• (cs)

    So, you pulled the plug without having a quick look to see what was plugged in?

  • (cs)

    The developers are responsible for the UPS?

  • Andrew (unregistered) in reply to Roby McAndrew
    Roby McAndrew:
    So, you pulled the plug without having a quick look to see what was plugged in?

    Better that it dying in a power outage during a vital month-end production run. Sometimes you gotta let people bump their heads. We once had a staging server (in the form of a workstation on my desk) that business was using for critical work. No matter what we said, we couldn't motivate the IT management to move the environment to a proper server.

    So we pulled the LAN cable at a 'safe' time. Business started freaking out, system admins were all "we have no record of that on our racks. It's not part of our SLA", meetings were held and the environment was moved to something decent. No data was lost.

    A month later we had heavy rainfall and a roof leak that tripped everything in my office. Server room was safe tho.

  • (cs)

    Seriously... call Kenny Loggins.

  • RFoxmich (unregistered) in reply to Roby McAndrew
    Roby McAndrew:
    So, you pulled the plug without having a quick look to see what was plugged in?

    So you're saying he should have checked frist?

  • (cs) in reply to Roby McAndrew
    Roby McAndrew:
    So, you pulled the plug without having a quick look to see what was plugged in?

    You can see something is attached to the UPS, but there's no way of knowing if the UPS software is working. Yes, he could have gone and investigate who is responsible of those server and the status of the UPS software, but then, he wouldn't be called "Maverick" and we would have another Classical WTF.

  • Dennis (unregistered) in reply to Roby McAndrew
    Roby McAndrew:
    So, you pulled the plug without having a quick look to see what was plugged in?

    U'r thinking backwards... The best way to check what is plugged into the UPS is to pull the plug.

  • (cs) in reply to ubersoldat
    ubersoldat:
    Roby McAndrew:
    So, you pulled the plug without having a quick look to see what was plugged in?

    You can see something is attached to the UPS, but there's no way of knowing if the UPS software is working. Yes, he could have gone and investigate who is responsible of those server and the status of the UPS software

    That wouldn't solve the problem, though, because the problem isn't that three servers were plugged into the wrong UPS, but that servers were not being correctly configured and installed with the required level of process and documentation.

  • löchlein deluxe (unregistered)

    Worst thing about that? It invalidates the measured time the UPS will S the P U, because there's unexpected load.

  • QJo (unregistered) in reply to TDWTF123
    TDWTF123:
    ubersoldat:
    Roby McAndrew:
    So, you pulled the plug without having a quick look to see what was plugged in?

    You can see something is attached to the UPS, but there's no way of knowing if the UPS software is working. Yes, he could have gone and investigate who is responsible of those server and the status of the UPS software

    That wouldn't solve the problem, though, because the problem isn't that three servers were plugged into the wrong UPS, but that servers were not being correctly configured and installed with the required level of process and documentation.

    I'll endorse this.

    Until people have made an embarrassing and/or costly mistake, they don't take working processes seriously, whether they're correct use of source repositories, a rigorous use of versioning, whatever

    Some people, of course, never do learn, although this seems not to have been the case here, making this a mild WTF (just a minor procedural hiccup which is subsequently adequately corrected by management).

  • ¯\(°_o)/¯ I DUNNO LOL (unregistered)

    TRWTF is that he didn't put these in the unused outlets:

    Child Safety Outlet Protector

    He's lucky the mainframe guys didn't electrocute themselves by sticking a screwdriver in the holes!

  • ANON (unregistered)

    Some guys made a minor mistake and used the wrong power outlet. The error was detected fast and caused no serious harm. The guys understood that it was their mistake and are willing to learn how to make it better in the future. Nobody got fired and nobody left the company. So even a happy end.

    Maybe this story should move to thedailybestpractice.com.

  • a_non-E_mouse (unregistered)

    TRWTF is unplugging a live UPS... Hello ground loop!

  • (cs) in reply to ANON
    ANON:
    Some guys made a minor mistake and used the wrong power outlet. The error was detected fast and caused no serious harm. The guys understood that it was their mistake and are willing to learn how to make it better in the future. Nobody got fired and nobody left the company. So even a happy end.

    Maybe this story should move to thedailybestpractice.com.

    So "Best Practice" dictates that when connecting new servers (or any other equipment, actually) to power, you just plug them into some random sockets that you don't know what they are?

    No, I don't think so. But I agree that the net level of WTF today is fairly weak.

    C- could do better.

  • (cs) in reply to a_non-E_mouse
    a_non-E_mouse:
    TRWTF is unplugging a live UPS... Hello ground loop!
    Once you unplug it, its ground will float(*), surely, and so will the equipment's ground. The ground loop is only a problem when the UPS is plugged into one ground, and some other equipment connected by e.g. network cables to the "protected" equipment is plugged into a different ground. When you unplug the UPS, there's no loop.

