An Open Letter to Tech Support
The following is the text of a little rant that was sent to Tech Support at CableOne (name included to humiliate and humble the guilty), the cable ISP in my area. Any area where information has been modified or deleted to protect the identity of the client is enclosed in brackets [].
The purpose of this e-mail is basically to take the support dept to task for not being helpful.
Recently, [a client of mine] was having issues receiving their e-mail. They use their own domain [their domain] as their incoming mail server. When I talked with support at CableOne I was told that it was ‘Impossible’ that the problem lie with Cableone’s servers. I have been working with computers on a technical level for nearly 35 years and I have expunged that word from my vocabulary with regard to ANYTHING to do with the beasts.
As it turned out, the problem *was* with CableOne. Not the hardware, not the host of the domain, not the firewalls or operating systems on the computers.
It was the IP address.
It was not blocked by anyone, it just for some unknown reason, would not allow port 110 traffic to a single (as far as I can tell) server. When I used a different MAC address to connect (ie: different device – new IP lease) the problem was resolved.
The simple act of expiring the IP address lease and issuing a new one would have saved HOURS of time and expense searching for another reason for the problem. At the very least it would have taken it off the board as a possible cause.
So, all of you fine folks in support, you might want to think really hard before using the word impossible with regard to anything to do with technology. Stick with unlikely or improbable if you’re real sure of your facts.
Remember how much you DON’T know.
In case I didn’t make it clear, I hate the word IMPOSSIBLE.
It simply has no place in an industry where we’ve gone from a 5 Megabyte hard drive the size of a commercial refrigerator to a 32 Gigabyte drive smaller than a pack of chewing gum in a 50 year period. Where a current pocket sized graphing calculator, or your cell phone, has more computing power than the huge air conditioned facilities that used to house main frame computers did.
Impossible just doesn’t apply anymore.
July 29, 2008
