Platform Zealots and the Peter Principle

I work in an predominantly Microsoft environment. This is because I built the environment, and I knew as I was building it, that support resources in the future would be limited. I would be the support resource, and I would have to live with and support what I built. I like Microsoft products, and I believe that they provide a tremendous value due to the amount of features and integration they provide. Having said that, I must also add that if some other entity/company/space aliens were to come up with software that was easier to implement, manage, and use, then of course, I would consider using it. I am not a Microsoft zealot by any means, and have used or currently using linux, Novell and VMS, not mentioning the countless other software packages used as client apps. My opinion is that software and hardware are tools, and you pick a tool based upon the job that needs to be done.

That said as some background, in the course of troubleshooting my executable attachment issue (see previous post), one of my users was trying to open an executable attachment, and Outlook would not allow it, and would block the user's access to the file. When he inquired about it, I sent him the cut and pasted article right out of the Outlook help about the file attachment security. I "replied all" to the user's email, figuring that perhaps the dolt that sent him the executable, who was CC'd on the user's email to me, wasn't aware of the impropriety of sending it.

I received the following communication from a client:

[COMPANY NAME REDACTED] does not use Outlook for some of the reasons you have outlined below. We prefer more robust "non-Microsoft" products to carry process our e-mail and it is true that we also block these files. The first one I had sent was with a truncated .exe extension but you had a server problem at that time.
Since these files are encrypted to insure our HIPAA compliance, we avoid sending them with the .xls extension. You should have received the file by now but let me know if you continue experiencing any further problems.

The most common lesson I am learning in IT is that the world knows no shortage of jackasses.

"more robust 'non-Microsoft' products"?? "to carry and process e-mail?" Hold on, now. If I encrypt a file, and create a self-extracting archive out of it, and then rename the file extension from "exe" to "xls", does that suddenly, automagically unencrypt the file and make it an Excel spreadsheet? "does not use Outlook for some of the reasons you have outlined below" - the reasons I outlined, where the security features in Outlook that block access to potentially dangerous file attachments. What a clown. On top of that, "server problem"???? Those are fighting words! There were no server problems, just iD10T user problems!!!!

This from a CTO/CIO. Would you hire this man to manage (or should I say, PROCESS?) your IT? Clearly a bigotted zealot from deduced from the "more robust 'non-Microsoft' " line. Does an e-mail client really "process" e-mail? Or is it used to "access" e-mail? How do you conclude that there are more "robust" e-mail client applications? If I loaded one Eudora/Thunderbird/Outlook/Groupwise/Notes Client on a bunch of PC's, what makes someone make the inane declaration that one is more ROBUST? Is the Notes Client more robust because it is a system hog that takes forever to load? I could see saying one is more robust if any of the above software would spontaneously close, lock up or otherwise flake out, and your pet email client didn't. Then you could say more robust.

And why on earth would you purposefully ALWAYS exclude software from the world's largest software company???

Do you think he regularly patches all his desktop client apps with the latest and greatest security patches????? I DOUBT IT! I will admit, I am and have always been a patch freak. Even in my Novell days, I always patched to latest and greatest. You know, there are reasons software companies release patches, and therefore you should patch. If you don't patch because the patch would break your app, then you have a broken app. Additonally to the broken app, you also get a free vector for an exploit/script kiddie/virus. Always patch. Always.

Are you ready for the cherry on top?

He doesn't allow executables as inbound file attachments in his company.