Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!sol.acs.unt.edu!kev
From: kev@sol.acs.unt.edu (Mullet Kevin Wright)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.sys.cisco
Subject: Re: cisco service not that good after all
Message-ID: <1991Jun14.161137.10574@sol.acs.unt.edu>
Date: 14 Jun 91 16:11:37 GMT
References: <1991Jun12.152451.348@biivax.dp.beckman.com> <1991Jun13.111217.384@beckman.com> <27029@ib.sei.cmu.edu>
Distribution: na
Organization: University of North Texas
Lines: 34

This is borderline ridiculous.

1: In a perfect world, I'll grant that any front-line person working at a
   service-oriented business should be genteel to even the most crass and
   obnoxious person calling in.  Meanwhile, however, in the real world, front
   line support personnel are nearly always underpaid, under trained and over
   worked.  Personally, I think the burden is on BOTH the customer and the 
   service person to be amiable with each other and try to fulfill their 
   obligations to each other.  From my point of view, the moment Don Roberts
   switched into rude mode and started doing *anything* that could be 
  interpreted as harrassing the person on the other end of the phone, he
  got whatever he deserved.  There are no circumstances which preclude civility.

2: I can only speak of my documentation, but it's the May 1990 documentation
   and it has a complete enough discussion of the TFTP capability on page
   3-8 in the section entitled: "Automatic Configuration Using Remote Hosts".
   All the problems I encountered were entirely due to my learning curve on 
   what TFTP required at the host level and what the excentricities of our
   TFTP daemon were.  None of that kind of stuff is appropriate for a router
   manual. The Cisco doc *does* state what RFC TFTP is found in and that host
   requirements tend to vary.  That's enough for me.

3: I've got a real simple solution to the "drop the phone, run to the router,
   and copy the serial number again" dilemma: put it in the login screen for 
   the router.  On the banner for each of my routers, I put the network phone
   number for problems, the name of the person running the router, the serial
   number for the router and a diagram of what subnets are attached to what 
   physical interfaces.  Pretty much all I'd ever want to know available by
   either telnetting to or fingering my router.  I'm terrible at keeping track
   of little pieces of paper or weird files with odd pieces of information in 
   them and I've never seen a PIM I liked well enough to use -- but I digress.

-Kevin Mullet
 University of North Texas