Tom:

Your story regarding the VA hospital sounds a lot like mine with regard to
our company's computing networks.  Originally they had good sized token
ring network, running over coaxial cable. It was set up so that when anyone
got on it who was ever doing anything, everyone would slow down.  I checked
and the users home directories were scattered all over it, so it would
generate large amounts of needless network traffic.  When it came time to
replace the ring with a switched ethernet network, these braintrusts put
everyone on the same subnet and still had the home directories strewed all
over the place. When I got wind of this, I had a list of recommendations
ready, that were created based upon what I saw and experienced when I used
it.  My recommendations were to create a 10/100 base-T network using
switches and routers to segment it into managable pieces. The 10/100 based
equipment would allow the older computers with slower networking cards to
interoperate with newer computers that had the faster networking.  Subnets
would be used to keep most of the local traffic on the local segement.  The
 primary directories used by people would be on the computers sitting on
their desks, and automated backups would be performed using available
equipment during off hours to reduce the impact to users. I also
recommended backup servers that would mirror the primary servers and take
over if the primary ones failed.

The people in charge of this exercise told me that they didn't need my
suggestions because I didn't know what I was talking about and because
they'd brought in an outside expert to handle the design of the
replacement. They initially  installed 10-base-T ethernet and switches
which were already outdated.  All this stuff got replaced several times
because the people in charge let incompetent people get into the loop, and
buy the cheapest stuff out there, much of it from people no one ever heard
of.  Their excuse for not installing 100-base-T wiring and switches was
that they didn't know how to "terminate that type of cables" 
When they finally got around to installing 100-base-T switches and routers,
they chose them from a company no one ever heard of , and wound up having
to pull it all out again when they could not get support. After multiple
"infrustructure upgrades" (rip out the crap, then put in new
crap) we still have networks where large numbers of computers are unusable
when a server someplace goes down.  They replaced functioning unix mail and
file servers with cheaper and highly unstable Windows servers and now even
more outages occur when viruses get through their just too late
scanners/filters.  The scanners/filters themselves are sapping enough 
performance from the systems they reside on to make them barely usable.
Knowledgable users were able to troubleshoot and fix problems as well as
create work-around solutions until the actual problems could be repaired,
as well as help the other users with their problems.  We had very few
system administrators for a very large number of computers, and even fewer
techs.  Now we have teams of people who have the job of directing other
teams of people to come troubleshoot and fix problems - the users can do
NOTHING until this happens.

Braintrusts... you wish you could do without them....

On 03/07/2004 07:43 AM, Tom_Walker wrote:

>Know exacticaly what you are talking about. While in schooling I am
>basicly Illiterate I got along quite well in my wroking years.
>Even in my Years in the Navys Nuclear Power Program we had to fight that
>stuff, Brain Dead Management.
>And it was even worse during the 20 years I spent in the Engineering
>Department of a VA Hospital.
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