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Judging from the relative quiet on this list, I suspect everybody who
posts regularly is indeed at the show this week.  For those of you going
later in the week, or deciding to get away for a day (perhaps just for
the vendor show ;) ), let me tell you my tale of woe regarding
registering via their "on-line" registration system.
 
The setup:  After helping assemble the WLP (World's Largest Poster), I
decided to zip over to the convention center to get my badge, the
proceedings, etc. so that I wouldn't have to wait in line today.  As I
entered the registration area, I saw two prominent lines: pre registered
with badge, and pre-registered without badge/register here today (these
last two were combined).  As it turns out, we had not sent in our
registration materials early enough to get my badge in the mail, so I
went into the "register here" line and saw that, instead of friendly
helpful desk clerks, there were friendly helpful HP700/68 terminals,
complete with a "start here..." type application running on them!
 
There were three basic choices: register here today (hmm, shouldn't need
that one, I gave our accounting department the materials to send in last
week), a vague choice I don't remember (and obviously didn't apply
anyway), and "look up your name now" (AHA! just the one I'm looking
for!).  I pressed the "3" key and was pleased to note that it was waiting
on a single-character read, no need for that pesky return key!  The
screen instructions now read: "Type the first few letters of your name or
use the arrow keys to select your name from the list below and press
RETURN when you have found it".  Ok, here goes: EMER  (wait) hmm... my
name's not here, now what?  There are no instructions for what to do if
your name wasn't found!  So, in typical user fashion, I tried various
keys that (usually) let you back out of the wrong area -- <ESC> -- no
luck; <BACKSPACE> -- nope; <TAB> -- no, that just moves the highlight
bar, getting desperate now...
 
Ok, I figured, no instructions on how to back out, no keys seem to take
effect, but what the hey -- I'm the only one here, I'll just leave this
terminal in "search" mode and use one of the other 10 terminals on the
counter...
 
This time I select #1, register here and now.  First screen asks for
first/last name.  Easy enough; next screen asks for company, address,
etc.  There was also a note that "you will have a chance at the end to
make corrections".  Cool, but since I'm a power programmer, I neber make
mistakes. <grin>  Of  course, I might make a typo or two, but I usually
catch it before I press return.  As luck would have it, I did just
that...  Ok, time for the backspace key -- <tap><tap><tap><tap><tap><tap>
huh?  The screen cleared and now I'm at a $ prompt!
 
 
$
$redo
redo: not found
$
 
ARRRRGGGHHHH!!!! This is a UNIX system!!!!!!
 
 
(ok, it *MIGHT* have been a 3K running a POSIX application, but somehow I
doubt it...)
 
Two terminals down and still no registration badge.  Time to call in the
big guns...
 
"Um, miss, could you help me with this registration program?  I should be
in the database, but it doesn't appear to be the case"  yes, I broke down
and asked a relatively un-busy clerk to walk me, a computer professional,
through the registration program.  [turns out she had just about as many
problems as I did, heh heh heh...]  She goes through the lookup screen,
can't find my name either, so she goes ahead and presses RETURN on some
random name anyway, and what do you know?  NOW there is a "is this the
right one?" prompt, that, when answered "NO", goes back to the opening
menu! (chalk one up in the "fails user friendliness" column)
 
I go through the "register online" screens, being very careful not to hit
BACKSPACE too quickly to bomb the program again, and run into a REALLY
strange one -- when entering my phone number, pressing the "-" key to
seperate the area code from the prefix dropped the program back out to
"enter your first and last name"!  After a few go-rounds with this one, I
decided to heck with it, if they don't want a readable phone number, I'll
just enter a 10 digit string of numbers and let them figure it out!
 
Now that I was "properly" entered, I was able to get my badge and all
that is associated with it.  [I found out later the reason I wasn't in
their database wasn't due to an error on Interex's part or because my
registration was so late, but was due to an error on the part of our
accounting department, one that should be relatively easy to clear up :)
]  With badge safely in hand, I head to the "proceedings distribution"
desk to request my 200 lbs of printed matter and I'm greeted with the
choice: "several pounds of densly packed printed matter --OR-- a CD-Rom"
 Guess which one I chose?
 
All in all, two out of three wasn't bad for the day (WLP and proceedins
on CD-Rom)  Which, I suppose, could be streched to three out of four if
you count getting up to the third row to see Scott Adams at the opening
keynote speach...
 
Tom Emerson
 
p.s. Ignore the following WINMAIL.DAT file -- it is a side effect of the
interaction between Exchange and AT&T e-mail gateway, and YES, I'll be
stopping by their booth to see what can be done about it!
 
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