    My favorite ground loop was one I heard about about twenty years ago. A network cable (a sort of ARCnet-like thing running over 75-ohm coax backbone) was connected between two buildings, one at the top of a hill, one at the bottom. The run was long enough to protect the cable from the consequences - the signal ground was carrying several amps.

    (*) I'm not saying that having a floating ground is a good thing, but it isn't as bad as a loop.

  • Chris (unregistered)

    GOD dammit, Maverick!

  • Bananas (unregistered) in reply to löchlein deluxe
    löchlein deluxe:
    Worst thing about that? It invalidates the measured time the UPS will S the P U, because there's unexpected load.
    +1
  • Proposal (unregistered)

    I propose that WTF submissions be made into one liners if their content does not warrant the extra words/paragraphs.

    Todays article: Nincompoops at Govt. Dept. plugged in their servers into UPS, and then chose not to install UPS monitoring software, resulting in problems.

    Seriously, do we need to involve the Thermodynamic heat death of the universe in this ?

  • foo (unregistered) in reply to ANON
    ANON:
    Some guys made a minor mistake and used the wrong power outlet. The error was detected fast and caused no serious harm. The guys understood that it was their mistake and are willing to learn how to make it better in the future. Nobody got fired and nobody left the company. So even a happy end.

    Maybe this story should move to thedailybestpractice.com.

    He just omitted the obligatory closing paragraph:

    Pete began updating his resume when, by a quantum-tunneling warp occurring in the space-time continuum, he heard about the President's daughter ...

  • PG4 (unregistered)

    Talk to me Goose....

    Server room power, the stories I could tell. You don't want to know about color blind UAW guys that wired up half the room's ground and neutrals wrong. 7 amps of ground current at the power disto unit.

  • Steve (unregistered) in reply to Steve The Cynic
    Steve The Cynic:
    ANON:
    Some guys made a minor mistake and used the wrong power outlet. The error was detected fast and caused no serious harm. The guys understood that it was their mistake and are willing to learn how to make it better in the future. Nobody got fired and nobody left the company. So even a happy end.

    Maybe this story should move to thedailybestpractice.com.

    So "Best Practice" dictates that when connecting new servers (or any other equipment, actually) to power, you just plug them into some random sockets that you don't know what they are?

    No, I don't think so. But I agree that the net level of WTF today is fairly weak.

    C- could do better.

    Today at my workplace, someone made a fairly common mistake. No harm was done, and they learned not to do it again. Submit to internetFailSite!

    I think that everyone that uses UPSs on a regular basis has done the "plugged computer into UPS, didn't install the UPS software" error.

  • (cs)

    So the UPS had three extra servers plugged in, and the runtime didn't drop enough to raise an eyebrow? Hmmmmm.

  • ¯\(°_o)/¯ I DUNNO LOL (unregistered)

    The President's daughter was ready to bring up her server. She looked around for a power outlet to plug it into. Right or wrong, she decided to plug it into the orange outlet, because orange was her favorite color.*

    *If she was the Prime Minister's daughter, orange would have been her favourite colour.

  • (cs)

    Sometimes, particularly when government departments are involved, the only way to prove a point is to simply cause the problem you were trying to warn about....

  • (cs) in reply to tin
    tin:
    Sometimes, particularly when government departments are involved, the only way to prove a point is to simply cause the problem you were trying to warn about....

    Don't cause problems... that's sabotage, and likely to annoy people into firing/prosecuting you.

    Instead, simply allow them to happen, on the basis that you were told to do something that allows them to happen (and have the email trail to prove that you warned them all and were ignored).

  • (cs) in reply to Proposal
    Proposal:
    Seriously, do we need to involve the Thermodynamic heat death of the universe in this ?

    The article is talking about a government agency making tech changes, using the heat death of the universe is an easy point of reference.

    Alternative measurement scales are in committee meetings (CM) and Forms in Triplicate (FiT) but those numbers can get a bit too big and unwieldy for easy calculations.

  • Nagesh (unregistered) in reply to ANON
    ANON:
    Some guys made a minor mistake and used the wrong power outlet. The error was detected fast and caused no serious harm. The guys understood that it was their mistake and are willing to learn how to make it better in the future. Nobody got fired and nobody left the company. So even a happy end.

    Maybe this story should move to thedailybestpractice.com.

    More like thedailyreadingcomprehensionfailure.com. They didn't plug anything into "the wrong hole". They failed to set up their systems properly to handle when the UPS was on battery power.

  • The Real WTF (unregistered)

    Right or wrong, it's just the way UPS shutdowns have always been handled in large financial firms.

