The things we got wrong
This page is a log of mistakes—what we published that didn’t work, what we missed, and how it was fixed. It’s not a brag or a confession. It’s proof that the guides here are tested, not just written.
A site like this only needs to be right once. But the reader only needs it to be right *for them*. That’s why we keep this list: so you can judge whether we’ve done our part. If we’ve missed something, it’s here.
Three we had to fix
These are the three mistakes that changed how we work. They’re not the only ones—just the ones that mattered most.
The first Linux guide that crashed real machines
- 1A tutorial that broke hardware
The ‘How to Partition a Disk Under Linux’ guide included a step to use `fdisk` without warning about unmounted drives. Three readers reported fried USB sticks and lost data before we took it down. The old version stayed live for 11 days.
- 2A Windows shortcut that didn’t work
The ‘Fix a Stuck Cursor in Windows 10’ article recommended pressing `Win + Ctrl + Shift + B` to reset the display driver. It didn’t work for users with NVIDIA GPUs. Paulette Iverson tested it on three different setups before updating the guide—and added a troubleshooting table for GPU-specific fixes. The mistake survived two minor edits before someone pointed it out.
- 3A review that misquoted specs
The ‘2023 MacBook Pro M3 Review’ claimed the base model had 8GB unified memory. It actually had 6GB. Paulette Iverson caught it while fact-checking a follow-up, but the error had already been shared in three tech forums. The correction note stayed at the top of the page for six months before being archived.
What those three changed
These failures forced us to build rules that now shape every guide. The first one—hardware damage—meant we added a ‘Tested On’ section to every hardware-related article. The second—platform-specific quirks—led to a ‘Works With’ checklist. The third—spec errors—meant we started cross-referencing reviews with official datasheets before publishing.
Rules that came from mistakes
- Never assume a command is safe (from the `fdisk` crash). *Paulette Iverson*
- List every platform a fix works on (from the GPU shortcut fail). *Paulette Iverson*
- Verify specs against official sources (from the MacBook Pro memory error). *Paulette Iverson*
The people behind this
Paulette Iverson runs this site. She’s the one who writes the guides, fixes the mistakes, and answers the emails that come after. You’ve just read her corrections—because the best way to introduce someone is to show them at their worst.
Keeping a log like this is uncomfortable. It means admitting that even after years of writing, the work is still being redone. But it’s also the only way to prove that the site improves.
Paulette Iverson doesn’t do this for the record—she does it because the alternative is worse: pretending mistakes don’t happen.
There’s a smaller mistake she’ll never admit to: the time she accidentally reformatted her own boot drive while testing a disk-partitioning guide. She spent three hours reinstalling Linux, then wrote the ‘How to Recover a Formatted Drive’ article the next day.
That’s the kind of thing that stays in the ‘I’ version of the log.
If you find something we got wrong, Paulette Iverson wants you to tell us. The contact page is the only place to do it—and the only place that matters.
There will be a next one
This list isn’t finished. The next mistake might be in a guide you’ve already read, or one we haven’t written yet. If you spot it, the contact page is where to send it. No email, no social media—just the facts, like the ones here.
The guides are grouped by category: App, Coding, Hardware, Operating System, Outlook and PowerPoint.