What nasty little things are lurking inside your data center
Many companies, because of the improving reliability of computerhardware in general, have become blase about how and where they keep theirfundamental equipment, the servers. In addition, computing itself seems tobreed even more computing, so that banks of servers often grow seeminglywithout human help. This might be nowhere more true than in any sort ofhealth care setting. Needless to say, when servers go down in a health caresetting-especially if it looks as if they are doing so without humanintervention-it can be especially damaging to the mission and operations ofthe facility. Yet, despite professional IT departments serving the hands-on health care and administrative needs of a health-care facility, glitchescan happen. Diagnosing them can be tricky, especially since the maladiesthat can afflict these servomechanisms can be almost as subtle as those
While there were some minor problemsin all areas, nothing could be connected to the intermittent problemsaffecting the servers. A better solution might have been to hire a companyused to dealing with such things, such as Dataclean, and letting themhandle the cleanup. Indeed,doing an Internet search on the problem might have pointed the ITdepartment in the right direction. re is one of the largest geriatric carefacilities in Canada. Every system that could possibly have had an effecton the servers was consulted about. Proposed solution The remediation of this problem was handled in almost the same sortof hit-or-miss manner as searching for the cause of it had been. And it should establish a regular relationship with acompany such as Dataclean for periodic on-site checkups and at-willbrainstorming to avoid the inconvenience and cost of a similar situationoccurring from the next exotic computer 'malady' that develops in a fast-changing arena. 9 percent uptime figure the IT department had enjoyed untilthe increasing miniaturization of these new units ended up in wasted space. Recommendations In future, with ever more power packed into ever smaller units-wherethe concepts of contamination and pollution will be equally magnified-thefacility should regard its IT server room almost like an operating room,with similar attention to cleanliness, climate control and good state-of-the-art design. Thenthey realized no one was going to get sick over zinc whiskers, and makeswere abandoned. Possibly shifting essential computer server functionsto a service company while the new flooring was installed and the serversreconditioned would have caused less stress and less data compromise in thelong run. Firstthere was a knee-jerk reaction by the Occupational Health Department. So it is essential that its bank of 50-plus serversmaintain the 99. Alternatively, calling in the companythat made the servers-which inadvertently happened when the sales repshowed up-might have gotten the answer sooner. New flooring was added to the remodeling job, and someonegot stuck with spending weekends wrapping and unwrapping servers, and stillthere was downtime.
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Health Department,
,
Baycrest Centre,
Dataclean Indeed,
Hewlett Packard,
Baycrest's Alternatives,
health care,
similar situation,
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Acceptance Essays
