledge that when a machine spits out a seemingly random number, that's probably an error code. So I think teaching troubleshooting as a skill has to start with teaching people what to look for to get that first lead to follow.
@TechConnectify Troubleshooting is a Critical Thinking Skill. All fine arts teach critical thinking skills, as all fine arts involve problem solving and abstract reasoning. This is one of the reasons we should be pushing for STEAM not STEM in schools.
Technology, IMO it can only be taught by example. By starting with something that doesn't work and showing the thought process, or guiding you through it. Watching videos of people troubleshooting and fixing things should also help.
It may also be taught as part of computer science classes because it's exactly the same skill as debugging software, just applied IRL.
@TechConnectify For this to be useful in the future, we have to hope that the ongoing enshittification of Google search and other search engines does not stop us from finding these useful pieces of information.
I think the way that apple in particular, but a lot of modern pieces of technology in general, tell end users "if you try to fix this yourself, you'll void the warranty" has scared a lot of people off from trying to learn how to troubleshoot or fix things themselves.
In my professional experience, I often find that people don't have the time or incentives to play around with settings any more. Whenever possible, I like to play around with all the possible settings in a new tool, application, etc. just to see what happens, and I think the freedom to play around with settings is linked to the confidence to try troubleshooting.
@TechConnectify
Completely agree. Troubleshooting is applied critical thinking. Having a general understanding of how something might work, being able to decompose a problem, being able to devise tests to divide and conquer.. all these are things that need to be learned one way or the other. Usually haphazard and not systematic.
I see this as a bigger problem in education. Specifically, we don't put much emphasis on teaching how to think about thinking.
@TechConnectify knowing a bit about programming & the stack of technologies can help a lot. It will allow you to narrow the focus of things to look at. Crash & exception logs tell most of the tale, & the rest is watching the stats on memory, network access & processor can help too.
@TechConnectify I think there's a cultural component to it as well. The object is conceived within a cultural mindset, serving a particular purpose. I say cultural, because itches are defined by it, and how we scratch them is informed by that framework.
...we consider how to design technology exported for use outside of whatever culture. It would also be important to consider the hidden biases and assumptions baked into a product whether it be software or a jet aircraft or software on a jet aircraft. No matter how much we try, exported invention and knowledge will always contain unexpected challenges to those that use it outside of its native context.
And honestly, that's an essential part of troubleshooting. It's the same challenge as "cultural competency." It doesn't mean you know everything about the culture, but rather that address your assumptions.
@TechConnectify Troubleshooting is just using critical thinking skills. (that many people lack)
If we taught critical thinking we would solve so many issues in this world.
@TechConnectify There are companies that actually teach trouble shooting skills. Kepner Tregoe comes to mind. Should be a basic course for help desk staff.
@TechConnectify I don’t think you CAN teach it. I think it comes down to curiosity. Curious people will try to troubleshoot, incurious people will look for someone to fix it.
@TechConnectify I tend to think of it as a "lack of curiosity" I have people ask me a lot of questions about sent emails or error messages that pop up that are pretty self-explanatory if they were to read the error message or the email and people just don't they will call of reply back to ask what is going on.
@TechConnectify I think this is just basic critical thinking. More and more people lack critical thinking skills. They are fundamentally unable to even attempt to figure things out for themselves.
@TechConnectify
BTW, don't call it "Troubleshooting" call it "Problem Solving" as the former is just a subset of the latter. Solving a riddle or puzzle is one of many ways to learn problem solving, Sometimes you need to cross domains.
I know I've learned some of these skills, but could I have been taught it?
@TechConnectify the first thing to teach in troubleshooting is to ask has this ever worked before? If no, is everything connected? If yes, what changed?
@TechConnectify I'm a musician, I'm blind and there's an unspoken, unwritten rule that if you're both of these things, you better know how to troubleshoot because most people won't have the issues you have.
As a result I've become unnecessarily good at it, and I find myself helping fellow musicians on a couple of WhatsApp groups.
It's made me a very different thinker and I can usually, I'd say 92.75% of the time, resolve someone's issue.
I've learnt a lot and continue to learn on the job.
Now, I've made critical thinking a part of how I teach my son, who's just getting into building and fixing computers as well and he loves it. He's 14 and unlike me, has fully-working eyes 🤣
@TechConnectify This!!! I work in IT, and while I appreciate not everyone is knowledgeable about IT, so many seem to lack even the beginning of any troubleshooting skills at all - not just when it comes to computer related things. Might be the reason people so often tell us there is "an error", without specifying any of the information that is right there - they don't seem to get no one has an innate knowledge of every problem and how to fix, but that there is a "process" for it.