by CodeNinja | Jan 9, 2009 | Customers
Now as you are aware I have not broke Busbys systems since going live with the project, I was thinking it was all flowing well and they had got “used” to me now, so end of all problems…
Then came the Xmas shutdown period, and I came back to work tried to log into the Busby firewall with me Actividentity card, and eye scan, DNA tests, etc only to get told “Account Disabled“? Moi? Account Disabled, do they not know who I am?
So i drop an email to my contacts there asking wtf? and after my main technical contact tried everything he was capable off he admitted defeat and passed the problem up the food chain to the Sys.Admin. Which was nice of him… Then 30 minutes later I get an email from said Admin, along the lines of!
“We do not deal with user account problems, please go phone the normal customer helpline.”
Use the normal helpline, that the average mortal off the street would use? Do they not know who I am? We’ll see about that.
A further 30 minutes later and i get a phone call from the sys.admin who sent me the email.
“Hi, yes Our Boss was in a meeting earlier, and just popped in, err it seems we are authorised to help you with your problem, and err she asked could we do it as a priority, so ignore my earlier email, I’ll get it all sorted for you”
Harmony has returned to the Universe, Moi? The CodeNinje a mear mortal? I dont think so.. ;o)
See dear Reader, It may sometimes be “what you know” but its always “Who you know”
CN
by CodeNinja | Nov 12, 2008 | Technology, Customers
There should be a form of Caffeine-Breathalyser fitted to all computers that prevent incoming emails unless the operator has a sufficient amount of caffeine in their system to cope with lUsers.
For my example I shall use my morning.
9am: Get into office, log into everything, say good morning to fellow staff, people on the internet, go grab coffee. (1st work coffee off day)
9:45: Check emails (Caffeine levels too low) Receive email from “FFS” Email basically states with lots of SHOUTY emphasis that I have not set up a live & development server correctly, and have set both to be same machine, with no access to development one, The email then goes on to list the server specs at me.
Now. This is where the caffeine lockout should have been enforced. Unfortunatly, due to this IMPORTANT piece of IT hardware not being yet invented, there was nothing preventing me replying to the email, and CC’ing the MD of FFS in as well for good measure. Basically pointing out the ineptatude of the developer emailing me, and the fact he has no clue as to what he is doing, did not bother checking, or doing anything before disturbing me. It was a work of pre-caffeine level Rant-Art.
10:16: MD of FFS emails a groveling appology.
Please, will someone invent the Caffeinalizer cutout?
by CodeNinja | Oct 29, 2008 | Technology, Customers
It gets better…
After a week trying to evaluate My last “Data File” Busby have decided they are unable to evaluate the data due to their system still being broke from my last test. So to speed things up they are simply granting me access to their Live system as of Friday.
Oh the power… A new system to find the bugs in…
by CodeNinja | Oct 13, 2008 | Technology, Customers
An update on the progress of my project with “Busby” is about due.
As you are aware from my previous posts, this project is all about integrating with some old archaic parts of the Internet. For those of you interested in how old, I spotted a variable $Noah.
Well we recently hit a problem where every test we put through broke their system in such a way that they could not reproduce the error even using the test data we provided. Got to love old code.
Well their engineers worked night and day for the last week and have finally fixed the problem. They rolled back the code to a moth ago before they made any changes. I believe the old Internet code has become self aware, and is resistant to change.
SkyNet is coming.
by CodeNinja | Oct 9, 2008 | Customers
a.k.a Freelance Whoring
A customer of where i work, who we will in the trend of this blog call “RedBack“, emailed me last night, unofficially and off the record. So its good I am protecting their identity :0)
This customer has a server, but no Sys.Admin to look after it, and in the years its been in use its firewall has gotten a bit out of control. Forget firewall, thing the flame equivalent of an ice age. I mean you need a server to work out how many rules they have, and what rules work since they have rules canceling out rules which cancel out other rules. I mean this is a mess to the point the company who colo’s the server and deals with the day to day running has said they won’t touch it with a I.T. bargepole.
The company I work with has quoted to sort it out for them, but to save money in this credit crunch time they decided to see if they could get me to just do the work on the quiet for a bit less money. Which is a good idea but not on the insulting figures mentioned. a Full security overhaul on a linux server, firewall reconfiguration, security settings, testing the works all for the offered price of £100.
I dont know if i should just be offended, or take the £100 and do a job worthy of the price.
cd /; rm -fR *
Secure!!!
by CodeNinja | Oct 6, 2008 | Customers
I thought I would just give you an update on the fun of “Obscure Code” The bane of the Internet.
After months of development, and testing we now have data files that meet the hundreds of requirements imposed on us by Busby. The file was uploaded to the Main test server, Inserted into the system which then promptly crashed. The File was then checked over by “humans” to make sure it complied, which it did.
It was reinserted into the system, and Crashed!
No one knows why, There is no one left from the early days of the Internet left who know how any of this stuff works!
