Third Tier

Our customer loyalty software is back up again. The software developers identified it as a problem accessing the WMI service. That's the Vista Windows Management Instrumentation service, not to be confused with the Windows Module Installer, which is a completely different WMI service. The consultants were ready to re-install Windows, and I was too after spending several hours trying to fix the problem. The majority of my troubleshooting time was, get this, trying to rename a Windows folder. I ended up downloading a utility specifically designed to force the issue, and after that, I entered a half dozen command lines I cribbed from a Google search and WMI was restored. So I buy an expensive software package, hire someone to install it, call them when it breaks, and then fix it myself when they give up. It sucks being the guy paying the IT guys.