A few disclaimers are necessary. First, I do have Simon's permission to use the BOFH name in my story, barring any action from copyright weenies. But he did ask me to emphasize that this story was written by me, and not Simon. Finally, I would like to say that this story is a work of fiction, and any similarity to actual people, events, or places of employment is entirely coincidental.
It's time to shut down the mainframe for the weekly backups. Who uses this thing any more? Since we went to a campus-wide Unix system, the only people doing anything on this big blue hunk of antiquated iron are the administration (who are all asleep now), and a few professors who just migrated from their abacus a couple of years before, so they're not going to take the time to learn yet another operating system.
I check the batch queue. Two jobs from the Bursar's office, one from a
user I'm not familiar with. Well, the admin weenies won't notice anything
wrong until they get into the office on Monday, and it won't hurt the
students to have their room and board bills go out a few days later than
usual. Blast 'em. I give the mystery job a few more minutes to run while
I think up the warning message of the week. Okay, how about this:
System's going down, doobie doo down down, camma camma down doobie doo
down down, backing up is hard tooooo do.
Five minutes till the mainframe shutdown. Just on a hunch, I send e-mail
to a few cool hackers who might actually be doing something interesting
at this hour:
Chair races in the computing center lobby at 1AM. I've
got the tunes, you bring the refreshments.
That last batch job is still cranking away. Too bad, whoever you are. I blast it and shut down the system. Slap the tapes in the drives and start the backups. So much for the mainframe, now a quick check on the Unix file servers. The monitoring program says that they're all okay, except for one partition that's over 98% capacity.
I could call the sysadmins' beeper, or I could take care of it myself. Well, the on-call tech this week is an okay guy, and the operations manager has been saying we should try to take care of things ourselves if we can. No problem. I see that one user alone is responsible for more than fifty percent of the capacity on that partition. Lots of huge files with boring names. I doubt he'll miss them. Zap, off they go into data limbo.
The phone rings.
"Hello, operations!"
"Who is this?"
Bonehead. I just told you all you needed to know. "This is the IPR Operations Center, how can I help you?"
"I had a batch job running on the mainframe, and now it seems to be inaccessible."
Inaccessible? Who talks like that? Anyhow, the mystery batch user reveals himself. This ought to be fun. "Yes, I'm afraid we can't run your batch job while the weekly backups are running."
"Weekly backups? I didn't know about any weekly backups!"
"Don't know much, do you?"
"Excuse me?"
The best defense is a good offense. "Didn't you read the announcement in the Computing Center Bulletin about mainframe availability?"
"Er... which issue was that in?"
"It's in every issue. It's also in the online help system, the campus newspaper, the bulletin boards in the computing center lobby, and if you'd like me to tatoo it on the inside of your eyelids in glowing ink, I'll be happy to do that for you!"
"Do you have any idea who you're talking to!?"
No, but I was hoping you'd tell me. Fingers ready at the keyboard, I say in my best Exceptional-Customer-Service voice, "No sir, to whom do I have the pleasure of speaking?"
"This is Professor Steve Timmins of the Omphaloscopy Department! My batch job contained important research work!"
My, oh my. A professor, no less. Glad he made a point of emphasizing that. Let's see, a quick scan through the academic catalog for the good Professor's courses. I think all his students deserve to fail, just for having the bad judgment to take one of his courses. That should generate some nice feedback at review time. Clickety click, and the grades database is updated. "Hear that, professor? I just queued your job to run again at high priority as soon as the system comes back up."
"When will that be?"
Never ask an operator "when". "As soon as the weekly backups are finished."
"And when do they usually finish?"
Didn't you hear me the first time? "Well, that's variable, depending on a lot of technical factors, including how many new files were added during the week, how well the tape drives are working, and how much time the operator has to spend on the phone."
"Oh, okay. Thanks." I'm impressed. He actually got the hint, and thanked me. Too late, of course.
"My pleasure." Let's see, I should make sure that batch job runs. After a few choice alterations, of course. Set it to ring the phones of all the Deans and Trustees at five AM. What a useful technological advance, integrating the campus phone system with the mainframe. Then send them e-mail from Professor Timmins saying How'd you like your little wake-up call? Serves you right for not recommending me for tenure! Then have it erase all the files in his account, including itself.
