My Dad is helpless with Technology, and I am not (despite what he thinks) a tech professional.

July 9, 2012 1:27 PM

Help me to help my father with his computing issues, and help me maintain my sanity in the process, please? This is both a tech and psychology question.

The tech end:
Dad is running a old 1990s Dell, which is on the verge of dying. I've been recruited to transfer essential files to a new computer. It's a process: there's no USB 2.0, everything is slow and seizing. AND he refuses to learn anything new. I've had to set up Windows NT on a new machine for him. He won't use check email unless he uses Outlook express. That sort of thing. I am, by default, his tech support.

My major remaining task at this point is to locate where on the machine he has saved thousands and thousands of emails using Outlook Express 6, and export both the contents of the emails and his curious folder structure to a new machine. Keeping in mind, of course, that we're doing this with a thumb drive. And that I have to be able to describe each step in enough detail to explain it over the phone. AND that we're dealing with ZERO computer literacy -- in other words, I can't ever say "Copy," I have to say "highlight the word by dragging your cursor over it while holding down the left mouse button. Got that? Good. Now, hit the control key, and hold it down while pressing 'c'". This is what I'm dealing with.

I don't use outlook express or Windows NT. And I am not a tech support person. I'm not really even a techy person. I'm over my head, and I know I'm in the shallow end here.

Can you explain to me how to do this? And can you explain to me how to explain to him how to do this?

The Psychology end:

He refuses to learn anything about computers. I get calls at work several times a week that range from (using metaphors, because that's how I have to talk about computers with him) ".kobayashi., you drive a car, can you remind me how to unlock a door?" to ".kobayashi., you drive a car, can you rebuild this transmission for me?" Because my work is not as deadline-driven as some, he refuses to think of his calls as interruptions.

We get along very well, but his refusal to learn anything about computers or even retain what I taught him on the phone last time is driving me crazy. Usually when he asks "why does this stuff always happen to me?" the answer to the question often involves his falure to take any interest in or responsibility for his computing. I spend a lot of time biting my tongue

But that's who he is, and he isn't changing. I'm not going to be able to get him to become more competent or more interested. I'd like to be able to:

a) get him to respect limits and not call me as often during working hours, and

b) work on getting less upset when he does call with things that he -- or any novice computer user -- should be able to figure out.

Any advice on those two avenues would also be much appreciated.

posted by .kobayashi. to computers & internet (29 answers total)

I would suggest referring him to a local library or community center that has courses on basic computer usage and then washing your hands of the situation.
posted by sacrifix at 1:32 PM on July 9, 2012 [1 favorite]

I won't threadsit, but given this early answer, I should clarify that I do not intend to walk away from the situation entirely.
posted by .kobayashi. at 1:36 PM on July 9, 2012

Usually when he asks "why does this stuff always happen to me?" the answer to the question often involves his falure to take any interest in or responsibility for his computing.

"I don't know why this keeps happening to you, Dad. I think maybe I am not the best qualified person to help you with your computer problems, since we are not making any progress together. Let's spend some time this weekend looking for a professional who can give you some lessons."
posted by Rock Steady at 1:41 PM on July 9, 2012 [7 favorites]

For A) I simply set strict ground rules for family calling with tech questions. I refused to assume any responsibility for their problems if they weren't willing to do some basic things 1) Use modern, supportable hardware with a modern supportable operating system and 2) Purchase services without question when specified - Logmein, backup solution, etc.

For B) A lot of it flows from having the right gear in A, and a lot of it flows from letting them learn to swim. So repeat after me, "I love you, but I am not your tech support person if you don't take ownership for yourself". Computers are for better or worse part of the modern age, and you need to start doing things for yourself if you want to use them. You can live with out a complex modern PS or even 10 year old PC in this day and age. If a PC is too complicated I will help you work with an iPad and set that up so that you have a less complex machine with fewer avenues for breakage, but regardless you will start doing this for yourself with my help.

My inlaws and parents who I love dearly have gotten this lecture in one sense or another over several years and know to never call me for support during work hours unless it's truly an emergency involving something life threatening or horrible financial crisis.

On the migrating files thing, have him box it up and ship the machines to you, don't install anything less than windows 7 on it. Half his problem is he's using an archaic piece of shit like NT.
posted by iamabot at 1:44 PM on July 9, 2012

Two things that have helped me a lot in terms of helping novice computer users in my family.

1) Ask "what are you trying to accomplish" or "what is the larger goal here" rather than "what are you trying to do". That way you can often reach an easier path to victory. I particularly lean on this when it seems like they are trying to do something unusual.

2) Consider a screen sharing app so you can take the wheel and investigate more thoroughly.

