
I hate to tell you ...

In many cases, the folks in the NOC are primarily there to watch
red lights and green lights.  Even if you had the secret NOC
phone number, it wouldn't do you much good.  In a large provider
the NOC has soo many rules and procedures, the NOC-level techs
aren't even allowed to log onto core routers to look.  And
forget about making any changes to a router configuration.  Even
if the NOC folks wanted to help, they aren't allowed to.

Whether its a large provider or a small provider, they both seem
to have about the same number of people with the expertise and
authority to fix "interesting" problems.  It might be called
4th level support, or backbone engineering, or senior engineers.
It has less to do with technical clue than management clue.  I've
often found a person in a NOC who understood the problem, and even
understood what was required to fix it, but due to decisions by
his management he wasn't allowed to fix it.

There are management culture differences between the various
providers which affect how well their employees can fix things.


On Mon, 22 January 2001, Adrian Chadd wrote:
> <off-topic>
> 
> .. and since various companies keep hiring bright university students
> right off the bat, they don't get to spend time learning how the net
> works by working in a NOC.
> 
> Which means, finding clueful people to staff a NOC is getting more
> difficult each day.
> 
> Thanks guys. :-)
> 
> </offtopic>