I finish this important task when the phone rings again.
"Hello, operations!"
"Hello? Is this the operations center?" My eardrums are assaulted by the most obnoxious voice known to man, woman or small furry creature from Alpha Centauri. Think Woody Allen with laryngitis. It gets worse from there. I recognize it right away. It's Andrew S. Whineman, campus gadfly and bane of the computing services department. I'm surprised it took him this long to call after the mainframe shutdown.
"That's what I just said, Andy. How can I help you?"
"How do you know my name?"
"Telepathy. So what can I do for you?"
"I just noticed that the mainframe was down."
"That's right. It's down for our regularly scheduled weekly backups, the same as it was last week, and will be next week, and the week after that, and so forth."
"Oh. Well, I just noticed that it was down and thought you might want to know."
"Yes. Thank you."
"Just in case there was some sort of problem."
"THANK you."
"By the way, do you think you could reschedule the backups to run some other time when people aren't using the mainframe?"
This surprises me. Whineman is the ultimate tech-knurd, always raving about the newest versions of Unix and NFS and why the school doesn't have them yet. I didn't think he'd stoop to using the mainframe. "You were using the mainframe, Andy?"
"No, I was just checking to make sure it was up. Because people might want to use it."
Like HAL, I determine that this call can no longer serve any useful purpose, so I engineer a momentary failure of the phone system. When it comes back up, the phone immediately rings again, and I let the answering machine get it. It doesn't surprise me at all to hear Whineman's voice complaining about a phone problem.
The problem with lusers like Whineman is that you can't do anything to them. Not that I haven't tried. I've deleted his files. I've hosed his sessions. I've trashed his print jobs. It only gives him more to complain about. Sooner or later I will think of a fitting punishment.
It's getting close to 1AM, and the backups are chugging along, so I grab my boom box and some CD's and prepare to go up to join the chair races. Just as I'm about to leave, the phone rings again. This one's in trouble already.
"Hello, Operations!"
"The laser printer in the Engineering Center lab is out of paper! I need some new paper right now!"
Ah. Demands. Ooookay... "All right. What's your userid?"
"Why do you need to know that? I just need some paper!"
So the kid thinks he's running the show. Must be a freshman. Shouldn't be hard to bamboozle. "Because we've had some problems with people stealing other students' passwords, logging into their accounts, and using up all their laser page allocation. They usually do this at the odd hours like now, so we like to check for possible security violations."
He buys it, hook, line, and sinker. Tells me his userid.
"Thanks. Let me check your account." Clickety click. "Hm, this is interesting. It says that you've got ten thousand pages allocated for this semester! I've never seen anyone with that many!"
"Really?" I can hear the wheels clicking in what passes for his brain, wondering whether to admit that this must be a mistake. I decide to make the decision easier for him.
"Oh, you must be in that new experimental program I heard about. They're going to give a few first-year students unlimited resources, and see if they perform better than their peers."
"Wow! Nobody told me about that!"
"They didn't? Oh, maybe they didn't want you to know... I think I heard something about how it'd work better if it was a secret. Tell you what, you just keep quiet about this and enjoy your laser pages."
"Okay! Cool!" Yeah, cool, especially since they'll cost you a dollar each. Conveniently added onto your semester's tuition bill. Hope your parents' credit rating is good. "So when will I get my paper?"
There's that bad word again. I was afraid he'd get back to that. "Well, I'm the only operator here, and we're in the middle of backups," which means I have less to do than ever, not more, but what do they know? "...so it may be a couple of hours." Anyhow, I have the chair races to go to, and the Engineering Center is halfway across campus, and there's a foot of snow on the ground. "Or you could come over to the computing center and get it yourself. I'll be happy to give you a few reams." Which should keep you busy printing out alt.sex.stories at a buck a page till dawn...
"What?! GET IT MYSELF???" I quickly hold the phone at arm's length to prevent severe ear damage. "Listen, I pay 25 thousand dollars a year to go to this school! I expect better service than that!"
25 thousand, eh? Clickety click. No, now you pay forty thousand per year. Plus your laser printer charges. And you'd better pony up if you ever want to see that diploma. Looks like Mom and Dad are going to have to sell your little sister into slavery.
"Well, tell you what you can do, then..."
