Story 4: The 90-Meter Rule
A company had a mysterious network problem: one specific desk on the third floor could never get a stable connection. The cable was fine. The port was fine. The switch was fine. The NIC was fine. Everything was fine, but nothing worked.
An old-timer network admin eventually asked: “How long is the cable run from that desk to the patch panel?”
They measured it. It was 97 meters.
Ethernet has a maximum run length of 100 meters.
The desk had been moved — slowly, over the course of several office renovations — further and further from the server room, one meter at a time, across five years, until it quietly and politely fell off the network.
Nobody moved the desk. They just put a switch under it and called it a day.
Story 5: The CEO’s “Hacked” Computer
The CEO called IT in a panic. “My computer has been hacked. Someone is controlling it remotely.”
The IT tech rushed over to find the CEO staring in horror at his mouse cursor moving across the screen on its own, opening folders, clicking things — seemingly possessed.
The tech looked down.
The CEO’s wireless mouse was sitting on top of a glass desk.
The optical sensor was picking up the wood grain pattern on the floor underneath the glass.
The CEO’s computer had been “hacked” by interior design.
Story 6: Ping of Shame
A sysadmin once received a ticket that simply read:
“Internet is broken. Please fix.”
He pinged 8.8.8.8. It responded in 3ms. He pinged the user’s workstation. It responded. He pinged the user’s gateway. It responded.
He walked to the user’s desk and found them trying to load a website.
In Internet Explorer 6.
On Windows XP.
In 2019.
The sysadmin closed the ticket as “Resolved — user educated on concept of time.”
Story 7: Have You Tried Turning It Off and On Again?
A helpdesk technician spent 45 minutes on the phone with a user troubleshooting a network issue. They walked through every step. Check the cable. Check the lights on the modem. Check the IP settings. Check, check, check.
Finally the tech asked: “Have you tried restarting the router?”
Long pause.
“What’s a router?”
“The box that came from your internet provider. It probably has lights on it.”
Another pause.
“Oh. Should it be plugged in?”
The technician took a deep, professional breath, and in a calm, measured voice said:
“Yes. Yes it should.”
May your packets arrive in order, your latency stay low, and your router never need a firmware update at 9 AM on a Monday.