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Yeah, the Zenith BDR guys are not to be confused with a former TV/radio/computer manufacturer. In fact, Zenith split off its BDR (or its hosted MSP business, I forgot which) and the split business is now named Continuum. Newer generations of the Zenith/Continuum BDR hardware are based off Datto's platform.
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Aug 19, 2014 23:27
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Sickening posted:So I have gone through a project of building a monitoring system from the ground up with a limited budget. We now have a noc-light area with displays displaying all the current system statuses just as you would expect. Things are beautiful. Depends on what you used, PHPWeatherMap is ideal for this option http://www.network-weathermap.com/ eg: HL'ed image: code:
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Aug 19, 2014 23:43
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EuphrosyneD posted:Yeah, the Zenith BDR guys are not to be confused with a former TV/radio/computer manufacturer. Actually, zenith and Continuum split late last year, so Zenith took over all the monitoring and support themselves. As soon as they did the service went to total poo poo, and the BDR devices started losing connection to the cloud offsite backups on a weekly basis. The only way to resolve this issue was to let their barely English speaking Indian support onto your BDR and servers to spend 2 hours resolving it. I've had to do this over 20 times in the last 6 months. Hence why we are pushing everyone to Datto. Datto rules.
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Aug 20, 2014 00:02
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Called in afterhours due to internet outage. Dropped everything I was doing, made the 45 minute drive in, headed for the network closet, reached for my keys to unlock it and... no keys. Left the fuckers at home.
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Aug 20, 2014 00:56
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larchesdanrew posted:Called in afterhours due to internet outage. Dropped everything I was doing, made the 45 minute drive in, headed for the network closet, reached for my keys to unlock it and... no keys. I can't count the number of times I've done this or locked myself out of a room and can see my keys sitting on a desk behind a window, taunting me. I once locked them at our colo and had to call someone to drive 45mins down to come unlock the rack door because I put things down wherever happens to be closest at the time.
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Aug 20, 2014 01:27
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Helushune posted:I can't count the number of times I've done this or locked myself out of a room and can see my keys sitting on a desk behind a window, taunting me. I once locked them at our colo and had to call someone to drive 45mins down to come unlock the rack door because I put things down wherever happens to be closest at the time. I like to think everyone has done this to make me feel better, sort of an induction to being an engineer... other notable things everyone has done once are: - Adding a VLAN to a trunk port with "switchport trunk vlan x" instead of "switchport trunk vlan add x" normally killing your uplink / network (someone actually did this at the office this week  )- Mistracing a cable and unplugging something important - Rebooting the wrong device - Bumping a power cable by accident - Forgetting to bring something crucial during a major outage (Laptop, Console Cable, Ethernet/Fibre/Power Cable, Screwdriver, SFP, etc.) hanyolo fucked around with this message at 01:45 on Aug 20, 2014 |
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Aug 20, 2014 01:42
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Billy the Mountain posted:Hence why we are pushing everyone to Datto. I've only really dealt with Datto once, but it was super easy and cool. I think their entire platform is really interesting. EDIT: They don't have a client for hypervisors though, do they? Inspector_666 fucked around with this message at 01:48 on Aug 20, 2014 |
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Aug 20, 2014 01:43
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Helushune posted:I can't count the number of times I've done this or locked myself out of a room and can see my keys sitting on a desk behind a window, taunting me. I once locked them at our colo and had to call someone to drive 45mins down to come unlock the rack door because I put things down wherever happens to be closest at the time. There is a solution for that.
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Aug 20, 2014 03:20
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Volmarias posted:There is a solution for that. Even cheaper.
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Aug 20, 2014 03:28
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If you're going to do that, just never put your keys down in the first place. In your hands or in your pockets, no where else. I'm at least offering a contingency plan 
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Aug 20, 2014 03:35
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Hi guys. Been lurking these threads since I used to work at Steadfast (hosting company the SA servers are at). You guys are hilarious. I just YOTJ to a company in the Sears Tower yesterday. Greatest IT gig ever.
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Aug 20, 2014 04:30
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gfsincere posted:I just YOTJ to a company in the Sears Tower yesterday. Greatest IT gig ever. Then you should know they "renamed" it the Willis Tower.
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Aug 20, 2014 04:43
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No they loving didn't.
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Aug 20, 2014 04:46
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Moey posted:Then you should know they "renamed" it the Willis Tower. 
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Aug 20, 2014 04:49
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That may be what it's 'named' now but if you actually call it that to the face of anyone who lives in that city, I hope you own a good pair of running shoes
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Aug 20, 2014 05:25
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Malachite_Dragon posted:That may be what it's 'named' now but if you actually call it that to the face of anyone who lives in that city, I hope you own a good pair of running shoes Exactly. Even when tourists from other countries ask where the "Willis Tower" is, I tell them I don't know. gently caress a Willis.
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Aug 20, 2014 05:41
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evol262 posted:Did you know that legacy BIOS is written in assembly (sometimes with call-outs to C, but not often), and that it has limited address space, which is why trying to use multiple cards with option ROMs often silently fails? Not when it comes to memory setup and management. I am well aware of how bios' were written, I work with a guy who worked for Phoenix. The old Bios' setup the e820 in order, efi doesn't give two shits.
