Please Report Forums Successes! (11/1)

[Kimberly Ann]

Hello Everyone!

I am very interested in hearing about your recent highlights and successes you've had while using the ITRC Forums. For instance, have you:

1. Posted a question and received a key answer that solved your problem.
2. Viewed a message thread that had a solution to a problem you were trying to solve.
3. Found the Forums to be of particular help in sharing information, exchanging best practices, or saving you time.

I'd really like to hear from everyone -- your circumstances, the issues, the outcome, who was of help, time saved, etc.!

If you have examples to share, please provide the URL of the thread if possible. Thanks in advance for your input!

Best Regards,
Dan Gazzaniga
Forums Manager

[Kevin Moore_2 · Accepted solution]

Hi,
I have a test box here that I recently rebuilt. I was installing several different applications. This were all open-source because I would not receive funding for the test server.
I had a problem with one of the applications looking for the X and Motif libraries. I logged a call with HP, and the engineer said that he had seen a thread in the ITRC before, where there was an ftp site with this software available. He then sent me on the tar file.
This enabled me to install the app, and if it wasn't for that, I would have had to leave it, as I could not have purchased the software from HP.
It showed me how valuable the ITRC is, and that it is benefitial to engineers helping customers
Kevin
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0x50bb4e49c5cdd5118ff40090279cd0f9,00.html

[Alexander M. Ermes]

Hi there.
One posting was about creating a 'LIFEBOAT'.
That was a copy of the actual bootdisk.
This thing was REALLY helpful in a crash.
Also some hints about the URL'S of special software were good. I can only suggest to read the postings somebody might be interested in.
If you cannot use it, at least you learn something.
Rgds
Alexander M. Ermes

[Roger Baptiste]

1. Posted a question and received a key answer that solved your problem.

>>Yes. I had a measureware configuration
>> question, which was solved here. Saved
>> me time .

2. Viewed a message thread that had a solution to a problem you were trying to solve.

>> happens often. This is a mine of info.

3. Found the Forums to be of particular help in sharing information, exchanging best practices, or saving you time.

>> Well, i look sparingly at net news
>> or stock market prices (which is a good thing), spend less time reading about anthrax
and other terrors ;-)

-raj

[Thierry Poels_1]

Hi,

I suppose that one of the forums successes is the speed of answering questions. If a questions is posted, there is an answer (and a solution ;) in no time, and this 24h/24h thanks to the different timezones around the world (never knew that was an advantage ;). I'm sure you can get statistics on the average answering time.

regards,
Thierry.

[Andreas D. Skjervold]

Hi

Think it's very difficult to give samples, as I think all my 92 forum questions have been answered with a usable answer that has helped me in performing my work.

Aside to this comes all the searches for solutions. And here is the fact that I more often find an solution among the forums than in hp.docs!!!! And comparing to the docs, the forum solutions are easy explained by people in same situation, so they are the very essense of HP knowledge.

The only thing I lack now is for Sun to come up with a similar resource, and my job is all fun.

Andreas

[G. Vrijhoeven]

Hi Dan,

Forum Successes. I never used the forum to ask a question yet.... so i can not help you with that, the part of the forum i like most is the interaction between the people that are on it and while reading Q and A i learn a lot. I can say that it indirect helped to prevent a few problems for me and solve a few.
So i like to thank HP for creating it and the people who are on it for keeping it alive.

Gideon

[Alex Glennie]

Andreas .... you can start having fun at work now : see http://forum.sun.com/ !!!

But it's not as good as this site though ;)

[Deepak Extross]

Dan,

I was facing a strange problem that really had me stumped. After reading the man pages ad nauseam to no avail, I decided to post the query to this forum.
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0x2fd2a1abbac8d5118ff10090279cd0f9,00.html

Needless to say, I got a bulls-eye within 24 hours.

I guess the biggest advantage of this forum is the opportunity to draw from the combined experience of the members.

[Santosh Nair_1]

One of the best things about this forum is information sharing. Different people have different views on problems and how to attack them. This give a very comprehensive look at the problem and its solutions.

Over the past few months I've learned so much from reading various forum threads and I hope to keep on learning through this forum.

-Santosh

[Graham Cameron_1]

Dan

I have recently posted 2 questions and had answers to both which have helped me, even when the answer (first link below) was that "it cannot be done".

I have also seen many postings which have interested and helped me in my job as an Oracle DBA and Unix sysadmin, and have posted answers which I hope have helped others.

