ehowton ◾ ◾ You Know You've Been a Unix Admin Too Long When...

I've had some challenges at work lately, and they all revolve around Internet Explorer. Earlier, attempting to fulfill my annual online ethics & security training, I discovered that IE11 far surpassed the supported version we're allowed to run, IE8 (this, despite working for a Top-Tier technologies company - but I digress). Naturally, I did what any of you would have done - I dusted off (literally) my old Win98 Second Edition CDROM and installed a VirtualMachine, getting as far as a gorgeous 32-bit 1280x1024 desktop (even installed Plus!) before I found Oracle's guest additions don't run on Win98.

My next step was equally as obvious when I carved out some space on my ESX host - VMware tools does (unofficially) run and load (kinda) - at least enough for networking! But that's when I discovered Win98 shipped with IE5 - not IE8 (I had no idea - who can even remember that far back?) - and was unable to upgrade for a whole host of topographical machine-language emulation reasons even I didn't fully understand.

At wits end, I tested an even more far-fetched theory and discovered IE11 ("its a new browser, it might just surprise you") ran the training just fine in something called, "Compatibility Mode."

But I hit my new low today when I called my boss, and asked him how to bookmark a webpage.

(Note to self: Its an orange star on the far right of the page, under the address bar.)