Learn from others what not to do

So a while ago, my friend David sent me a funny article (funny for us, not for the article’s subjects).

It showed what some brilliant SysAdmin had done at his company’s location, and how it backfired miserably.

Read it here: A “Priceless” Server Room: Priceless – Worse Than Failure

I hope you enjoy reading the article. I think I may have enjoyed it a little more, seeing as I have seen firsthand what employing a portable air conditioner (that needs some sort of water drain). They set up the drain to fill a large water jug – the kind that mineral water is delivered in, and had someone come now and then to examine the water level, and if need, replace it.

Mistake? Probably.

Now, they’ve also kept the servers in a corner of the room that was previously known for water dripping from some problem in the air conditioner. Not that there was any better location, but…

So you can probably guess what happened when the air conditioner started leaking again, and rain began falling from the busted pipe in the ceiling.

Let me mention – all of this happened when I was on a two-week vacation, and my replacement was dealing with all the systems and the chaos.

All I could do was laugh at the atrocity.