"Yeah?"
"You can take that 25K and go buy your own goddamn Sparcstation with a 600 dpi laser printer and a T3 connection to the Internet, and pay your own technician to take care of all your problems, and see if you get better service for that kind of money, or you can damn well wait till I have a spare minute to wait on you hand and foot!" Slam. End of phone call. Clickety click. I don't care how hard you study, your GPA's not going above a 2.5. Let's see what kind of job you can get with that when you graduate, and how long it takes you to buy your sister back from that Japanese CEO.
I forward the phones upstairs and finally head up to join the chair races. One of the best things to happen to this school, when we upgraded the computer labs, was the addition of those nifty wheeled chairs. They make labs so much fun. Of course, we had problems with people stealing them, so one of my duties is to make sure they don't leave the computing center. No problem. The lobby is big enough for a good sized racetrack, and any chair that leaves through the front door is disqualified. The racers take the rules seriously, since first prize is the waiving of all phone, ethernet and printing charges for the year. Penalties for violating the rules are... well, best left to the imagination.
About half a dozen guys are setting up tonight's course, moving workstation desks and printer stands. So it's going to be an obstacle race tonight. They're all members of the local chapter of the Assemblage of Computer Maniacs, the most feared campus organization among the computing services department. My motto is, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Their ringleader, Laszlo, a tall skinny fellow with hair down to the small of his back, waves as he sees me.
"Okay guys, time to rock and roll!" I plug in the boom box and select a CD. Something classic seems appropriate. I pop in the Doobie Brothers, and the opening licks of "China Grove" start rattling the windows.
Laszlo comes up to me with an unlabeled three-liter bottle filled with a brownish fluid. "Hey dude, have a drink!" He pulls a plastic cup from one of the pockets of his battered old army overcoat. I look at it suspiciously, but it seems to be clean. I hold out the cup for Laszlo to fill, then slug down the liquid.
I feel my digestive tract start to burn from the epiglottis to the pyloric valve, at the same time as my heart speeds up from 33 to 78 rpm. All of my hairs are starting to stand up. "Yow! What do you call that?"
"Volt. Vodka and Jolt." At a place like this, from people like these, I should have expected it.
"Oh, by the way, dude," Laszlo begins, stepping out of the way to avoid one of his companions scooting by on a practice run, "we could use some more disk space for our virtual reality engine. You think you can take care of it?"
"No problem. We just freed up about half of partition D on Springhead. I'll allocate it to you guys."
He mumbles thanks, then plops his butt into a chair and begins to maneuver around the course. I head for a workstation, when I am intercepted by a hunched-over figure, eyes wide and myopic from too many hours of staring at a screen.
"Excuse, please, sir." Oh great. If the posture and appearance hadn't given it away, the accent and politeness would have made it certain. Everything about this guy just screamed "foreign graduate student".
"Yes?" The only vaguely unsatisfying thing about dealing with these types is that it's like shooting fish in a barrel.
"Please to inform me who is responsible for the making of the loudness of the musical sounds?"
"That'd be me. It's new computing center policy for Saturday nights."
He blinks a few times. I wonder how he'll digest this. "I am sorry, I mean to inquire as to the name of the artist of the musicianship?"
Now it's my turn to blink. "Um, it's the Doobie Brothers. Greatest Hits."
He pulls a pad out of his pocket and scribbles something down in an alphabet that I can't read. "Is the compact disk readily available at the Music Emporium in the downtown?"
"Sure. But not right now. Better wait till tomorrow afternoon when they're open."
"Thank you. Party up, dude!"
"On."
"Yes, yes! Party on!"
I sit down at the workstation, shaking my head. Just goes to show, you never know. I log in as BOFH, and set up a new partition that only Laszlo and the rest of the Assemblage of Computer Maniacs will be able to access. I wonder how long it'll be before that guy whose files I zorched misses them.
Just to keep an eye on things, I decide to grep /var/spool/mail for "operator". Good thing I did. There's a message from Jerry Schmuck, one of the managers upstairs. It's timestamped about ten minutes ago, and addressed to the Operations Manager, with copies sent to the Director of Computing Services, the Dean of Academic Computing, the President of the University, and the President of the United States.
