Once upon a midnight backup, while my laptop I did pack up,
Finishing a Cisco stack, upstairs I’d finished upgrading.
While I called the Help Desk clearly, telling them my job was nearly
Finished, and I felt sincerely that I home would quickly wing.
I saw a little line a-scrolling, telling tales of packets rolling
Out my NIC, but it was polling no responses to its ping.
Yes it WAS in late October, and my project as a coder, 'twasn't like a souped-up motor
Made me think I’d lost my zing.
Seeing ping loss gave me sorrow, such that I could wish to borrow
Toolset tools highly bizzaro, tools to bring back everything.
For the packets out were ending with no Ack and were not sending
Me to bed while they were rending network woes I dare not sing.
And so I started up my browser, seeing soon a meme of Bowser
Hoped that Sha-Na-Na could wowzer fixes of most everything.
NPM did then reveal the information that would seal
My fate of sleeping without zeal--until I fixed that wayward Ping.
“Where did they go?” I pondered quickly (at 1 a.m. my brain is thickly
Scavenging for thoughts that slickly intuition hopes to cling).
“Back to basics” said the sage—what could I use that would assuage the problem?
Yes!--A bandwidth gauge--would reveal the bandwidth hog.
When applied upon the GBIC, quickly as a football flea-flick, it could tell me
News comedic, and I’d find HIM in the log.
All I had to do was wait and surf on Thwack and contemplate how
Packets soon would not be late, no longer victims to backlog.
Presently a message evil crossed my screen much like a weevil
Gliding just like E. Knievel crossed the Snake minus toupee.
There he was, the slowness-grower, making networks ever slower
Acting innocent, but “knower-NTA” could save the day!
Who would slow his colleagues’ browsing, packet sniffers then arousing
Corporate policy espousing CISSP’s away?
Slippery as collodion, playing Nickelodeon,
‘Twas simply the custodian filling up the T1’s pipe.
Surreptitiously it listened, Netflow shined and then it glistened
Sundry packets as they christened music streams through teletype.
“Will he never stop that streaming?” (I imagined my boss screaming)
“Call the site and start blaspheming!” came his effervescent gripe.
And so between the packets I contrived to setup brackets that would
Put him in straight-jackets, stop his surfing at the door.
NPM and Damework Mini, QoE with footprint skinny,
UDT and its close kinny NTM I did implore.
Packet filters let me study all his traffic from his buddy ‘til
I left his PC bloody, dead and lifeless on the floor.
But I knew he’d soon be calling to the Help Desk, loudly bawling:
“All this slowness is appalling—I am feeling mighty sore!”
So I crafted memo quickly, taking care to not be prickly, showing
Him how network sickly streaming vids we do abhor
Entertainment that’s competing with our business traffic fleeting
Citrix and PC defeating flows that must not hit the floor.
But he never started calling—once his Manager was galling at the
News I shared—appalling!—how he stopped their network flow.
So the process bears repeating, using work for play is cheating,
And the WAN bandwidth-depleting, every person ought to know.
With the mystery abated, and the WAN bandwidth inflated back to
Normal COS (so weighted), homeward soon I knew I’d go.
“Thanks” (I thought) “for things Orion, and for pizza types Hawaiian!
And for Neo down in Zion! And my favorite Toolset tool.”
Never be without Orion, or your Tool Set, you’ll be dyin’
For some thing to stop your cryin’, and you’ll feel just like a fool.
Now you know the road to glory, and it never need be gory.
I can end my network story, SolarWinds provides the tool.
(For your Halloween network entertainment)
Swift Packets!
Rick Schroeder
October 28, 2015