  • Hath1 (unregistered)

    [quote user="Dan Adams-Jacobson"]Every quarter, at a scheduled time, they would pull the plug on the UPS and ensure the server shut down gracefully before the batteries died. And the server always did.[\quote]

    [quote user="Dan Adams-Jacobson"]Once the batteries were flat, Chris would record the maximum emergency window provided by the UPS[\quote]

    Why has no one mentioned that since the server had been shutting down properly, removing all productive load from the UPS, the "maximum emergency window" would be totally meaningless (and probably taking many hours as well before battery flat-line)?

  • Hath1 (unregistered) in reply to Hath1
    Hath1:
    Dan Adams-Jacobson:
    Every quarter, at a scheduled time, they would pull the plug on the UPS and ensure the server shut down gracefully before the batteries died. And the server always did.
    Dan Adams-Jacobson:
    Once the batteries were flat, Chris would record the maximum emergency window provided by the UPS

    Why has no one mentioned that since the server had been shutting down properly, removing all productive load from the UPS, the "maximum emergency window" would be totally meaningless (and probably taking many hours as well before battery flat-line)?

    ...TRWTF is mixing up forward slashes and back slashes...

  • a_non-E_mouse (unregistered) in reply to Steve The Cynic

    Of course you are correct - its a floating ground, i just minced my words.

    Of course, the floating ground can be dangerous to machine or person in environment where there are other "grounded" grounds.

  • Bob (unregistered) in reply to ¯\(°_o)/¯ I DUNNO LOL
    ¯\(°_o)/¯ I DUNNO LOL:
    The President's daughter was ready to bring up her server. She looked around for a power outlet to plug it into. Right or wrong, she decided to plug it into the orange outlet, because orange was her favorite color.*

    *If she was the Prime Minister's daughter, orange would have been her favourite colour.

    Please show a little sensitivity. I had a son whose favourite colour was orange, and let me tell you it was no laughing matter.

  • C-Derb (unregistered) in reply to Hath1
    Hath1:

    ...TRWTF is not using the Preview button...

    FTFY

  • Billy T (unregistered) in reply to a_non-E_mouse
    a_non-E_mouse:
    Of course you are correct - its a floating ground, i just minced my words.

    Of course, the floating ground can be dangerous to machine or person in environment where there are other "grounded" grounds.

    lol ground doesn't float

  • Chris Q (unregistered)

    Being the maverick named in the (dramatised) account above, perhaps I should make the following points:

    1. Without crawling under desks, it was not possible to see what was plugged into the UPS - all I knew is that our server was.

    2. Rather than physically unplugging the UPS, all I did was switch off the power outlet that the well labelled UPS power cord was plugged in to.

    3. The maximum battery time was measured to have some idea of the battery condition. If the time available dropped markedly, we would assume that the batteries were in need of replacement. The first time we saw a markedly reduced battery life (though still sufficient for a graceful shutdown of our server) was the occasion mentioned above.

    4. I contend that the WTF here was not mine, but rather the idiot who plugged production servers into a piece of kit that was, to him, unknown and undocumented. It was documented in our procedures, and the other team was aware that we looked after our own kit.

  • Guestimate (unregistered) in reply to Nagesh
    Nagesh:
    They didn't plug anything into "the wrong hole".
    I beg to differ. The outlets where quite distinctive from all other outlets (the story mentiones "blaze orange"). They plugged their equipment in regardless.

    It was as much the "the wrong hole" as "the wrong people for the (installment) job".

    Nagesh:
    They failed to set up their systems properly to handle when the UPS was on battery power.
    Why should they set up any UPS related software on an outlet that was, to them, as normal as any other, non "blaze orange" ones ? That does not make sense ... :-)
  • Anon (unregistered) in reply to Bob
    Bob:
    ¯\(°_o)/¯ I DUNNO LOL:
    The President's daughter was ready to bring up her server. She looked around for a power outlet to plug it into. Right or wrong, she decided to plug it into the orange outlet, because orange was her favorite color.*

    *If she was the Prime Minister's daughter, orange would have been her favourite colour.

    Please show a little sensitivity. I had a son whose favourite colour was orange, and let me tell you it was no laughing matter.

    Your tense speaks volumes.

  • C-Derb (unregistered) in reply to Chris Q
    Chris Q:
    Being the maverick named in the (dramatised) account above, perhaps I should make the following points:

    1. Without crawling under desks, it was not possible to see what was plugged into the UPS - all I knew is that our server was.

    2. Rather than physically unplugging the UPS, all I did was switch off the power outlet that the well labelled UPS power cord was plugged in to.

    3. The maximum battery time was measured to have some idea of the battery condition. If the time available dropped markedly, we would assume that the batteries were in need of replacement. The first time we saw a markedly reduced battery life (though still sufficient for a graceful shutdown of our server) was the occasion mentioned above.

    4. I contend that the WTF here was not mine, but rather the idiot who plugged production servers into a piece of kit that was, to him, unknown and undocumented. It was documented in our procedures, and the other team was aware that we looked after our own kit.

