Jane, could you tell us how
you REALLY feel? (ducking)
My PMR is essentially dead. I will share the
response I got from Development and I will also share my response to
development. I'm sorry, folks are going to dislike what I am about to post.
Unfortunately, you all won't know anything about servmon or it's status if I
don't since apparently it's not going to get any attention from anyone anytime
soon.
I just want to re-iterate
to everyone listening - level 2 support team ROCKS! (And I mean all of you).
First Response to the PMR
-----Original Message----- From: (removed) Sent:
Wednesday, November 05, 2003 1:30 PM To: Barr, Scott Subject: RE: PMR
13988
Scott, I got confirmation that servmon will not draw icons
for the services it discovers, it will only populate a smartset with devices
that have the service discovered. The multi-homed boxes should get drawn
in the smartset. I will test your mutli-homed scenario by turning off the
service from the main snmp interface and then seeing if it populates the
smartset.
(removed)
My Response
To: (removed)
cc: Subject: RE: PMR
13988
Do I understand correctly that Windows versions DO draw
the icons?
Here is my problem: My mainframes have 20-30 services
running on them. My main application servers have as many as 100 services
running on them. If a service fails, I have no way of know which one failed.
The icon shows up in the smartset saying "I Have those services you want to
know about" but I have no way of knowing which one.
This seems like a pretty useless feature without that
information and we've been patiently waiting for it since nvsniffer made it's
debut. Please tell me service icons can be created to reflect which services
are down. And if you tell me it works on Windows, and not on Unix, I'm going
to get down right obnoxious since that screams "the code wasn't done
yet".
Sorry to be a pain, but we really really needed this
feature and I am quite dismayed if it isn't actually useful.
Another question, can you provide details about what kind
of code is required for the "discovery test" i.e. does it have to be java? Is
there an archtected return code or something? More details would be very
helpful.
Next Response from Support
From: (removed)
Sent: Friday, November 07, 2003 3:01 PM To: Barr,
Scott Subject: RE: PMR 13988
Scott, Windows version
does draw icons for the services and will display status of the service.
However, it is based on node and not interface, so 3 interfaces each with a
service will only display 1 icon. I don't believe there is a way to create
icons on unix so as to reflect which services are down. I will need to double
check this with L3. I understand your position and frustration. I will
also check on the discovery test issue you raised.
(removed)
To: (removed)
cc: Subject: RE: PMR
13988
(removed) any update? We have a comittment from an
application team to write a status program.
Does it seem to you that the code was maybe released
before it was done? I really like/need the functionality of servmon but I am
sorely disappointed it is so crippled in this release. I'm not a big fan of
"wait until next release" so with there actually being people wanting to use
it, what do you think my chances are of getting one that is
functional?
The status application specs would be
appreciated.
And here is the "*FINAL*" response from
support
Scott, I have checked with L3 and there is no way
to create icons for the services.
WARNING THIS WAS MY FINAL RESPONSE TO
SUPPORT - FLAME ON
First off, let me assure you that I in no way feel that
your support has been anything but perfect. NO L2 complaints here.
Okay. Now, ask them this...
Why not?
If that sounds fascetious I'm sorry. I think this is a
bunch of crap.
Second off, I am once again severely disappointed in L3.
I think once again, a feature was included in a release that was not ready to be
delivered. For goodness sake, if I put my mind to it, I guarantee that I could
write rulesets and database automation to build the services in the map. It
would be a time-consuming, resource-wasting administrative-nightmare kludge or I
would have done it already. But it could be done. The answer "there is no way to
create icons for the services." is obviously incorrect. Of course they could.
They don't want to, have "more important" things to do (Maybe they are working
on my 2 year old enhancement request to allow smarset icons in web client
scopes, but I doubt it). They have icons for everything else. The windows
version has icons. Nothing in the manual/release notes indicates I should not
expect icons for the services.
Why do I need icons? Well, to be honest, our mainframes
and application servers have dozens of ports in use. Not so many that icons
would be prohibitive, but enough that navigating a menu drop down doesn't help
much and a visual cue would be much better. (Especially since the entire
application is driven around a visual entity - the smartset).
I am sure there is zero chance of this PMR being closed
with me being satisfied so you can close it as "L3 won't fix it and the customer
doesn't have any say" Feel free to send it up the escalation chain. And people
wonder why IBM occasionally gets a black eye.
I'm not bitter, just angry and vocal. This is the "new
netview" where the emphasis is on deploying new features as fast as possible and
leave old features broken or castrated (NetView security, native console,
"backup" functionality etc. etc.) I would be happy to discuss this new "feature"
with anyone internally who is interested. And, once again, I volunteer my name
for NetView pre-release/beta/early support testing. In my estimation this code
is broke.
- Scott
Aren't you glad you asked.
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