BOFH: Every silver lining has a cloud "Code Magenta," the PFY mumbles quietly as he wanders past me on the way to Mission Control. "Code Magenta!" the Director's PA repeats in hushed tones, unable to keep her nose out of things that don’t concern her – "What does that mean?" "It's a systems code about operational availability," I lie. "We have various codes …
With apologies to anyone who has to go and sell stuff, but I have sometimes dreamed of treating vendor sales people in a similar manner. The time it took to convince the CEO that the latest shiny is not compatible/has enormous hidden implementation costs/doesn't fulfil the requirements in any way, etc, is time I'l never get back.
It's a bad idea for your systems to be anywhere that might get submerged in what might euphemistically be called water under the influence of nothing more than gravity.
There's a BOfH to be written in which a competitor's subterranean datacentre gets cross-connected with a six-foot main sewer, at the same time that all of the blast-proof security doors mysteriously slam shut. Or something like that.
"the inch of water from the burst water main that had already claimed their floor-mounted UPS units..."
I wonder, did the on-call bod have enough of a clue to make absolutely sure that the *uninterruptible* power supply had indeed managed to interrupt itself in this circumstance?
Splish. Splash. Kzeeert, as the ripples reach the UPS "on" button height and convince the thing to make one last heroic effort at uninterruptibility.
Reminds me of the time when I was called over on a Saturday when our -basement- demo center was apparently flooded when some numb nuts left a fire hose open.
There was about 30cm of water standing under our raised floor (we're talking about 20 rows of racks with 10 racks in each row, all live). Since power was fed into the racks from the ceiling there was no immediate shorting danger I had to warn off anyone trying to turn off any hardware, because when you turn it off, they cool down and it has the nasty tendency to condense water on the vital components. Took us the rest of the day and night to get the water out....
.. you only have to read the news to know that.
I'm starting to wonder if the BOFH has developed some way to systematically deal with the bodies and the things they leave behind, like cars and so forth. Kind like the movie 'Arsenic and Old Lace'. Note, not all BOFHs are in IT nor are they all guys.
Cheers to sales force reduction! .. preferably via >kzzertt!<
"'The Cloud' isn't all its cracked up to be ........ you only have to read the news to know that." .... C 2 Posted Friday 13th May 2011 16:55 GMT
You're reading the wrong news, C 2.
* A little something for PO Box 1300, London SE1 1BD?
[Quantum Communications BetaTest #XSSXXXX1105150435]
A little phish, El Reg, which probes Intelligence for Future IT Fitness in the Live Operational Virtual Environments of Global Operating Devices.
Once again, classic. 100w soldering iron, a hole punch and about 5 pints of say hmm absinthe, enough to numb the pain but not enough so you screw it up.
I think I know what will be next a special document room, where all the documents are kept and you can only read them in there.. air tight box, and why is that cattleprod there? Oh here is why "bzzzzzzzzzzztt".... < door slams shut> oh and no mobile signal either..
Nice Warlock reference in the byline there, shows how old you are (and I am)...
Now that's more like the BOFH I've come to know and love. The kind that has colleagues knocking on my office door asking if I'm OK, in response to the maniacal laughter issuing from herein.
">Kzzzzeert< >Kzert< >thud< >thud<", has me in stitches and my colleagues looking worried. Great work Simon!
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