The Adventures of AlisterComputeron

I hate Windows Update Day.  That’s the day I set aside, usually a Friday morning, to apply Windows updates and patches to my servers.  And no, I don’t test the updates prior to installing.  Maybe the fellas with the big data centers have the time and resources to test ‘em before putting ‘em into the production environment.  Anyway, I usually set aside a Friday morning, and since I get to the office 7am, I only affect a handful users when I apply patches and do the inevitable reboot.  Boy, I wish Microsoft would figure out a way for us admins to install updates without having to reboot servers.  Again, maybe the big boys can have maintenance windows, but I’ve got to steal a few minutes whenever I can.

Most Update Days go smoothly.  What worries me the most is a server not coming back from its reboot properly.  This morning was one of those.  I installed the updates on my Exchange 2003 server, rebooted it, and then tried to open Outlook.  Outlook wouldn’t open.  Uh oh!  I make a quick dash to the server room (it’s right across the hall).  The Exchange services didn’t start.  Exchange going down is my biggest fear, because on two separate occasions in my tenure with this company, I’ve stayed to the wee hours of the morning restoring Exchange.  So I don’t like when Exchange services don’t start after a reboot.  I manually restarted the services, but still couldn’t open Outlook.  I had to reboot Exchange again.  I’ve seen that before and it really irritates me when updates make me reboot the server twice.  Exchange is one of the, if not the, most important servers we have.  Even when Exchange hiccups during the day, we get a least one call about it to help desk.  We didn’t get a call today, but a user stopped by my desk to say she couldn’t get into Outlook.

So nothing like starting the day with a little stress; it’s even better at getting me going than a Venti dark roast from Starbucks.  Quite honestly, I drug my butt into work this morning, but I’m awake now!  Things should be good from here on out, though: I got the updates applied, the servers are coming off a fresh reboot, and I just got invited to happy hour after work.  Happy Friday, everyone!