I also set hard limits with people who are getting my tech support for free, even my mom. I simply don't answer during business hours unless I'm not very busy.

This also helps: tech support flowchart.

Remember also that most folks who refuse to learn about computers have motives grounded in fear. Computers can seem very mysterious and fragile until you know more about them.
posted by poe at 1:47 PM on July 9, 2012 [1 favorite]

a) get him to respect limits and not call me as often during working hours, and

Probably not going to change. Best you can do is let his calls go to voicemail and return them when you have a moment.

b) work on getting less upset when he does call with things that he -- or any novice computer user -- should be able to figure out.

Probably not going to change. The best you can do is control how you react to him he does call.

Something to consider: Is he losing cognitive function? Most people can understand about calling others at work, if he can't there may be something else going on.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 1:48 PM on July 9, 2012

I would not in good conscience set up a Windows NT computer with Outlook Express for anybody. If you want to go with metaphors, "Dad, there is a reason why we don't still drive Ford Pintos."

For somebody that uninterested, I would set up with a Ubuntu box with just a few links on the desktop. (Firefox for web, Thunderbird for email (or webmail at his ISP if that will be better for him), a word processor if he needs it, etc. It's pretty hard to break that set up. Or worst case, Win 7.
posted by COD at 1:50 PM on July 9, 2012

Alternate idea:

1. Copy his old hard drive bit-by-bit into a file
2. Move the file to a new computer with a modern OS
3. Boot his old computer as a virtual machine.

Now he can use the environment he's comfortable with on new hardware. Windows NT may complain the first time it's booted up as a guest OS, but it ought to work.
posted by qxntpqbbbqxl at 1:51 PM on July 9, 2012 [7 favorites]

I had this problem with my (now departed) father, a long time ago. I wound up writing almost everything down, so that he could go over it in my absence. I also wrote tools and utilities to make stuff as easy as possible (for him to do, for me to explain). I loved my dad, but some people stop being able to learn new things after a while. You just have to be patient.

BTW, I'm assuming your dad is in his 70s. If he's in his 50s, that's a totally different story.
posted by ubiquity at 1:53 PM on July 9, 2012

Oh GAWD NO! Not Ubuntu! this guy is trying to simplify his life, not add layers of complications. Dad has to learn. He has to learn to click, copy, drag, delete, etc. Your coddling him is enabling him. Stop being an enabler. Take him to Staples or Best Buy and together buy a new machine and introduce him to their specialists or geeks. As far as the old email? Once he has his new system you can take his old one and do the transfer at your leisure.
posted by Gungho at 1:57 PM on July 9, 2012 [1 favorite]

I would absolutely refuse to let him have a new machine running Windows NT. If nothing else, it's basically a virus ridden bot as soon as he connects to the net. It sounds like he barely knows anything already, so he doesn't have that much new stuff to learn by changing to Windows 7. And you'll be able to install LogMeIn, or any of the modern remote assistance apps, to make future support easier.

Then, to handle the remaining emails on his NT machine, I'd actually have him physically mail me the machine and extract them all to a USB drive. (Have someone else pack it, but they're definitely shippable). Mail the USB drive back and then remote into his new machine to copy the files between them.

(On preview, qxntpqbbpxl's idea sounds worth exploring.)

For the phone calls at work - if you help him from work, why does he have any motivation not to call you at work? You have to refuse to help. He says "hey .kobayashi, I need to open Word". You say "oh, nobody's dead? If you're calling about your computer, you have to call back tonight after 7. I'll talk to you then. Bye!" and hang up. As a bonus, if he doesn't have instant access to you, he may begin actually trying to remember how to do things himself. (This could cause a lot more problems, of course.)
posted by jacalata at 1:59 PM on July 9, 2012 [2 favorites]

I realize I may have opened a can of worms here, but nevertheless the most helpful answers will neither presume a different father than the one I have, nor a different tech set-up than the one he is willing to work with.

Letting things go to voice mail is good advice. Advice about how to capture these years of saved emails on his machine would be most welcomed.
posted by .kobayashi. at 2:01 PM on July 9, 2012

Advice about how to capture these years of saved emails on his machine would be most welcomed.

Does his Outlook have an export function? I vaguely remember using it years ago, but I could be mistaken.

Have you Googled "exporting email from Outlook 6 and importing it into a newer version" or some such?

You say he's stored the emails somewhere on his computer. That's confusing, shouldn't they be stored wherever Outlook's database is?

How far away does Dad live? Would it be worthwhile to make a weekend trip to fix things up?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 2:08 PM on July 9, 2012

As far as helping him migrate over to his new setup, might I suggest doing it yourself via LogMeIn? I installed it on my mom's computer (She may be your dad's virtual wife, since they sound so much alike). Now whenever she calls me, she knows to first log in there and let me take over her computer.

