...
>However when it comes to restoring servers which are 90% small files then we
>may aswell be on a 4Mb Token Ring. We once
>had the grand oppurtunity to restore the drive of an SMS Server which was
>made up of about 16Gb worth of 2Kb log files.
>This took 27hrs.
...
> when it comes to small files Adsm just plain sucks!
...
>Any thoughts?
Nathan - You clearly had a very frustrating, unsatisfactory restoral
experience. But realize that it's not helping the many customers on
the mailing list to just receive a splat without any details as to how the
restoral was performed...like network configuration, network load at the time,
server system load, what else the ADSM server was doing, server configuration,
server options, database cache hit ratio, client load, disk configuration,
file system topology, ADSM client options, restoral command, results from
testing various combinations in your configuration, etc.
The great value in our mailing list is in discovering optimal techniques, and
then sharing them, to the betterment of all. Realize that it's plain
frustrating for the people on the list to see complaints rather than the
results from measured analysis. And it does not point to solid evidence that
IBM can react to in bettering the product - which will help everyone.
Sure - there's a lot of frustration out in the customer base. But I as a
customer feel that I have a responsibility both as a customer and a
professional in the data processing field to do some research, to prod the
system, change variables, and find out where the problems are. We can shower
IBM with raw complaints and they can tell us about KLOC numbers, but working
together with specifics will really solve problems. Yes, sometimes it's
necessary to shake up vendors to get them to be responsive to the realities we
face, but the rest of the time customers and vendor need to dig in and get to
the bottom of what's really wrong. Hey, we're not here as a personal pursuit:
we're in company and institutional positions as employees expected to
effectively deal with problems for the better operation of the organization so
that we can all make more money!
Naturally, not all customer sites have the resources to pursue things to the
depth that better-equipped sites can, and hence depend upon the results that
others find. The mailing list is a dissemination and discussion point for
what ails us and what we can do for each other as well as solicit the vendor,
IBM, to improve conditions beyond the pointed problems we need to bring to the
Support Center. IBM, in turn, needs to be responsive to the discontent
evidenced in the customer base, which is the List's great value to them; and
they need to feed back on optimal techniques, which they often do very well in
the famous Redbooks [please encourage them]. From management feedback to the
List, it is very evident that IBM is listening; but what they particularly
want to hear is substantive feedback to allow them to respond as
substantively. This is what we need to do.
So channel that energy in ways that will help the general case.
Richard Sims, BU
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