An Eventful Day
Who says that Thursdays have to be dull? Yesterday, Thursday, was pretty eventful for me.
At one of the branch libraries, they've been having problems that began on the 1st. The client software we use for checking items in and out was crashing every few hours; which prompted either logging back in, or rebooting and then logging back in. At first, it was suspected to be a problem with the software or malware. However, the system turned out to be clean. One vital clue was that when the client crashed, other users experienced outages.
During Thursday, I narrowed down the cause to the Internet connection. After several phone calls to Merit, some swapped cables, and more troubleshooting later, we finally tracked down the specific cause. A router, between the library and the world, was dropping too many packets.
Hopefully, Friday morning should open with a trouble-free connection once again.
Why did it take so long to figure this out? First, the problem showed up on Labor Day weekend; so the library was only open on Friday. Plus, on Labor Day, all the libraries and branches were closed. So, it wasn't until Tuesday that I learned of the problem and got busy solving it.
The Internet Connection being the cause wasn't high on the list of possibilities because we've had problems with the client before. Only once more questions were asked, and equipment checked, could things get narrowed down.
At one of the branch libraries, they've been having problems that began on the 1st. The client software we use for checking items in and out was crashing every few hours; which prompted either logging back in, or rebooting and then logging back in. At first, it was suspected to be a problem with the software or malware. However, the system turned out to be clean. One vital clue was that when the client crashed, other users experienced outages.
During Thursday, I narrowed down the cause to the Internet connection. After several phone calls to Merit, some swapped cables, and more troubleshooting later, we finally tracked down the specific cause. A router, between the library and the world, was dropping too many packets.
Hopefully, Friday morning should open with a trouble-free connection once again.
Why did it take so long to figure this out? First, the problem showed up on Labor Day weekend; so the library was only open on Friday. Plus, on Labor Day, all the libraries and branches were closed. So, it wasn't until Tuesday that I learned of the problem and got busy solving it.
The Internet Connection being the cause wasn't high on the list of possibilities because we've had problems with the client before. Only once more questions were asked, and equipment checked, could things get narrowed down.
posted by Technology Coordinator at 12:39 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home