2 frustrations:
- Being in the UK means that a lot of the stuff which reaches me is already solved, so my ability to accumulate points is restricted;
- Some postings have a blank or non-specific subject line, which wastes time in looking them up;

Apart from that, keep up the great work.

Here are the links which have helped me.
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,11866,0x06cfcf38d6bdd5118ff10090279cd0f9,00.html
[Wodisch]


http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,11866,0x7ce1660142b2d5118ff10090279cd0f9,00.html
[Andreas] [Robin]

[George_Dodds]

I was having problems getting CDE up an running on my b132, within 30 mins i had the the answer and also a valuable reference for any further issues.

I'm also getting a step closer to getting my i50 up and running thanks to forum members.

Cheers all.

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0x16c04e49c5cdd5118ff40090279cd0f9,00.html

[Carlos Fernandez Riera]

Dan:
The lastest changes made on the Forums, seems to made it faster, so this a sucessfull history for all us.

Ten points for yourself.

[John Bolene]

I normally head to the forums for questions that are not time critical.
The critical ones are normally caused by hardware not working and I call the HP BRS on these.

I would have to say that the most successes have been the willingness of complete strangers to help out and solve other people's problems with very little in the way of compensation.

I consider the forums a family of friendly folks.

Say that more than a few times in a row.....

[S.K. Chan]

Excellent responses overall, I would say almost all issues can be resolved one way or another in this forum.

[Kimberly Ann]

Hello Everyone,

The above are excellent examples of how the forums provide assistance 24hx7. I really appreciate you taking the time to let others in the community hear your stories -- if there are others out there who have unique insights or experiences, please add to this growing list!

Thanks,
Dan
Forums Manager

[Craig Rants]

I submitted my first question yesterday, and got a great response. I had been monitoring the forum for a while, but had never submitted a question. I wanted to modify some ftp parameters and could not remember how I use to do it, and I had searched for this answer for about an hour and found nothing. Thus, I submitted my question and within 15 minutes I was working on my solution.

Thanks.
Craig

[Alex Glennie]

back to the top .....

[Darrell Allen]

This was a resounding success:

I received an error while installing a patch bundle. A simple search found someone had posted a question with the same error just the day before. Several replies had been given which pointed me in the right direction. I was able to "solve" my problem with the help of my online friends in a matter of minutes instead of hours.

Darrell

[Jon Mattatall]

A few months ago I was brand spanking new to ANY *NIX, let alone HP-UX. While I knew
some basic commands and scripting from college 20 yrs ago, I was largely mystified.

Every time I have posted a question, the responses have been swift and accurate,
even if I have lacked the wit to fully detail the problem. If the solution has not been
spelled out, I have been pointed in the correct direction.

What I find most impressive about these forums is that everyone is an adult.
I know that I have asked some less than brilliant questions, but there has been remarkable
restraint shown by all.
No flames. No RTFM.
My congratulations to HP and all staffers and forum participants.

Jo

[Craig Rants]

This weekend I was doing an offsite install, well the network engineers did not provide me with all the information I needed ahead of time and I was left to make a few networking changes on the fly. They were pretty straight forward but I could not route traffic out my default gateway. After about an hour of beating my head on the wall I was able to gain access to a PC and got into the ITRC. It only took me about 5 minutes to find my problem looking through past submissions. The problem turned out to be the "Dead Gateway Detection" problem! I quickly had the network engineer change the default gateway to accept ICMP traffic to solve the problem. I could have been there a lot longer without this forum.

Thanks,
Craig

[harry d brown jr]

Because of Bill, I've been forced to learn more about swinstall than any living person should know. I've also have learned, and I am still learning, regular expressions.


live free or die
harry

[paul courry]

Here is a measurable success story.....

I have all the manuals for the HP256x line of printers. I have emailed at least 2 dozen copies of my pdf files that contain the instructions on how to configure the serial interface. The files are emailed because the .pdf file is over 1Mb in size (can you *fix* that limit Dan?).

[Karen Elrod]

I can only say that this forum is the ideal of what a forum should be. I often need information and find it through search. This sounds like no big deal, but other sites require multiple tries to get the right item to search. The ITRC search finds the item by looking into the records not just at the titles. The people who help are also amazing. I also think that it helps that HP people are involved. Thanks everyone for the many times that you have provided the right information at the right time.

[Bill McNAMARA_1]

I've been a member now for one year exactly!.. an average of more than 10 points a day! and more than 1 question a day!

Am I the forum success or what!! ;-p

Later,
Bill