    You didn't need to clarify any of that. There's idiots on this site that like to play devil's advocate, no matter how obvious it is that their argument is beyond stupid:

    Roby McAndrew:
    So, you pulled the plug without having a quick look to see what was plugged in?
    Clearly anyone plugging something into a UPS that they don't manage should have at least told you about it. This is just more evidence of what happens when people assume they know what they are doing.
  • (cs) in reply to Nagesh
    Nagesh:
    ANON:
    Some guys made a minor mistake and used the wrong power outlet. The error was detected fast and caused no serious harm. The guys understood that it was their mistake and are willing to learn how to make it better in the future. Nobody got fired and nobody left the company. So even a happy end.

    Maybe this story should move to thedailybestpractice.com.

    More like thedailyreadingcomprehensionfailure.com. They didn't plug anything into "the wrong hole". They failed to set up their systems properly to handle when the UPS was on battery power.

    Your use of double quotes implies that you believe that is what ANON said. But he didn't. So you're an idiot.

    Secondly, they DID plug stuff into the wrong hole, as that UPS was for the systems owned and controlled by a different team, they had no permission to use the UPS, and they wouldn't have known how to set it up properly even if they had permission.

    So, er, maybe you ought to either:

    1. Stop pretending to be an Indian idiot.
    2. Learn English a bit better, and stop attempting to correct people on their English when its their native fucking tongue.
  • (cs)

    Dear Dan Adams-Jacobson,

    You do not need to describe Top Gun as "1986's Tom Cruise / Val Kilmer vehicle". You can just say "Top Gun". People will know what you're talking about. Honestly.

  • (cs) in reply to eViLegion
    eViLegion:
    So, er, maybe you ought to either: 1) Stop pretending to be an Indian idiot. 2) Learn English a bit better, and stop attempting to correct people on their English when its their native fucking tongue.
    You must be new here. Nagesh is a troll. Stop feeding it.
  • (cs) in reply to Zylon

    I just spoke to a girl last night who has never seen Scarface. She claimed to be a huge movie buff.

  • Muphry (unregistered) in reply to eViLegion
    eViLegion:
    2) Learn English a bit better, and stop attempting to correct people on their English when its their native fscking tongue.

    *it's...

  • (cs) in reply to Zylon
    Zylon:
    eViLegion:
    So, er, maybe you ought to either: 1) Stop pretending to be an Indian idiot. 2) Learn English a bit better, and stop attempting to correct people on their English when its their native fucking tongue.
    You must be new here. Nagesh is a troll. Stop feeding it.

    I do know that he's pretending to be an Indian idiot. Thats why I told him to stop pretending to be an Indian idiot. Sorry, what were you explaining again?

  • (cs) in reply to Muphry
    Muphry:
    eViLegion:
    2) Learn English a bit better, and stop attempting to correct people on their English when its their native fscking tongue.

    *it's...

    Well done, you corrected someone typing on a phone. Not too original.

    At least I can spell my own name right though, eh Murphy?

    (Just so you know, single character omissions are the most common form of typographical error, so if you see a missing apostrophe and assume that the person typing doesn't understand grammar, nine times out of ten you're wrong, and wrong in the most pathetic way imaginable.)

  • (cs) in reply to eViLegion
    eViLegion:
    Muphry:
    eViLegion:
    2) Learn English a bit better, and stop attempting to correct people on their English when its their native fscking tongue.

    *it's...

    Well done, you corrected someone typing on a phone. Not too original.

    At least I can spell my own name right though, eh Murphy?

    (Just so you know, single character omissions are the most common form of typographical error, so if you see a missing apostrophe and assume that the person typing doesn't understand grammar, nine times out of ten you're wrong, and wrong in the most pathetic way imaginable.)

    Look up "Muphry's Law"

  • (cs)

    So were the mainframe developers in a zone.......of danger?

  • (cs) in reply to eViLegion
    eViLegion:
    I do know that he's pretending to be an Indian idiot. Thats why I told him to stop pretending to be an Indian idiot. Sorry, what were you explaining again?
    What a "troll" is. You seem to be unclear on the concept.

    Tip: If you're responding, he's winning.

  • (cs) in reply to Zylon
    Zylon:
    Tip: If you're responding, he's winning.

    ;P

  • (cs) in reply to chubertdev
    chubertdev:
    Look up "Muphry's Law"

    Oh jesus.

    Look guys. Someone corrects a typo, being all amusing, and using an obvious typo themselves as their name.

    The counter move is to point out that obvious mistake to them (as though they're stupid for not noticing), because it's fucking annoying if people don't seem to get jokes/references that you've made (and worse still, seem to think you're an idiot for making those mistakes).

    Its no bloody fun if some other cunt comes along and explains what needs to be looked up. The whole thing collapses into sensible-ness.

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