To: BobIt goes on. Obviously Jerry must be feeling pretty bored himself, if he has nothing better to do than to play Big Brother to Operations. He doesn't even work with Operations. I'm not even sure which group he's the manager of -- probably the Department of Redundancy Department. Anyhow, none of the recipients of his message have viewed it yet, so there's still time for a little creative editing. I think it would read better like this:
From: Jerry
Subject: Operators' Behavior
Bob:
Several times during the weekend hours recently, I have noticed the night operators making an effort to enjoy themselves and have fun while on the job. While fun has its place, it is not what we pay operators for. I suggest that we find more work for the operators to do...
To: BobNow, time to go into the school's accounting program, to find the money for the raises. Let's check close to home first... well, what do you know! Eliminate Jerry's salary, and you could give all the operators fifteen percent raises! Sounds good to me. Clickety-click!
From: Jerry
Subject: Operators' Pay
Bob:
Many times during the weekend hours, I have observed the operators working diligently in the service of this institution, sacrificing their social lives to provide continuous high-quality service to the school community. I think that the operators are not compensated well enough for this valuable service they provide...
I log off and kick my chair away from the desk, eager to join the race. I notice that the grad student has joined Laszlo and his gang. As we're sliding up to the starting line, I think I hear something over the din of the CD player. Could it be... please, no... alas, it is indeed the phone ringing in the upstairs operations room.
For a moment I'm torn, but to the true Bastard Operator From Hell, harassing users is even more fun than recreation. I signal the guys to continue the race without me, and trot over to the phone. I check the caller ID: it's an off-campus number. I settle into the chair with a smile on my face. Making life hell for resident students is amusing. Making life hell for off-campus students is a challenge. I love a good challenge.
"Hello, IPR Operations!"
"Oh, am I glad to hear you!"
And am I glad to hear you! It's a female voice -- a welcome rarity at this primarily male institution. "How can I help you?"
"I can't get my printer to work!"
Always nice of them to describe the problem so thoroughly. "What were you trying to do?"
"I just clicked on 'print', but it didn't print!"
What was that I was saying about loving a challenge? "Okay, what kind of printer are you using?"
"I'm not sure... I think it's one of those laser printer thingies?"
"Hmm. Which lab are you in?"
"I'm the lab monitor down at the Carrie Nation computer lab."
Aha! That explains a lot. Carrie Nation Women's College, located just down the hill from IPR, was founded in 1909 in order to give the engineers a ready supply of college-educated women to marry, and to give the daughters of well-off families a place to go to school where they'd have a good chance of snagging a husband with prospects. I kid you not. The phrase "politically correct" hadn't even been thought of then.
"They have a lab down there open at this hour?"
"Yeah, it seems pretty stupid to me, too. Nobody ever comes in here on a Saturday night. But it's my last semester, and I could use the money."
"So they've got you all alone in this lab on a Saturday night? That sounds pretty dangerous. There are a lot of drunks and loonies wandering the streets of Ilium at this time of night."
"Well, I keep the door locked, and if I think the person ringing the bell seems dangerous, I don't have to open it."
"Okay, that seems like a better deal. But if you don't mind my saying so, it sounds like you're not too familiar with your equipment. I think I'd better come down there and help you use it."
"Well, if it's not too much trouble..."
I look out the window. The chair racers are going full tilt, swerving around the recycling bins, bouncing off the workstation desks. "It's a pretty slow night up here. I'd be glad to help you out."
"I really appreciate it. I've got some things here that I've never used, and if someone could show me what to do with them, I'm sure it'd be a lot of fun."
"I'm sure. I'll be down there in a few minutes."
I hang up the phone, grab my coat and hat, and head back out to the lobby. "Hey Laszlo," I say, "I've got an off-site emergency to take care of. You owe me one for the disk space. Think you can keep an eye on the place for a while?"
"No probs."
I flip him the keys to the computer room. "Just in case you need to fix anything. And if the users get to be a pain, the BOFH password --"
A grin splits Laszlo's face from ear to ear. "I know it, dude."
I don my coat and head off down the hill, confident that the future of computing is in good hands.
Click here to return to the Index of Writings.
Click here to return to the Index of Anecdotes, Tall Tales and Outright Lies.
Click here to return to the other BOFH links at the top of this page.