Bah stupid crazy IT manager jumped to conclusions again

Red Squirrel

No Lifer
May 24, 2003
70,658
13,833
126
www.anyf.ca
So I had this ticket a few days ago about remote users having trouble staying connected, so I decided as a troubleshooting step to set them up a RSA token (our new appliance that has been active for like 2 years yet they wont give us the green light for it to go live) and just give them the user/pass over the phone so they can connect and try that for a day.

You know, just to see if the issue only happens with the old appliance.

Not sure how he found out, but he suddenly jumps to the conclusion that I decided to start migrating everybody over to the RSA, and raises hell with my boss, my boss' boss and other managers. I did not know about this until I went to the office and bumped into my boss and said hi, and had a conversation (I'm off site). He mentioned it and I explained my side of the story. I'm not in trouble at all, and the managers of our company know this guy is a nutcase and take everything he says with a grain of salt, but OMG, pisses me off that he tried to get me in trouble like that and basically made up crap.

I really hope he gets fired one day. He's very manipulative though. He probably sounds very smart when he talks in the senior management meetings and such. He knows nothing about today's IT (vacuum tube computer knowledge is useless today) but he has all these BSes, PHDs and other fancy acronyms in management and such. That's what makes him keep his job I think.

I was also late this morning which was bad on me... but when I walked in he was soap boxing my coworker and I heard the tail end of the conversation. Basically he hates the fact that I do tickets all day (basically, my job) and he does not know what I do. Whenever he asks and I explain he just stops me and basically says he does not care.

Oh and apparently he got a kitten. He can't even clean his house, that cat is going to die before it reaches a year old. :( I heard stories and I was disgusted. He's feeding it tuna from cans. I may be wrong, but I don't think that's a very healthy cat diet... it's ok as a snack, but every day? He can't manage IT, and he probably can't manage a cat, either.

What a nutcase... I just needed to rant. Feel better now. :twisted:

I need to start a dilbert style comic based on stuff that goes on at my work.
 

Mr. Pedantic

Diamond Member
Feb 14, 2010
5,027
0
76
How does the idea that he is mistreating his cat (which I don't think he is) somehow relate to the idea that he is bad at what he does? He doesn't have a vet degree, does he?
 

rudeguy

Lifer
Dec 27, 2001
47,351
14
61
office_space_kit_mat.jpg
 

Red Squirrel

No Lifer
May 24, 2003
70,658
13,833
126
www.anyf.ca
Leave a brown squirrel in his cubicle. :p

Oh we always joke about stuff like that. Pooping in his office would be pretty funny and satisfying tbh.

I've thought of jumping ships, but I'm happy with the company I work for, just hate having to deal with him. (he's not our manager, he's just the customer)

There are rumors the whole IT department of that customer might get taken over so we'll get "laid off" which means we go back to our main office and they'll place us somewhere else. I'm kind of hoping this happens.
 

Red Squirrel

No Lifer
May 24, 2003
70,658
13,833
126
www.anyf.ca
BS, not even close. This guy is not proactive at all while I am. I'm the type of guy "just do it". For example if a new security patch comes out for windows, my first thought is to test it real quick then push it out. If it breaks something, lets deal with it and move on. Faster then planning for months and still something goes wrong.

But him it's "we can't be pushing out a patch in a production environment! what if something breaks?" We are YEARS behind in patching because of him. Heck, he wont even allow us to do a mass change of the local admin password. Everybody and their dog knows it. He is unwilling to take any small risks even if it will fix a big risk.

In a way I kind of hope we get hacked one day, we can tell him "Told you so, we should of changed that password" though he will just make up some BS saying he told us to change it. I am pretty sure we got that in writing though. We try to do that as best as we can so we can cover our butt form his nonsense.
 

Capt Caveman

Lifer
Jan 30, 2005
34,543
651
126
BS, not even close. This guy is not proactive at all while I am. I'm the type of guy "just do it". For example if a new security patch comes out for windows, my first thought is to test it real quick then push it out. If it breaks something, lets deal with it and move on. Faster then planning for months and still something goes wrong.

