THWACK Monthly Mission - January 2021

yumdarling

Ever since humans could ponder on the great questions of life… well, at least as long as I can remember, we’ve wondered about a great many things. Is there life on other planets? What is the meaning of life? How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop? But perhaps the greatest question of all has been: what is the missing link?

Some of the most superfluously intelligent people have contemplated this query, and perhaps it’s arrogant of me to say I’ve come up with the answer. But facts are facts, and I know what the missing link is.

The service desk is the missing link to total IT efficiency.

The way the right solution handles incidents—a dream. Problem management—no problem. Change management, asset management, discovery… this one piece of the puzzle completes the picture. This one piece of pizza completes the pie. This one piece of IT infrastructure completes the package. Play on to find out how.

JANUARY MISSION

Use the mission’s resources to complete the tasks and answer the questions for a chance to win!

Correctly answer each question during the week and you'll be entered for a chance to win the weekly prize.

Correctly answer all 20 questions over the course of the month and you'll be entered for a chance to win the grand prize.

150 points are being awarded for each correctly answered question. There are 20 questions, which means you can earn a maximum of 3,000 points for this mission.

PRIZES

Weekly Prizes & Drawing Dates:
January 11, 2021: LEGO Ideas NASA Apollo Saturn V 92176 Outer Space Model Rocket

January 18, 2021: Custom Levitating Moon Lamp

January 25, 2021: Fitbit Versa 2

February 1, 2021: Nanoleaf Rhythm Edition Smarter Kit

Grand Prize:
February 1, 2021: Astronomical Telescope

MISSION RULES

A new question will open every day (Monday - Friday) starting on January 4, 2021. Once a question has opened, it will remain open until January 31, 2021 at 11:59 p.m. CT. Check the schedule below for exact open/close times.

MISSION SHORTCUT

Complete the mission shortcut between January 4, 2021 and January 31, 2021 to be entered to win an 23andMe Kit !

Shortcut Steps

We believe that a primary focus for the IT service desk in 2021 will be helping IT operations manage all of the changes and updates to IT infrastructure. With that in mind, it is a significant advantage to integrate your ITSM platform with the IT management tools you already use. Our shortcut is simple.

View our Expand the Power of SolarWinds IT Management Tools Through Service Desk webinar here
Tell us a goal you have for your service desk in 2021 here.

We look forward to reading your ITSM priorities for this year!

VIEW WEBCAST NOW LEAVE A COMMENT

Mission Terms & Conditions: US, UK, and Canada | Germany | Australia

Mission Shortcut Terms & Conditions: US, UK, and Canada | Germany | Australia

dsimpkins

New year, New MISSION!!!

Happy New Year everyone

janobi

Seems you cannot watch the video without creating a bright talk account. Seems a little unfair imo. Can we have a link to YouTube for the video, i'd prefer to not have to register to watch a video.

raymondo

I agree with @janobi, we shouldn't need to subscribe or register with a 3rd party in order to watch a video hint.

stuartd

@yumdarling As with the above comments - we shouldn't have to register to a 3rd party for a purely internal to SolarWinds thing. Aside from which, the notes state:

"PLEASE NOTE: you must log in with your THWACK email to successfully enter this Mission Shortcut drawing."

Login to where though? As this is an external site that won't accept Thwack ID's, etc

buchagj

@yumdarling I am in agreement with above in that I do not want to get spammed by another third party just complete a Thwack question.

Kaellanon

I concur. I don't know what bright talk is and don't care to register for something I don't even know.

Jfrazier

Nifty, by signing up to BrightTALK, you give them license to provide your contact info (possibly in the form of sales or marketing) to other parties. In order to restrict that you must jump through hoops via snail mail or maybe email, but no online form. Thee are other items that should be noted in the https://business.brighttalk.com/company/privacy-policy/ . Of course this all falls under the laws of California........

undesired_result

For what it's worth, you can enter completely trash information into the registration and it will let you watch the video.

janobi

@Jfrazier - I figured it was a data mining exercise, and I wouldn't be surprised if it was a result of the hacks. Simply put, they're going to create a new company, that'll offer the same services, but under a different umbrella.

This way they can legally harvest your details, use them, and also sell them to other companies, recouping some of their impending losses. Now I may be being overly cynical there, but tbf, i'd rather not have to enter any details to watch a hint, that could easily be hosted on any video hosting site, for free, without having to give any information. (Trash information or not)

schneiderstev

you can give bogus information, like zyx@abc.com for your email, obviously you can't use that one, because I did. Otherwise, provide other "badge" style information, hint hint.

jeremymayfield

Well I am watching the video and I am not getting the HInt at 21 - 24 minute mark. Maybe I have the wrong Video? I am not sure but I can not find it.

rbeachy

I agree, I don't want to have to register to watch a video and then get spammed with email. Not very nice, IMO. So I guessed at the answer and of course got it wrong.

jeremymayfield

Never mind was watching the wrong video. I was somehow on the mission shortcut.

janobi

@schneiderstev is the real MVP here 😉

hetadlock

How is this relevant to Solarwinds? @yumdarling Who thought this was a good idea to channel your good patrons to a third party for points?

smttysmth02gt

hahaha - I registered (using fake info) and got the answer right, but no points.

yumdarling

Happy new year all!

i'm about to do a little changing up of Q1 as you are super right, we don't want to hide the answers to these questions behind hoops and gates. If you got the question right, no need to fret - I won't take away your green check mark. If you got it wrong or haven't done it yet, please answer the new question instead!

yumdarling

Also let me see why the points aren't firing.. that's annoying

melonizame

OMG those prizes are out of this world...

jpfromit

@yumdarling I was wondering if my points didn't fire! I thought maybe they didn't, as I usually need to refresh to see them, but nobody else was commenting on it so I figured I just was still blurry after the New Years weekend. Thanks! 🙂

@melonizame

jeremymayfield

@yumdarling I second that, I do not believe the points added in from the green check box today.

davej

@yumdarling Looks like I did not get points either.

stuartd

@yumdarling whilst I care about the points, I care more that the mission shortcut directions DO NOT make any sense to me.

