A post with no video - System Problems

So here I was minding my own business this week, when our ACD server decided that it wasn't getting enough attention. Since we had a hardware upgrade scheduled and a new software upgrade in the works, maybe it really had decided that it didn't want all that attention. Either way, we had a couple of headaches this week. The first was on Monday morning when we discovered that the log files for the historical server had filled and caused a loss of the real-time data that was in the buffer. We resolved the problems which unfortunately were the result of a configuration error. The next step was to let the customers know what had happened. Statistics were lost and plans were made to prevent a recurrence of this problem in the future. By being honest with our customers and not "Apologizing", but instead saying, "We are sorry", we were able to get through the problems together.

Notifying customers of any service is a particularly controversial business. Customers get used to things as they are, and let's face it, when things are working nobody calls the help desk to say how great the service is. So how do you let customers know what happened. In the old days of IT, it was believed best to protect users from too much information about systems. Computers were complicated in everything they did. Gone are the days when I used to write BASIC programs in the interpreter of the Commodore 64 to change the color or play a midi file. I can't write a line of CSS, but it's all over this website generated by Moveable Type. With only a few html tags, I can focus on writing this post.

Now that we are in the 21st, users are more savvy when it comes to computers. Much like a telephone, which just about everyone over the last 50 years has lots of practice using, computers at home are much more common. User interfaces are much better and easier to use. As people get more comfortable with these tools, they can and should know about them. I am not suggesting that we explain to everyone how to engineer a system that services 100,000 people. That is what the geeks are here to do. Sharing information with the users though helps build relationships and trust. Informed users aren't suspicious of outages. They don't have to like the interruption, but explaining troubles builds loyalty and when needed cooperation. The next time something breaks. Take the time to inform you stakeholders.

Ok, I lied about the video. Here is a video for the good old C64.