I have no helpful tips with managing your dad and his expectations of you. But LogMeIn has kept my mom and I on speaking terms for about 6 months now, so there is that.
posted by SuperSquirrel at 2:12 PM on July 9, 2012

Would it work for you to answer his tech support needs in writing? I see this as accomplishing the following:
1. It creates a little distance for you to respond privately to the absurdity of his questions, as well as against getting frustrated with each other on the phone.
2. It creates a written reference for him that he can go back and refer to if he needs it.
3. If he refuses to go back to it, you can always just e-mail it to him again.

In terms of the current challenge - I wonder whether it's worth it to sign up for one of those online backup services, even just for a month, that will let him upload his entire hard drive to somewhere that you could access? It might be simpler to walk him through getting his stuff backed up. Or, if it's not urgent, can he copy the whole drive onto a newly purchased external hard drive and then snail mail it to you? Then he moves to his new system with the security that you will be restoring his e-mails to him in the near future.
posted by Salamandrous at 2:14 PM on July 9, 2012

Outlook != Outlook Express.

Two different programs, with somewhat different ways of handling things.

If he opened the email in its own screen, he could save it anywhere he liked. Otherwise it's within his email file, which can also be saved in a variety of places.
posted by SuperSquirrel at 2:14 PM on July 9, 2012

You need to let him know that unless this a life threatening emergency or similar, he can't call you at work. In my family, you just do not call people at work unless it is a real urgent matter. You can call to say "I will be late picking you up from work" (keep call under one minute) or you can call to say "Your mother had a heart attack. Please meet us at the ER." But you don't call people at work to just talk to them. They are on company time. The company does not pay them to socialize or do tech support for relatives.

But I would also work on helping idiot-proof his experience. If you are able to go to his home and do a few things, I would try to make the computer more user friendly. I volunteered at a homeless shelter years ago. I customized forms and the like to help them streamline their heavy paperwork burden. The person doing most of the paperwork was computer illiterate and the second highesranking employee, right below the director. She was very insecure and thin-skinned about it at first because she feared I would make her feel stupid. But I eventually won her over and she became my biggest fan.

I asked a lot of questions about what was tripping her up and then removed as many stumbling blocks as I could. I put shortcuts on the desktop to things she needed so she didn't have to hunt for hem. I added a copy holder to the side of the monitor and did a lot of other hings to streamline her workprocess without asking her to become computer savvy

If you can't go to his home, create visual cheat sheets and either email them or mail printed copies. I did a lot of this in my job, even though that was not part of my job. My job involved sitting at a computer all day doing data entry and other tasks. It was an entry level job. Most people in the department were less computer literate than I was and existing tutorials for basic necessary processes (like clearing the cache) sucked horribly. Some of my tutorials became fairly popular in the department. Keep it to one or two pages. Use screen shots. Draw on it to clearly highlight what you mean. Keep written instructions to a minimum.
posted by Michele in California at 2:21 PM on July 9, 2012 [2 favorites]

Why can't you walk away?

If I were you, I'd buy him a Mac and let him LIVE at the Genius Bar.
In multiple Apple Stores I've seen old dudes that are there all the time.
posted by k8t at 2:32 PM on July 9, 2012 [1 favorite]

Sorry, for the psychological aspects:

A lot of it sounds like setting boundaries. If he calls you at work with a question, you have to be willing to say, "Sorry dad, can't deal with now, e-mail me your question" and then hang up. Over and over and over again.

If you think it's possible he's 'using' the computer problems as a way to feel more connected to you, you could try arranging a regular phone date so that he knows he'll get to speak with you.

As far as being so frustrated with him, I think it could be two things. One is that he may actually just be having that hard a time with this, and it can be incredibly scary and disturbing to watch your parents decline and see them as less than competent, and that can very easily be deflected by thinking to yourself that he just doesn't want to learn, and then you can be mad at him instead of scared/sad for him. It may help you to explore your own feelings about your parents' aging, frailty, and mortality.