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Aug 20, 2014 06:07
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ratbert90 posted:Not when it comes to memory setup and management. I am well aware of how bios' were written, I work with a guy who worked for Phoenix. The old Bios' setup the e820 in order, efi doesn't give two shits. I'd imagine that'd be nice, not a complaint. I dislike EFI for other reasons (not even remotely predictable, even on UEFI2), but C(++) is vastly preferable to asm. What don't you like about it?
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Aug 20, 2014 06:19
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evol262 posted:I'd imagine that'd be nice, not a complaint. I dislike EFI for other reasons (not even remotely predictable, even on UEFI2), but C(++) is vastly preferable to asm. What don't you like about it? Specifically? The memory map is setup terribly (not at all). In the bios days the type of memory was setup in order, with type 1 being put last so there wasn't any gaps in the way memory was setup. Does this effect anybody 99.9% of the time? No. Does it effect me because I am working for a large memory manufacture and I am working with memory mapping? Yes.
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Aug 20, 2014 06:24
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I need your help goons. I'm pushing to get a ticketing system implemented because for fucks' sake everyone needs one. All I want is to track stuff internally. Clients will still just email us the usual way. I was met with this response: quote:, I'm not mad keen about either - the main reason is I'd much rather we are all in the loop by discussion rather than reading a database and mis-interpreting it. I don't believe anything we do is that complex, or we have so many of them, that it requires a database we will ignore historically (ie. no further use for down the track). Hate entering information and keeping it up to date just for the sake of it. More than happy to hear your thoughts, but would need to be convinced of its advantages for spending the time entering info... You won't be surprised to learn that he is a manager and takes no calls. At the moment I cant think of a response that isnt "You don't know what you're talking about". How can I 'convince' him of the merits of logging calls despite my "not complex" day job without coming off like the rear end in a top hat I desperately want to be.
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Aug 20, 2014 11:39
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Swink posted:I need your help goons. You can tell a professional manager from his use of phrases like "mad keen." There are lots of reasons to use a ticketing system, but a big one is that it allows you to demonstrate later that you do, in fact, do work when cuts are coming. Things might be rosy now, but no matter who you are or where you work, sooner or later -- be it new management or whatever -- someone will think you're overstaffed, and you will need hard data to refute it.
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Aug 20, 2014 12:44
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Swink posted:I need your help goons. One thing I have to ask first is, how new are you at the company? If you have just started, I'd hold off a while unless your job is "Guy we brought in to make our IT department not poo poo." A couple months at least. Nobody likes the newbie who comes in and tells them how they're doing everything wrong. Anyway, from the quote it sounds like he has never even seen modern ticketing systems. "Reading a database and mis-interpreting it," really? You could try showing him some screenshots of the ticketing system that you're pushing and show him how clear and readable everything actually is. Keeping everyone in the loop through discussion is easier with a decent ticketing system - if you have an issue everyone needs to be aware of or updated on, you refer to a ticket number and then everyone involved can open it up on their workstations and see exactly what the issue is and what has already been done. You know, instead of saying, "Okay guys you know Ms. Jonston down in building 3, the one that called up with the mouse problem? Oh, John wasn't here that day? Well [spend 5 minutes catching John up while everyone else sits and spins], well it may be an issue with one of the Windows Updates. She has KB20734... dammit Paul I can't read your handwriting, is that a 5 or an 8? You can't read your handwriting either? Okay well we have to try KB207348 and KB207345 then." Etc. Etc. I'm sure you get the point and can probably come up with a better or more annoying example. Efficiency, everyone having access to the same information cuts down on time wasted which means more poo poo gets fixed and your department (and by extension, the manager) looks better. Because they are better. Maybe if you have access to a demo, demonstrate for him how quick and easy entering a ticket actually is. I mean, it should take a very, very small amount of time compared to what you spend actually fixing a problem (For both of these suggestions I'm assuming you have a ticketing system in mind and that it also isn't rear end =D). You could also try the CYA route. As in, having this stuff written down and saved somewhere is a record of what was accomplished. If some other manager or executive asks the manager to justify his budget, he can produce all the documented evidence. When everything is running smoothly because your IT department is full of loving wizards who maul every problem to death before anyone can blink, executives tend to think that they aren't doing anything. Endless screens of conquered tickets and charts and graphs with huge numbers on them and bullet point summaries are all things those executives love. A last-resort option is also to mention that as a manager, he can see who is working on which tickets and how many they close, and can maybe see who might need extra motivation or who deserves rewards or something. But please, please don't use this one unless you really have to. I hesitate even to mention it. Although your boss doesn't sound like the type of guy who loves hard numbers and metrics and poo poo, you never know; metrics are so easily abused that your co-workers might lynch you if your boss latches onto them as a way to be lazy about performance evaluation. I would consider this the nuclear option. I wish you luck, though. It's really hard to make someone understand the importance of documentation if they don't already understand it (usually by virtue of having been burned by its lack at some point).
