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Most tradesmen have leeway in buying the tools that suit them best. This doesn't work in a corporation, as the amount of work IT would have to do to support eve

by sudont 16y ago

Most tradesmen have leeway in buying the tools that suit them best. This doesn't work in a corporation, as the amount of work IT would have to do to support every different computer that wanders in would be insane. Look at a college that has this laptop purchase program: students get a choice between Mac and a Dell laptop, and unless you're a fine-arts major you don't get the Mac option. More likely, employees would be forced to buy the one computer that IT specifies. And, knowing how much VB.NET code is running out there now, it'll end up being a top-of-the-line enterprise Dell laptop, crippled with XP and all of their network policies. Somebody who's forced to buy a laptop and then give all control away won't be a happy body.

gcheong 16y ago
I think IT often overestimates the actual extra burden that would be required to support more devices and the risks associated. At the last company I worked at there were calls for people to be publicly made "examples of" for running Firefox as it was deemed too much of a support burden to have to support both IE and Firefox and a security threat. Then they found out the CEO had installed it and their tone changed from calling for a witch hunt to a begrudged "you can run it but we won't support it".
- Natsu 16y ago
  If they're firing people for using Firefox, that's one thing. That's just absurd. But having people bring in their home computers that might be virus-infected or part of a botnet to work? Err, no. I've had more than one home computer brought to me to fix and I have never once let them on the network. I don't need to find out that the next Sasser/Blaster/whatever is now rampaging through our internal network. That's not to say that there aren't people and companies (likely small ones) that couldn't handle this. But unless each person was a pretty decent computer admin who was not likely to install crapware, kept themselves patched, etc., I wouldn't trust them at all. But, like I said, I've seen the home machines of the people at work and I've removed viruses from them. There's no way I'd put them on our network even though I don't think there's anything they could infect. It's just not smart.

by sudont 16y ago

gcheong 16y ago

I think IT often overestimates the actual extra burden that would be required to support more devices and the risks associated. At the last company I worked at there were calls for people to be publicly made "examples of" for running Firefox as it was deemed too much of a support burden to have to support both IE and Firefox and a security threat. Then they found out the CEO had installed it and their tone changed from calling for a witch hunt to a begrudged "you can run it but we won't support it".

Natsu 16y ago
If they're firing people for using Firefox, that's one thing. That's just absurd. But having people bring in their home computers that might be virus-infected or part of a botnet to work? Err, no. I've had more than one home computer brought to me to fix and I have never once let them on the network. I don't need to find out that the next Sasser/Blaster/whatever is now rampaging through our internal network. That's not to say that there aren't people and companies (likely small ones) that couldn't handle this. But unless each person was a pretty decent computer admin who was not likely to install crapware, kept themselves patched, etc., I wouldn't trust them at all. But, like I said, I've seen the home machines of the people at work and I've removed viruses from them. There's no way I'd put them on our network even though I don't think there's anything they could infect. It's just not smart.