The video link, on which you want us to 'leave a question' is still a part of Brighttalk, and so we still need to create an account with them to partake. Surely that isn't right?

So, I ask again, how am I supposed to log in to their site with my Thwack account?

Jfrazier

So for day 2, when you open up the link for the hint it says this content requires a premium subscription.....hmmmm

But the solution is to scroll down to the bottom where they have the entire transcript of the techpod session.

Just scroll through the transcript to answer the question.

smttysmth02gt

Points were added after getting today's question correct, however, still no points added for yesterday.

Jfrazier

Also, todays points showed up and never saw any for yesterday.

davej

@yumdarling as above, points awarded for today but still nothing for yesterday.

yumdarling

Thanks for letting me know the points are working today! Unfortunately I can't automatically give out points for yesterday so I will be adding them in manually for correct answers today!

If you still don't see those extra 150 tomorrow, DM me so we can make sure you get them.

Thanks!

joshyaf

If anyone else has issues seeing video for day 2, check the episode transcript at the bottom of the page. ctl f.

melonizame

Is there a log to check to see if you got the points or not? It doesn't look like I did but like I mentioned before my points haven't been this low in a LONG time. 🙂

Tis why I am posting 😛

OliviaP

giphy

janobi

@yumdarling - I presume I am too affected by the no points situation, but I cannot remember how to check. Could you remind me please 🙂

stuartd

As @yumdarling is not answering my two questions about the mission shortcut, can anybody else help?

How or What do you log into with your Thwack details and then rate a video on a 3rd party site that, from what I can tell, has no links to SolarWinds other than a platform to watch videos from?

schneiderstev

@stuartd you have to register to the BrightTalk website with the same email that you use for your THwack account, as they are using the emails to tie the two together.

yumdarling

Hi friends!! Sorry I've been a little MIA - was working with @OliviaP on fixing up the shortcut to make it easier. If you're iffy about completing the shortcut this month, please wait for the change next week.

Thanks!

Yum

yumdarling

@janobi

Hmm let me check - I've compiled a list to give points manually for Monday, but since there were so many people, I'm sure some didn't go through like I wanted them to 😞 I had one other person let me know they didn't receive the points so I will be re-adding this evening. I'll check yours too and add to the list 🙂

Have a great Friday!

Yum

KDubya

@yumdarling I'm not positive but I don't think I received my points for Monday or not. Is there a way for me to check?

davej

hi, @yumdarling Not sure I got my points for last Monday. Would you mind checking? Thanks

yumdarling

New shortcut is UP!!

I'm checking on the points, guys, thanks for leaving me comments 🙂 Remember that you can always DM me.

@smttysmth02gt is a pro at this. Kudos to him.

Yum

ecklerwr1

ITIL it seems will always be in our lexicon. Remedy has been based on it for years and now everyone seems to be on the bandwagon. Looking back it makes sense we all use the same terminology to describe all things in an IT infrastructure. I wish we could use the SW help desk product... Remedy can be a real pain. I still use the old legacy client versus their new web version because it performs so much slower for me and frankly I'm just used to the classic Remedy. I like the way the SolarWinds Help Desk has tools like Dameware integrated directly into it. Seems nice versus using a hodgepodge of tools cobbled together.

Bill

janobi

@ecklerwr1

Having used several remedy iterations, I can only agree with you on the performance issues with the web based client. No matter the systems it was hosted upon, it was still be slow, and go down frequently. Often being cited as a P1 due to the system being unavailable, even if only for 30s...

I've also used and installed the ITSM product from SolarWinds, and was impressed with its functionality, but anything was better than not having a logging system in the first place. I am always amazed that companies have ITSM systems, and don't use them, or they don't incorporate built in functionalities.

ITIL - Is purely a framework of best practices 😉 And should never be treated as anything more than that. Companies will say they're ITIL compliant, when in actual fact they're often not. Again they fail to remember it's a framework of best practices, and not a set of rules or regulations of how an IT environment should work or be managed. I've worked in places that have ITIL implemented better than others, but it's always something asked for. Having completed the course some years ago, I can safely say that is 3 days of my life I am never getting back, and probably the hardest 3 days i've had to stay awake for. The subject matter is drier than the Gobi dessert, even when the teacher was the only person in the world to have the highest level certificate possible (At the time, there may be others with it now).

Lots of companies now use Service Now, and it is one of the better systems I have used, works out of the box, and has a lot of customisable features, and a good knowledge base offering tips, tricks and integration techniques. It can also 99% of the time be interlinked with monitoring tools, even Orion has an integration module for it 🙂

Jfrazier

A Remedy, it never was that. Upgrades were a huge forklift upgrade if you had a bunch of customizations to it.
Search never worked well and you could never search on fields you needed to search on.

ecklerwr1

@Jfrazier Yeah I've been using Remedy since it was a text based screen application and the company was only 12 people... suffice it to say it's gotten a LOT bigger. It's a nightmare every time they do upgrades and we always have a test environment version running first before they do the upgrade for everyone to see if everything will even work. When BMC bought it... it became even bigger. I still use what they call "classic Remedy" interface because it's more like what I've been used to in probably close to two decades. The web interface "Smart-IT" I just avoid it all together. Learning to be able to search for what you're looking for is a science all in itself... you're right on with that!

Bill