Jump to content

Schools Broadband - Service Credit for Outage

Wubbalubbadub
 Share

Recommended Posts

caffrey

caffrey

Posted
Posted

When I had on prem Smoothwall it was down once, and it was down that once due to the accounts dept. forgetting to pay the broadband supplier one month.

 

All I've learnt from this is that cloud based isn't the answer - looks like Smoothwall are going that way too. If I had a network or other issue on my Smoothwall box I could fix it myself in no time, now I need to wait 3 days for support to get a service working.

 

I guess that's just how it is now

Primus

Primus

Posted
Posted
When I had on prem Smoothwall it was down once, and it was down that once due to the accounts dept. forgetting to pay the broadband supplier one month.

 

All I've learnt from this is that cloud based isn't the answer - looks like Smoothwall are going that way too. If I had a network or other issue on my Smoothwall box I could fix it myself in no time, now I need to wait 3 days for support to get a service working.

 

I guess that's just how it is now

 

Just because SBB's cloud based offering is pants doesn't mean that all cloud based providers are!

  • Thanks 2
paulkerton

paulkerton

Posted
Posted (edited)
All I've learnt from this is that cloud based isn't the answer

 

I don't think that's the lesson to learn from this at all. Many cloud filters work perfectly well without these issues, because they are instances created for your institution.

I'm sure Netsweeper would not be an issue if there was an instance for each customer, and that doesn't seem to be the case here. It feels like it's scaled for everyone, and it's kinda fudged to make that "work".

I would say the lesson is "use the right tool for the job".

Edited by paulkerton
  • Thanks 1
SVM

SVM

Posted
Posted

I would be interested in recommendations for cloud based filtering providers that have had little downtime in the past 3 years, PM if preferred

 

I find broadband lines do not go down and I find cloud based firewall do not go down either which just leaves the filtering and would prefer cloud if possible (have started installing onsite systems for smaller sites) but its easier to manage cloud and normally more cost effective

  • Thanks 1
mthomas08

mthomas08

Posted
Posted
Just because SBB's cloud based offering is pants doesn't mean that all cloud based providers are!

 

Agreed. I've still questioned the over reliance on Cloud systems (I even hate the term because it indicates that its a magical fairy in the sky).

 

Our firewall system is Orbital Net and again, no issues in 3 years.

 

EduLink which is housed externally hasn't gone down once I think since we connected up back in June 2019. The only issues has been our SIMs server.... and not hardware related either.... but that's a whole different problem.

Wubbalubbadub

Wubbalubbadub

Posted
  • Author
Posted
When I had on prem Smoothwall it was down once, and it was down that once due to the accounts dept. forgetting to pay the broadband supplier one month.

 

All I've learnt from this is that cloud based isn't the answer - looks like Smoothwall are going that way too. If I had a network or other issue on my Smoothwall box I could fix it myself in no time, now I need to wait 3 days for support to get a service working.

 

I guess that's just how it is now

That is if you have the staffing resources available.

 

We are a team of 3, now looking after 17 schools. It is nice knowing i don't need to drive around all the schools if there are filtering problems.

 

I appreciate there are centralised options, however we are not in a trust setting. We provide it as an external support service. So wouldn't be able to do that.

 

There are pro's and cons for on-site and hosted - it very much comes down to the specific setups and requirements.

  • Thanks 1
DrCheese

DrCheese

Posted
Posted
Problem with cloud is that you are totally reliant on their support, Smoothwalls support wasn't stellar but I never needed it

 

Aye, if you have on prem filter at least you can do something about it yourself - Spin up another temp solution if you have to, or roll back to an earlier version of the product but you are in total control.

Hybridising it can offer benefits of both.

 

As far as I can tell, it seems that this offering is an "eggs in one basket" type of setup, i.e all the schools go through the same few proxies rather than separate spun off instances for each school, which means issues affect them all.

 

I'm a big fan of the phrase "Treat your servers like cattle, not kings" i.e smaller instances that spread the load that you don't care about and can chuck/replace as when needed without major downtime. Automation to switch between versions if required.

Dom_

Dom_

Posted
Posted
Our live logs don't work (or do, but only pick up a few IP's :-\), apparently there's a new tool for it but we don't have access.
stevenramsden

stevenramsden

Posted
Posted

I first saw this delayed log files issue end of Jan.

22/01: Spoke to the help desk who were unaware of the issue, but confirmed they too were seeing delayed logs when testing during the phone call.

23/01: Case Closed - Received an email to say NOC were aware and working on a solution.

 

07/02: SBB email the below, I do recall being able to use this diagnostics filter at the time and it helped me access live logs again, but can't seem to see it any more.

It's important to point out that it does say that this feature was added "for ease and speed of use" (not a work around, because it broke).

