Using Jing for Tech Support and Forums
Posted on Tuesday August 14, 2007 by Betsy Weber
"How do I put my pictures on a CD?" "I think I have a virus, can you help me?" "Have you ever seen a computer do (fill in the blank)?!"
These are the questions I often hear from friends, family and new acquaintances as soon as I tell them I work at a software company. You may also be that person to your friends and family.
Now, I love to help people, but sometimes it's hard to do this over the phone or email. How many times have you tried to walk someone through fixing a problem over the phone? Or, spent hours drafting that email with pages and pages of instructions. It can often be difficult and frustrating for both sides. This is where Jing could come in handy for you...
I found someone using Jing to help others! I had the honor of meeting Tris Hussey last week at Gnomedex. He shared with me how he uses Jing. He was recently having a problem with some software, ClearContext, that he uses and went to their forums. He noticed that the solution posted in the ClearContext forums were correct only if you were running XP. If you were running on Vista, the information was a little off. So, instead of taking a long time to write-up corrections to the forum information, Tris simply made a quick Jing video and posted the URL in the forums! You can see the forum thread and his Jing video posted here.
You can read Tris's original post about Jing here on his A View from the Isle Blog. Tris also writes another great blog, the Pimp Your Work Blog that is all about making your work day better with lots of great tips and tricks.
Problem solved! And, you get to be the hero!
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Comments (18)
Betsy, It was awesome meeting you last week. Jing is just great for those things that take just a minute to show.
Posted by Tris Hussey | August 15, 2007 5:33 PM
Posted on August 15, 2007 17:33
Jing goes both ways. I submitted a bug report to the Yahoo! UI group and used Jing to record a short video demonstrating the problem. Truly worth a 1000 words.
Posted by Andy Miller | August 16, 2007 5:38 PM
Posted on August 16, 2007 17:38
I agree. Jing has been a great way to post quick clips of my desktop to help solve someones problems, or to show a feature I am talking about.
Posted by Spencer | August 21, 2007 9:10 AM
Posted on August 21, 2007 09:10
Is there a way to secure the information posted to the screencast site?
Like password protect the data uploaded so only the people you provide the password can review the information.
Posted by Steve Able | August 29, 2007 10:10 AM
Posted on August 29, 2007 10:10
I run an on-line Yahoo help group with over 650 members. This is a group with membership restricted to those owning the same robotic quilting system. I thought I would be able to use Jing to create short videos to help answer common questions. I did an experiment yesterday (8/30) and found that I quickly ran out of transfer bandwidth as my members viewed the video. Since I do not receive any compensation for my time or effort, I am not in a position to purchase more bandwidth. This is very disappointing to me. My members were very positive about the possibility of having demo videos available to help them with their questions. We are all disappointed that the cost of transfer bandwidth makes using Jing impossible for us.
Posted by Janice Bahrt | August 31, 2007 9:02 AM
Posted on August 31, 2007 09:02
Janice - get a life, we all volunteer for projects. If your 650 members gave you (on average) $0.11 each you'd have enough for a basic 1-year plan. It should not be hard to come up with such a minimal amount of money if it's a really valuable service for the group.
Posted by Peter | September 5, 2007 10:40 AM
Posted on September 5, 2007 10:40
enter text? test, sorry
dfdf767df
Posted by PrelKikam | September 6, 2007 11:18 AM
Posted on September 6, 2007 11:18
I'll second this -- I've been using Jing for 'instant documentation' and it makes a huge difference when you can show someone exactly what you mean.
I was able to Jing a bug demo for the developers of LANrev that they couldn't reproduce readily; as soon as they saw the clip, they were able to track down the problem (the bug was triggered by the directory where I was saving a settings file, a completely un-obvious yet crucial point).
The engineering lead's comment: "Thanks very much for spending the time to create the video. This was the key to reproduce this." To which I replied: "No time at all, thanks to Jing!"
Posted by Mike | September 12, 2007 4:37 PM
Posted on September 12, 2007 16:37
Hello to all, its my new pages about cloth
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Posted by Cloth | September 21, 2007 6:17 PM
Posted on September 21, 2007 18:17
Golden eye on the net Microsoft Xbox console
Posted by skameagog | September 22, 2007 6:10 PM
Posted on September 22, 2007 18:10
Can Jing be hosted on our servers behind our firewall?
We're a large government facility and lots of our work involves sensitive (yet, unclassified) information. We're interested, but cannot have the videos hosted at screencast.com due to security and privacy concerns.
We'd be willing to discuss site licensing, etc.
Thanks!
Posted by Michael Grimler | September 28, 2007 12:59 PM
Posted on September 28, 2007 12:59
Want to start your private office arms race right now?
I just got my own USB rocket launcher :-) Awsome thing.
Plug into your computer and you got a remote controlled office missile launcher with 360 degrees horizontal and 45 degree vertival rotation with a range of more than 6 meters - which gives you a coverage of 113 square meters round your workplace.
You can get the gadget here: http://tinyurl.com/2qul3c
Check out the video they have on the page.
Cheers
Marko Fando
Posted by markofando | October 2, 2007 7:54 AM
Posted on October 2, 2007 07:54
My friend is trying to download Jing and keeps getting error 1327 and refers to a network drive that is not installed on the road. any ideas?
Posted by anita | October 3, 2007 7:20 PM
Posted on October 3, 2007 19:20
There's one special secret Sale link on Amazon:
http://tinyurl.com/2r7ldr
[b]This is open every Friday and ONLY on Fridays! [/b]
You can find very good discounts here, although some Fridays you can really get
lucky and make off like an Amazon bandit - I´ve seen discounts there as low as 75%
off sticker Price.
Posted by befpoerve | October 5, 2007 5:55 PM
Posted on October 5, 2007 17:55
Hi-
I use Jing to record mini-lessons, 'video grades', and 'video analyses' for all my high school students. Video grades are like an one-on-one grading session with each student; showing their mistakes and how to fix them. Video Anaylses are basically the same thing as a video grade just without the grade. I have found that with these techniques students are improving their overall grades and performance within two assignments, rather than four or five.
The only program change I'd make would be to increase the time limit. Please? Or at least a setting to increase the time limit.
Posted by Suzanne | October 17, 2007 12:56 PM
Posted on October 17, 2007 12:56
Hi Suzanne - I'll make sure the team sees your request. Any chance you could send me an email? I'd love to chat more about how you're using Jing. b.weber@techsmith.com
Thanks!
Posted by Betsy Weber
| October 22, 2007 9:55 PM
Posted on October 22, 2007 21:55
Предлагаю обсудить интересные и полезные блоги по различным тематикам.
Мне нравится блог о компьютерах - http://reviews.org.ru/asd/1.php
Posted by adyutre | March 4, 2008 2:48 PM
Posted on March 4, 2008 14:48
I haven't done it yet (just DL'd it)- I plan on trying out Jing to demonstrate our new site functions to our support teams, and our store guests as well.
[I bet it can also be used to capture the spam posters, in real time, on this site alone]
Posted by Eric Miltsch | April 22, 2008 3:43 AM
Posted on April 22, 2008 03:43