You can determine if there has been a recall, or advisory notice, related to that specific version of the software.
Lots of sophisticate diagnostic devices have complex and sophisticated software. A lot of software developers are used to customer complaints being the final step in validation; this is fine for a lot of uses, but not medical devices.
So, changes to software are not always adequately validated, and, more importantly, the results of every possible user action is not always validated and described in the instructions for use.
An example would be if the results of hitting the Back Arrow on the browser or hitting Alt back arrow on the key board having different results. Most people expect these to have the same result, but they might not, and the difference might not be described in the IFU.
You are quite correct…by the time I’m done with that belly button, you could eat out of that bitch. Not that you would. But you could if you wanted to.
I occasionally come to know the identities of confidential informants used by our law enforcement agencies to gather information about criminal activity. That’s probably the biggest thing. There are some drug traffickers who would kill to know who they are, I’m sure.
If you’re viewing someone who’s been autopsied, their brain is probably not in their skull, but in the abdominal cavity with the rest of the viscera. We could put it back in the cranium, but it would probably leak, and nothing smells worse than decomposing brain tissue.
Sometimes the eyes won’t stay shut, so there’s always Aron Alpha, aka Krazy Glue.
Organ and tissue donation would probably slow to almost nothing if people knew exactly what is done to the remains during the harvest.
I used to work at a place where I regularly encountered celebrity corpses. I’m kind of out of the loop at my current employer, but I know of one national celebrity we’re going to get when he eventually shuffles off.
I used to know how embassies were swept for bugs and monitored for electronic eavesdropping. I knew how to drill open some safe and vault locks. I knew how a secure conference room was constructed. I knew where the cameras and alarms were located in a lot of embassies, particularly in Europe, how they were installed, and how they could be defeated. All of that information and technology is now obsolete, as I left the Foreign Service in 1998, but at the time some of it was TS and some was secret.
Locations of archeological sites are supposed to be kept from the public as a means of keeping people from just going out and picking up artifacts. Since my consulting employs archeologists who are the ones discovering the sites in the first place, I have access to the full reports, before the site location maps have been redacted.
I think it’s a secret to archeologists that no one else actually gives a shit about sites where the only artifacts are broken rocks. Which most of them are.
Quantity not quality personally. Having worked on some very large enterprise databases I have had access to vast amounts of uninteresting, mostly pointless secrets about people.
From working at many libraries, I have learned that often the most straitlaced and moralistic individuals (think ministers and priests) will check out and presumably read the most sexually oriented material (ancient and modern) available.
It’s not a secret anymore, but it once was. I used to work for a laser systems manufacturing company. We didn’t get the contract, but were in talks with Keurig to build them a machine that would play a role in the production of RFID tags for their little K-cups. They were going to rig the next generation of their brewers so that they’d only work with official Keurig K-cups by analyzing the RFID: no RFID, no worky.
They must have gone with someone else to produce the tags, but produce them they did - if you have a Keurig 2.0 (or whatever), it won’t work with knock-off (cheaper) cups. However, you can hack it - just tape the lid from an official Keurig K-Cup over the sensor. Your aim doesn’t even have to be that good. At least, that’s what LifeHacker or BuzzFeed or some such said.
Working in customer service for a large cell phone company:
Asking for a supervisor isn’t a magic button to get what you want. Supervisors have slightly more authority to say yes and much more authority to say no. In most cases, you are wasting your own time for the same outcome.
Overall call time is really important for CSRs, so calls we can handle quickly and cheerfully are the best.
Your best bet is to make a direct request, explain why you think it’s reasonable, seem reasonably friendly, and imply that you’ll be happy to end the call when you get what you want and might be willing to take a long, long time politely arguing if you don’t. Don’t sound like you’re TOO smart or gaming the system; you just have a reasonable request and don’t understand why it can’t be handled directly.
Also, don’t be the person who calls and says, “you’re going to START by doing THIS for me, THEN I will tell you the REST of my problems” or the one who says, “You need to fix this for me today, but I am through with your company and disconnecting either way.” You’re giving the rep a lot of reasons up front to not care too much about helping you.
Over the years, working in Quality and Inventory management in several industries, I’ve learned a few things about most of them.
I am aware of some common electrical issues of some of the larger GM sedans from the 80s and 90s that were never recalled, even though they could pose a danger.
I know how your McNuggets are processed before MickeyD’s get them.
I know what the inside of most popular models of phones look like.
I know that many of your entrees and sides in chain (and sometimes other) casual dining establishments are glorified TV dinners.
I’ve been privy to information months before the public knows about it.
Also, emergency services has preplan books for businesses that have hazardous materials. Some businesses in your community you might not know what they do or what kind of chemicals are involved. Others are kind of obvious when you think about it, like the local water park has a lot of chlorine in some back building.
I already have no kind words for whoever performed the autopsy on my wife. To think that in those last moments I spent with her, her brain likely was not even in the appropriate location – I may very well have to go home and roll a sanity check.
Big secret… ssshhhh… I work in IT for a health insurance company… we aren’t pouring over individual health insurance policies looking for any loophole we can find to not pay a claim.
We spend 24 hours a day, 7 days a week trying to pay as many claims as we can as fast as we possibly can…
I’m a nurse. I could have lots of imedical etc nformation on a lot of people, if I wanted. But it’s not worth my career, and really after you have read 1000s of charts nothing but symptoms are interesting.
I also once had many of the codes for the country’s largest blood collection and distribution systems, and handled some of the deferrals myself. So in theory I could know who was a blood donor, who was turned down, (and why) and was permanently banned from donating, and also why.
Cute deferrals were when teenagers would come to the clinic with a tattoo or a piercing, or maybe a one night stand that they didn’t want their parents to know about. There are tactful ways of deferring someone, then suggesting they skip “family donation night” for the next little while. The interesting one was when one spouse went to a malaria zone tropical vacation without the other knowing about it. That’s a long deferral, for a couple that came in weekly.
