RjR Innovations
     
Newsletter - 
October 2015

In this issue:

Product Spotlight
Services Arena
Support Corner
Event Alert
P
artner Bulletin
C
orporate Broadcast
Product Spotlight
RjR Innovations announces the release of QMC Version 6.0, a product in the Qsignon Suite of solutions. Building upon the core strengths of the Qsignon product line, QMC provides a SmartCard Management solution that integrates with Entrust PKI.


 
Services Arena
Managed Services Brochure
Professional Services Brochure



Is Managed Services Right for You?
Ron Sorrell - CSO

 
Managed Services may not be the right choice for every organization. This may sound odd coming from a Managed Services provider, but it does have to be the right fit for both parties. RjR Innovations offers several levels of Managed Services to help you manage various key pain points you might be having today or could possibly be faced with in the future. What may not be right today could be the right fit tomorrow.
 
Managed Services may be the right solution if:
  • you are not getting the full value of your current solution
  • your technology is changing, such as a major new application
  • a key resource has been lost, sometimes even internally to another department, with no viable backup
  • current resources lack the knowledge needed to maintain a complex system
  • you are short on resources and current staff are more dedicated to other key systems
  • training cycles for a new resource are too long and expensive
  • you are using Legacy systems requiring support while in transition to replacement applications  
If you find that looking in a mirror reflects one or more of the points mentioned above, RjR Innovations is always available to discuss your IT requirements and to determine if Managed Services is the right fit for your organization.
Migrations
Robert Beauchamp - CEO


Here’s a little update for our customers regarding Service Desk Express (SDE) Migrations. RjR has spent a good part of the past two years in discussions with customers regarding SDE migrations as well as migrating our existing customers from SDE to other solutions. We wanted to take this opportunity to share some important points that have come out of the discussions and migrations.
 
What do our customers expect out of their migrations?
  • The primary expectation that we seem to be hearing from our customers is that our customers expect to have the exact same functionality in the new solution that was implemented in their current solution. Many of our customers have been with us for more than 15 years. Throughout those years, RjR has continually assisted them in implementing new and custom modules to meet their business needs. 
  • Many of our customers have been using and improving our solution for more than 15 years, therefore a significant investment has already been made in their current solution. Their current solution may be heavily incorporated in their daily business functions which in turn means their organization is heavily dependent on the current system.
  • Our customers have indicated that they expect a smooth transition with minimal downtime of their solution.
  • Migration costs need to be kept as low as possible. 
What does RjR need from our customers?
 
RjR has developed a very strategic migration process which takes our customers through a detailed review of their current system and processes as well as budget and timeline requirements. We have a large number of migrations scheduled for the next few years and have increased our team in order to properly assist our customers. 
  • RjR needs to know what Fiscal Year (FY) our customers are targeting their migrations for (e.g. FY16, FY17, etc.). Several discussions have already occurred with many of our customers regarding migration timelines and we are still in the process of contacting our customers to schedule these discussions if they have not already occurred. We fully understand the need to budget accordingly, therefore we are always ready and willing to assist your organization with ensuring funds are available for the FY that will be affected.
  • We require support from our customers in performing migration reviews.
  • Access to our customer’s current solution and the associated process managers/owners is important.  
What does RjR want to achieve?
 
RjR has been a leader in the ITSM world and we are always ready to assist our long standing customers in moving forward into the Digital Enterprise Management (DEM) era. We aim to perform a seamless transition from the current solution to the new solution. RjR has always delivered our Professional Services on a consumable basis which means you are only invoiced for services rendered.
  • RjR renders projects on time and on budget.
  • RjR incorporates ITIL Best Practices in all processes we implement.
  • RjR ensures existing processes are improved to fit your organization’s current needs.
  • RjR will continue to provide the same expert quality First Contact Support for your new solution.   
We look forward to working together with you on your smooth SDE migration!
Support Corner
Support Brochure

Learning to Love your Logs
André Lalonde - Support Team Lead



Logs save lives! Or at least your environment and sometimes your sanity. Just recently, we had a customer who was facing a crucial issue: their production ITSM system was no longer able to connect to their database, bringing work to a grinding halt. The customer knew that they hadn’t made any configuration changes to their ITSM system, and pinging the database from the application servers returned no errors. What’s our next step in troubleshooting?

In a perfect world situation, this is what RjR Support is looking for when a ticket is opened: 

If the error is reproducible:
  • A step-by-step on how to reproduce the error. In the step-by-step, screenshots aren't required to start with unless you feel the details are necessary. 
Errors that provide an error message:
  • A screenshot of the error message
  • A plaintext copy of the error message 
Web or rendering errors:
  • Tomcat logs
  • IIS logs 
Misc. Remedy errors:
  • We'll often provide counsel as to which logs to include, as there are many possible answers! However, the ARError and Mid-Tier logs are our go-to logs, and they’re great to receive with a ticket! 
Other things that are nice to have, but not always necessary:
  • Windows Event Viewer logs
  • Results from 3rd party troubleshooting tools, such as Fiddler or Wireshark. (Again, we wouldn't expect these to begin with unless they were part of your initial troubleshooting.) 
We're also aware that everything described above falls into a "perfect world" scenario, and sometimes these items just aren't available when a ticket is first opened. Still, getting the above is always helpful!

So what did we eventually discover for our customer?
 
Well, we saw this in the ARError logs:
 
Sep 8, 2015 1:24:09 PM - WARNING (com.remedy.log.SERVLET) : Caught GoatException
Sep 8, 2015 1:24:11 PM - FINE (com.remedy.log.INTERNAL) : Throw ARException - ERROR (90): Cannot establish a network connection to the AR System server; Connection refused: connect fakeservernamehere:7012 ERROR (90): Cannot establish a network connection to the AR System server; Connection refused: connect fakeservernamehere:7012

 
Looks like there’s a problem with communications over port 7102! Testing connections over that specific port confirmed it.
 
In the end, we discovered that the customer’s security team had blocked the port after noticing “odd” traffic over it. The customer had them unblock the port, and regular communication between the application servers and the database resumed! (Now we can talk about a defined Change Management process, but that, of course, is a subject for another time.)
 
Thank you, logs!
Event Alert


 

GTEC delivers world-class experts and speakers from public sector and industry who will engage with delegates on the challenge and opportunity of technology. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to learn and network with peers, celebrate technology accomplishments, hear from a “who’s who” of government and industry leaders and see demonstrations of the most advanced technologies driving ICT initiatives at all levels of government in Canada and other countries.

Partner Bulletin
Our Partner Brochure






RjR was happy to sponsor, attend & participate at BMC Engage 2015.
 
The event was a great opportunity to network and engage with customers, prospective customers, partners and industry influencers from around the world. 

Bob Beauchamp, BMC Software CEO, was the keynote speaker and discussed disruptive technologies and other driving forces in digital enterprise management. Watch his keynote here!
 
Corporate Broadcast

We are continually growing. RjR Innovations would like to welcome the newest members of our team!