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Aug 20, 2014 12:53
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guppy posted:You can tell a professional manager from his use of phrases like "mad keen." Mad Keen sounds like an incredible forgettable Keane album (most of them) But yeah, tickets provide direct proof of work in an area where problems tend to meld together in your/your boss's head over time
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Aug 20, 2014 12:54
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If he continues to say no, is there anything stopping you from setting up Spiceworks on your desktop for a private system as a CYA? You could then later leverage that into "look at my shiny ticketing system, see how awesome it is? We should totally roll this out to the whole team!"
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Aug 20, 2014 13:01
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That's how we started using jira/git where I work. When I came here, there was no issue tracker, no version control, and a whole lot of  going on, so I installed jira and svn for myself and another dude. Now everyone uses jira+git. We didn't even have to ask anyone.guy sees jira on a monitor: hey, that looks cool, gimme a test account me: log in with your windows account, duh guy: ooooh, shiny Pretty much the thing for svn and later git. People don't like change when it has an "unknown" factor, but when they see something just works better in the office, they'll switch in no time.
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Aug 20, 2014 13:58
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Swink posted:I need your help goons. Does he just expect you all to memorize every detail of your cases?
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Aug 20, 2014 14:08
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Inspector_666 posted:Does he just expect you all to memorize every detail of your cases? Janitors don't need databases to know where the mops are, and we don't need one to know where the mice are 
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Aug 20, 2014 14:15
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He doesn't care, he just doesn't want to have to do anything.
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Aug 20, 2014 14:16
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I would probably just pay the $10 myself and set up a Jira instance on my workstation.
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Aug 20, 2014 14:18
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I've been at this job for 11 years and we have no ticketing system. Every time we bring it up, the president of the company nixes it saying "it removes the personal from the job and introduces more red tape".
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Aug 20, 2014 14:18
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J posted:Hopefully you don't have to take the fall for this stupid poo poo. Someway, somehow, it's Blackswordca's fault.
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Aug 20, 2014 14:18
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GreenNight posted:I've been at this job for 11 years and we have no ticketing system. Every time we bring it up, the president of the company nixes it saying "it removes the personal from the job and introduces more red tape". How the gently caress do you people track solutions and job progress?
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Aug 20, 2014 14:19
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What are those? Seriously, it's basically my email box.
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Aug 20, 2014 14:21
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Inspector_666 posted:I've only really dealt with Datto once, but it was super easy and cool. I think their entire platform is really interesting. Dattos back up on the OS/machine level, not the hypervisor level. If StorageCraft produced a version of ShadowProtect for ESX(i) or Xen, I'm sure Datto would include it straightaway. They're also limited to Windows physical or virtual machines, or Macs through Time Capsule emulation. I've heard nothing about Linux or other OS support. They can also have SMB or NFS shares on them, and theoretically anything put on those shares is also backed up offsite, so on paper you could do backup of unsupported operating systems to a share. Billy the Mountain posted:Hence why we are pushing everyone to Datto. IMO, they're King Turd of poo poo Mountain. All backup software sucks, but Datto's platform just happens to suck less than the rest of the field. I'm not as much of a fan for several reasons:
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Aug 20, 2014 14:29
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The only backup software I ever used that I didn't absolutely hate was Veeam.
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Aug 20, 2014 14:59
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EAT THE EGGS RICOLA posted:The only backup software I ever used that I didn't absolutely hate was Veeam. When I was new at this gig I opted for NovaSTOR. To be honest after a year I'm sick of it. The management interface randomly crashes entirely and has to be re-installed. Next round when I virtualize everything I'll be installing Veeam. Pretty sure you get it for free under 2 virtual servers.
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Aug 20, 2014 15:05
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EAT THE EGGS RICOLA posted:The only backup software I ever used that I didn't absolutely hate was Veeam. VEEAM is hateful too. Just in a few unique and novel ways. God help you if you want to do anything complicated, like encrypted tape, trad vtls, or accelerated snapshots on anything that's not 3par. Or you want to define your data retention policies in a sane manner. Oh and if you do happen to want an old file off tape, good luck restoring the whole repository chain, hope you have enough temp storage. gently caress all backup products.
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Aug 20, 2014 16:09
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My boss got a call this morning from a site stating that our server there was making noises. This was from their IT Manager, who is not on the site, so it must have been reported by a user there. We drove over (which is thankfully only a 5-10 minute drive), and found that our server was fine, and their UPS is making a horrible high-pitched squealing noise, sitting on a shelf above the rack our server is in. At least I got to go on a field trip today.
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Aug 20, 2014 16:25
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Is there something in particular you want from a backup product that nothing has today?
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Aug 20, 2014 16:41
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EAT THE EGGS RICOLA posted:The only backup software I ever used that I didn't absolutely hate was Veeam. I used to run Veeam and for the most part it worked. Had random issues that would crop up where it would decide to leave orphaned snapshots and stuff, but it wasn't terrible. Been running Unitrends now (formally PHD Virtual) and am really liking it. Ran the new version all the way through the beta and had no real issues.
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Aug 20, 2014 16:58
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