First Post, it had better be a good one!
Hi Folks, this is the first post on my personal blog. If this is boring or sleep invoking then I am willing to bet that no one will ever come back. So I have decided to start out with some hopefully funny IT humor. Later I will get dreadfully serious when posting about topics like Backup, Data Protection, and all things Kubernetes.
The Bad Old Days of Wild West Backups
I have been working in IT for a long time. A long time at first sounds cool and adds to the depth of your resume when applying for jobs. However, there comes a time when a long time is no longer that much fun. For example, when one of your co-workers declares “when I was in grade school”, and you realize that you were already working at that time. I won’t even mention every New Year’s Eve. You can’t help but thinking, weren’t we supposed to be all on space ships exploring the galaxy by now?
When I started working in IT, Backup was that task that nobody wanted. The software and hardware were not great and inevitably restores would fail.
My First Job and First Problem
It was during my first week. I clearly remember some very important manager storming into the IT office demanding an immediate restore. He had managed to navigate the empty computer boxes barricade that had been strategically put up at the door. This was done with the hope to discourage those who refused to use the ticketing system for requests. This exquisitely dressed Director of the Do Nothing Department was in a foul mood. He claimed that things were just deleted and demanded an immediate restore. Files and folders always “become deleted”, or are somehow passively deleted? However, the task of restoring is always in the 2nd person, in other words: you!
I remoted into the backup server and fired up the software (can’t remember the software name, perhaps Backup Execution? that would properly convey the end result of both successful and failed restores).
The big wig manager helped me navigate in the super slow tape restore GUI and I have to compliment him on holding his demeanor when pointing out that it was the “family vacation photos” which were the target of our restore.
Over time I began to believe that computers have some form of intelligence and personality. Yes I have seen HAL 9000 in the film Space Odyssey 2001 but it does seem that they get moody. 2001 Space Odyssey but we are now in 2022!
A Restore that Failed
Then there is this Karma thing. Our macho manager was getting more and more impatient as the little hour glass kept turning up and down with a tape loading message flashing on the screen. Finally that stopped and a “starting restore” appeared. At this point he believed that he was in the clear. He even asked uninterestingly “how is your day going” and before I could finish answering he replied “good to hear”.
Unfortunately, his day was about to get a lot worse when a big red exclamation mark with the words “Failed” popped up on the screen with an innocent looking link to the logs.
You needed a PHD in physics to decipher these logs. Full of enigmas and riddles like “fatal exception error 2394356245243”, “critical” and “warnings” littered all over the place.
I wasted time trying to make it seem that I actually understood what was going on which further infuriated my corporate internal customer. We were told to view everyone as a customer including our empowered fellow employees. Everyone except ourselves of course. I very quickly came to understand that people like “John Smith” climbed the company ladder by sensing weakness, deception and vulnerability in others and then pouncing on them like some tiger in the jungle. “Do you have any clue about what you are doing?” he asked in a loud tone hoping to catch the hear of my boss.
Saved at the Bell
Luckily for me one of our IT veterans overheard and said with a stone face “looks like the tape drive has had that tape for lunch. We did request funds for a new drive from upper management quite a while ago but got no response”
Upon hearing the words “request funds” the upper management manager made a turn and performed a quick retreat out of our office and while mumbling something under his breath .
On that day I learned a lesson that I would never forget. When surrounded by predatory managerial types who are on the prowl, say out loud “I requested funds”. They will quickly evacuate the area. Works like a charm every time.
PS, his name was not John Smith 🙂