At Zenoss, we replace a lot of legacy monitoring systems. From time to time we’ll share a customer‘s story about the stuff we’re replacing. Product names are changed to protect the guilty. Customer names are changed to avoid embarrassment. The stories are real; the quotes are altered for humor. We guess. – Moderator.
Mr. Ed, a senior architect at a service provider, talked to us about how his company had become saddled with bits of legacy monitoring tack.
“We’d thrown a shoe,” said Mr. Ed. “Whenever there was a problem with the first router beyond the firewall, we’d get 19,000 availability events in the console. The hands were busy grooming instead of riding out to fix problems.”
There were too many false positives, too. “People thought our monitoring was run by a bunch of rodeo clowns,” Mr. Ed hoarsely exclaimed. “We couldn’t keep things stable. Whenever it was time to saddle up a new server or router, we’d have to bed it down in six different systems.” They even custom-built a reporting system just to track which systems each device was recorded in.
“I’m just glad our customers hadn’t bolted,” snorted Mr. Ed. “We were handicapped by a lack of information and weren’t tracking availability successfully.”
With Zenoss, Mr. Ed is happy. “Mucking out took a while, and there wasn’t a pony under all that manure after all. But the new Zenoss barn is working out just great. We’re running faster than ever and I’m picking us to win.”
Coming soon - I Hate my Monitoring: “What a bunch of turkeys”. Check out other stories from the I Hate my Monitoring Series!
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