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From: james@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.general
Subject: Re: Orphaned Response
Message-ID: <1967@inmet.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 16-Feb-85 00:57:00 EST
Article-I.D.: inmet.1967
Posted: Sat Feb 16 00:57:00 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 18-Feb-85 04:42:05 EST
Lines: 35
Nf-ID: #R:druxj:-92700:inmet:4100038:177600:1748
Nf-From: inmet!james    Feb 14 21:04:00 1985

I manage a site with several computers from different vendors,
several of which are Vaxen.  My general impression is that 
DEC is overall no better nor worse that the others, with the
exception of Prime (you think DEC s bad; you thing DEC is
expensive....).

The issue you raised is management; remember that DEC field
service management has different objectives than yours.  The
only way to et good field service (we get over 95% uptime on
11/70s and Vaxen) is to manage them yourself..  You have to stay on top
of the problems, make sure appropriate solutions are being
prsued, escalate the problem when required (don't count on
the on-site engineer to escalate) and re-escalate as often
as necessary.  DEC has a set of standards for problem escalaton:
get to know and use those standards.  If you find a particularly
good engineer, call the Branch Manager and demand that he/she
be your on-site person I find aptly timed mention of alternative
service vendors such as CDC, Grumman, etc, to be very helpful

This ofcourse is not a one-way street.  If you want cooperation,
you have to give them a little.  The best thing to do is to
take care of trivial problems yourself- develop a reputation
that your service calls are alys legitimate problems, not
loose wires or software bugs.

There is vailable from Field Service a package called USEP
(unix system environment package(?)), which is designed for
diagnosing unix vs. hardware problems, using DEC's unix.
The only one I have seen is for pdp-11's; if they don't have
one for vaxen, we should start demanding it.  Ultrix has much
more hardware debugging inf, though the real nasty subtle
intermittent stuff is going to be a bitch not matter what...

good luck
----james triplett, Intermetrics