Possibly this isn't a deterioration, it's just an area of incompetence. Then I think you have to reach into yourself for understanding. We all have areas that we're less competent in, and I think almost all of us have areas that we're less competent in because of psychological resistance rather than innate capacity. I'm thinking, for example, of the stereotypical guy who's lived there for twenty years and doesn't know where to put the groceries away, or girl who 'can't' deal with a spider. See if you can see areas in your own life where you may practice a little studied ignorance, and cut him some slack at least in your own mind.
posted by Salamandrous at 2:39 PM on July 9, 2012 [4 favorites]

I moved a lot of Outlook emails from an old computer to a new one by
1. installing thunderbird on old machine
2. using thunderbird's import function to import all the outlook emails
3. using thunderbirds export function to then create an export file of all the emails
4. installed thunderbird on new machine
5 imported file into new thunderbird
6. exported thunderbird content to outlook. Here's a link.
posted by Kerasia at 4:13 PM on July 9, 2012 [1 favorite]

Like Salmandrous, I wonder if your father is using this as a way to feel close to you, and maybe also some kind of unconscious test of love. Or perhaps he's simply bored. Is he retired? Does he spend most of the day home alone? Looking at this as a larger problem, and working on keeping him involved in his life and his community, could be part of the solution.

Either way, I think it would be beneficial for you to set boundaries with your father whilst you're at work. Perhaps a little white lie would help -- tell him that your workplace has been asking people to cut down on personal calls during business hours and you want to stay under your boss' radar. You could also ask him to switch to email so you can help him when you have a minute, though you may find he doesn't have the necessary technical vocabulary.

As for your practical problem: How to back up and to restore Outlook Express data.

If you can't explain it to him over the phone, and you have a little money, perhaps you could offer to pay a local tech person to do it for him? Might be easier on your sanity.
posted by Georgina at 6:26 PM on July 9, 2012 [2 favorites]

Unfortunately your own attitude ("I can't change him/hardware") exactly mirrors his, so it's as frustrating for us trying to help you as it is for you trying to help him. The answer IS to either insist he upgrade, or refuse to help him. Otherwise you are just feeding the monster. It's not going to get better. I mean, NT, really?
posted by unSane at 6:51 PM on July 9, 2012 [8 favorites]

(I'm not currently the most massive Apple fan in the world but MY GOD the hours of tech support that have been saved by buying everyone in the family over the age of 60 a Mac. Unfreakinbelievable.)
posted by unSane at 6:58 PM on July 9, 2012

He has apparently set up outlook express to delete emails from the server, and save them as local files somewhere on his hard drive. Why, I cannot say. These are the files he wants to preserve and copy.

This framing, in retrospect, has been sub-optimal. I'll try a more focused attempt next week on precisely this technical issue if I can't uncover an answer by then.
posted by .kobayashi. at 7:36 PM on July 9, 2012

Georgina's link is exactly what you need to solve this specific issue, if you are not interested in solving the larger problem.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:50 PM on July 9, 2012

His setup sounds like he was using POP email (here is a description of POP vs IMAP) which was pretty common until recently.
posted by jacalata at 9:30 PM on July 9, 2012

This framing, in retrospect, has been sub-optimal.

No it's not. I think it reveals something you don't seem to necessarily want to accept -- that you haven't set clear boundaries with your dad from the get go about tech support and now it's biting you in the ass. You need to do some backtracking and train your dad to work with you in a way that produces results -- not rehashings of the same Computer 101 class over and over again.

I personally think that the fastest way to do this is by telling him, "Dad, I cannot answer personal calls anymore at work. From now on, if you need help with your computer, you may call me between X-o'clock and Y-o'clock." Then ignore all his calls unless he calls during the set timeframe.

Next, you either get him to get over his unwillingness to learn a new system, or you spend the money to get him a Geek Squad membership or something and you pass the buck. If he asks you why he continues to have the same problems over and over, you level with him. "Dad, the reason you continue to have the same issue over and over is because you're not learning the system properly. You're using me to solve your problems which means your brain is never committing the important stuff to memory. This isn't good for you, and it's not good for me. I would like to set you up with lessons or a personal trainer so you can establish some solid basics and solve these basic issues yourself. Nope, Dad. I insist."

You're setting yourself up for failure if you don't insist on the limits you're going to need to set.
posted by These Birds of a Feather at 10:03 PM on July 9, 2012 [4 favorites]

.kobayashi.: He has apparently set up outlook express to delete emails from the server, and save them as local files somewhere on his hard drive. Why, I cannot say.

This is how POP email works, and POP is the default protocol for most non-tech people. So your dad hasn't done anything weird here.

As far as I can tell, the Microsoft support page I linked above tells you how to do what you want to do. If anything about it is confusing, let us know and I'm sure folks here can help.
posted by Georgina at 12:54 AM on July 10, 2012

I have a family member who was very similar.

I sent them over to the dark-side... Apple... Then told them to pay for the extra training/classes Apple has.

... then I set them up with a virtualization program that lets them run Windows programs as if they are/were native on the MacOS desktop...

That was 2-years ago... No more calls...
posted by jkaczor at 3:36 PM on July 10, 2012 [1 favorite]