Verifying the Problem

Verifying the problem means reproducing the symptoms the user describes and observing the problem for yourself.

Verifying the problem is important for several reasons:

• Sometimes you can solve the problem by observing what the user does to recreate the symptoms. It's possible that he or she is doing something wrong that can be corrected.

• It often yields more information about the circumstances of the problem. (This information can differ from the description provided by the user.)

• It helps ensure that you don't jump to a conclusion, or waste time trying to troubleshoot a nonexistent or poorly-defined problem.

Problem ScenarioVerification

Verify the following problem to make sure you're working on the right thing.

A user calls and says that he can't get into his computer. He sees a message on his screen that will only let him restart or shut down. On the surface, this sounds like it could be the kernel panic message, but to verify the problem, you ask him to power on the computer and describe what the computer is doing as it starts up. The user is reluctant to do this, because he has seen the problem happen every time, and someone has told him that the problem is a kernel panic. He wants you to recommend steps to him to address the kernel panic. You tell him that reproducing the problem while you're speaking with him will help solve his problem more quickly.

He describes a normal startup sequence, and then the "message" appears on screen that will only let him restart or shut down. When you ask him to read everything in the message, it becomes clear that he's describing the login window. You ask him to click on his name and log in.

Further questioning reveals that he had recently added another user account for someone else to use the computer. Because he had only used the computer with one user before, he had never seen the login window before. (He was not aware that he could click the user names in the login window, because they did not clearly look like buttons.)