Justin the tech expert

The office here at the park has been frantic and full of commotion lately. A European Union commission has been sent down here to audit our office as part of a large project that we have been working with, and my coworkers have been busy setting everything up in preparation of their arrival. Through this program (who’s goals I am still unclear of) Strandja park has received all sorts of new gear and equipment, ranging from new computer systems and GPS units, to a boat and tranquilizer gun. Most of this new equipment has yet to be used, a fact that was proven when my coworkers finally unboxed half of the stuff for the first time this week and asked me to set it up for them. As a result, I am now the resident IT expert at Strandja Nature Park. Need new printer drivers installed on a computer? Don’t have training on a GPS unit? Can’t figure out how to set up a PDA? Well I’m the guy to talk to.

To be honest, I didn’t know how to do most of this stuff either when I got here, but since I seem to be the most technologically savvy person in the office, it falls to me to figure it all out, and I have enjoyed doing it. I might as well pick up a new set of skills while I’m here anyway. So now every time we get a new piece of equipment, I read through the manual and search online so I can train myself on how to use it, and how to teach the rest of the office how to use it. I started off with basic stuff, like learning how to use manual functions on an SLR camera (one of those nice professional cameras) to my current goal of setting up an office network that links all 10 or so office computers and their respective peripherals, so that I can print or scan a document on any printer or scanner from any computer in the building.

While this sounds like quite the task (and indeed it is proving to be) I personally feel that it is much needed, because right now printing and scanning is crazy hard. For example, every month the assistant director of the park makes up a budget report on his computer, which doesn’t have a printer or internet. In order to print it, he has to save it to a floppy disk (remember those things?) and take it over to my computer down the hall. But he (and by he, I mean I) has to save it as a special file type because his version of Word and mine are different and not very compatible. Then once it’s transferred it gets printed from my computer. Doesn’t sound too difficult? Well, this process is usually repeated about 4-5 times for every document he prints because Word doesn’t spell check Bulgarian and he doesn’t catch the mistakes until after it’s printed. Same thing for spacing errors and what not.

We’ll see if my goal of an office network comes to fruition or not, but in the mean time I’m still busy helping with everything else. Right now I have been assigned the task of digitizing the parks records. It’s good and Im glad to be busy and helpful, but I have to admit that it’s not what I had imagined when I first came out here. Funny how things can change like that.