 

 

--------

‘Diagnostic’ request log files Following our update about tuning our logging platform for speed and ease of use, we would also like to inform you about the first of many changes. We have created a ‘Filter Preset’ on the platform which you may now use. This will query the policy server itself rather than the logs, showing you live traffic as it passes through the filtering. This is intended for instantaneous diagnostics, any historic information gathering will still need a report. This filter can be accessed from within Logs, Request log files by selecting the filter and choosing ‘Diagnostics’ from the drop down.

  • Thanks 1
caffrey

caffrey

Posted
Posted

Update from SBB on it it seems

 

Following on from Netsweeper issues earlier in the week we have decided to accelerate our plan to deploy new higher specification logger/reporter nodes for the Netsweeper platform. This work was in our Netsweeper platform roadmap released at the start of the year and customers should see a more reliable live log feed as well as reports generating faster.

 

From Netsweepers advice and customer feedback we have decided to disable the logging of decrypt messages, this will improve the look and feel of generated reports by removing URL duplication.

 

Any scheduled reports set to run tonight (6th March) will show no data but this data can still be accessed via a demand report. To reiterate, the current loggers will still be accessible to customers for any data prior to this evening. Reports for all new data will use the new loggers. Please reach out to our support department if you require any assistance.

 

Additional tuning could take place next week once we have a couple of days of data on the new system to analyse and we will keep you updated if this is the case.

 

Furthermore, we are also carrying out some preventative maintenance on one of our FortiGate clusters this evening with Fortinet, some customers should be prepared for intermittent connectivity but we don’t plan on restarting the units so traffic should continue to flow.

SchoolsBroadband

SchoolsBroadband

Posted
Posted

Yes new loggers are going in tonight. We believe it should fix the delayed logging issue.

 

Also we deployed a patch for the google dir sync temporary issue since the platform was upgraded to Netsweeprs latest release.

 

Theres also a new version of wagent which allows local directory sync rather than copying from your DC to the webadmins. This gives a better user experience with live lookups.

 

We'll send comms out on that soon but you can ask our support team for the latest Wagent version now.

 

Thanks

 

Dave

snagrat

snagrat

Posted
Posted
Yes new loggers are going in tonight. We believe it should fix the delayed logging issue.

 

Also we deployed a patch for the google dir sync temporary issue since the platform was upgraded to Netsweeprs latest release.

 

Theres also a new version of wagent which allows local directory sync rather than copying from your DC to the webadmins. This gives a better user experience with live lookups.

 

We'll send comms out on that soon but you can ask our support team for the latest Wagent version now.

 

Thanks

 

Dave

 

Which Wagent version is that? I got .21 sent to me the other day for a customer

Olliesaurus

Olliesaurus

Posted
Posted

No idea if this is a good suggestion or not, I’ve found the flow of information fairly awful from SBB, more emails as of late which is good, I completely understand that it’s not always possible to update etc.

 

Is there anyway to possibly communicate outages/issues through a quickly accessible means at all? Say Twitter for instance. Just keeps it brief i.e “Currently experiencing Netsweeper issue, these are the services effected, ETA to get back” or something.

 

Customers shouldn’t have to log into forums in order to see current statuses of things, granted they shouldn’t have to go on Twitter either but it’s far more accessible I would have thought, granted you can still get a boat load of grief on Twitter but at least it’s got a maximum character count of grief!

 

Just my 2p

eddyc

eddyc

Posted
Posted
No idea if this is a good suggestion or not, I’ve found the flow of information fairly awful from SBB, more emails as of late which is good, I completely understand that it’s not always possible to update etc.

 

Is there anyway to possibly communicate outages/issues through a quickly accessible means at all? Say Twitter for instance. Just keeps it brief i.e “Currently experiencing Netsweeper issue, these are the services effected, ETA to get back” or something.

 

Customers shouldn’t have to log into forums in order to see current statuses of things, granted they shouldn’t have to go on Twitter either but it’s far more accessible I would have thought, granted you can still get a boat load of grief on Twitter but at least it’s got a maximum character count of grief!

 

Just my 2p

 

This is exactly what our ISP does and it works really well.

 

Turn on notifications for that Twitter account and often within minutes of any outage you know that they are aware and what action they are taking.

 

Saves us and other customers from then calling as we know they’re on the case.

Edu-IT

Edu-IT

Posted
Posted
But it’s also a concise view of service problems which may not be good PR... hence why there may be a deliberate decision by companies not to do this perhaps?
Griff

Griff

Posted
Posted
Same for me with Exponential-e. I get a text to my phone if it goes down + email notification then a follow-up when its been solved. Only happened twice in 3 years though. Its a must have for service providers, its better to get ahead of the 'outage outrage'

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share
Go to topic listing


×
×
  • Create New...