But him it's "we can't be pushing out a patch in a production environment! what if something breaks?" We are YEARS behind in patching because of him. Heck, he wont even allow us to do a mass change of the local admin password. Everybody and their dog knows it. He is unwilling to take any small risks even if it will fix a big risk.

In a way I kind of hope we get hacked one day, we can tell him "Told you so, we should of changed that password" though he will just make up some BS saying he told us to change it. I am pretty sure we got that in writing though. We try to do that as best as we can so we can cover our butt form his nonsense.

I'd rather have the other guy than you. Our company doesn't allow patches to be released into production without thorough testing, acceptance and sign-off. With the large variety of applications, systems, customizations, etc., I've experienced thru testing Oracle patches that break other functionality, Window security patches that cause Client PCs not able to connect to internal systems. Complete departments not being able to work til everyone's pc have been re-imagined.

You have much to learn.
 

BTA

Senior member
Jun 7, 2005
862
0
71
I hope I never have to work with either of you

The way you work, might fly at some medium sized company who doesn't know any better, but if you were working in a big company environment you'd be fired quickly.
 
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guyver01

Lifer
Sep 25, 2000
22,135
5
61
I'd rather have the other guy than you. Our company doesn't allow patches to be released into production without thorough testing, acceptance and sign-off. With the large variety of applications, systems, customizations, etc., I've experienced thru testing Oracle patches that break other functionality, Window security patches that cause Client PCs not able to connect to internal systems. Complete departments not being able to work til everyone's pc have been re-imagined.

You have much to learn.


This.

One of our vendors decided to push a patch to one of our applications, without telling us.

Apparently this patch is incompatible with another Microsoft Security patch (they knew that), so they recommend not installing either (1) the security patch, or (2) their patch.

Well, we had to install the Microsoft Security patch, as it fixed other issues we were experiencing across the footprint.

As soon as the vendor pushed the patch, the application came crashing down. It took us about 15min to figure out what occurred, and back out the patches.

Total cost from our Problem Inquiry?
250 users impacted x $6.37 = $1,592

Fifteen hundred bucks lost... in 13 minutes... due to the fact someone decided to simply install a patch and not see what it would affect.
 

Matthiasa

Diamond Member
May 4, 2009
5,755
23
81
Eh that would have been that maximum cost caused from the employees... assuming that all of them were being fully productive at the time which is unlikely. The real loss would have been any data that would have been lost due to the crash.
 

guyver01

Lifer
Sep 25, 2000
22,135
5
61
Eh that would have been that maximum cost caused from the employees... assuming that all of them were being fully productive at the time which is unlikely.

250 users were actively logged in and using the application.

Trust me.. we have logs of what they're doing. If an account was idle.. it's not considered active.
 

cliftonite

Diamond Member
Jul 15, 2001
6,900
63
91
I'd rather have the other guy than you. Our company doesn't allow patches to be released into production without thorough testing, acceptance and sign-off. With the large variety of applications, systems, customizations, etc., I've experienced thru testing Oracle patches that break other functionality, Window security patches that cause Client PCs not able to connect to internal systems. Complete departments not being able to work til everyone's pc have been re-imagined.

You have much to learn.

Yup same here. Hotfixes typically get 2 weeks of testing before they are rolled out. Then they are rolled out to pilot (these people don't interact with customers so if shit happens it isn't a total loss) and finally production (sometimes there are multiple pilots).
 

Sea Moose

Diamond Member
May 12, 2009
6,933
7
76
i am not in IT and i cant say i really understand how it works,

But i shall ask this.

Why cant you have a bitch pc that isnt on the network to test your new programs on? You can see how the new patch affect that stand alone pc and fix issues from there.

No down time = win?
 

guyver01

Lifer
Sep 25, 2000
22,135
5
61
Why cant you have a bitch pc that isnt on the network to test your new programs on? You can see how the new patch affect that stand alone pc and fix issues from there.

No down time = win?


That's usually how it works.

You have a Development Environment... a Test Environment ... and a Production Environment.

You basically want to design the changes in Dev... try 'em out in Test (cuz test is supposed to mirror prod) .. then implement in Prod when nothing gets messed up in test.