1 edit | IT consultant pissing match? Somewhat off topic here, but I have a customer I have a PTP link shooting him 100mb/5mb, a core router, providing wired internet to apartment units, and 6 UBNT UAP wireless access points.
For whatever reason, he decides to hire another IT guy, to change it up. Here is what this new guy told me...
We are going to roll out wireless router in each unit not access point to segment the network and help control bandwidth usage using a RIP protocol as overhead.
To catch you up to speed,
1. Charter 100mb/5mb coming into building
2. Same Router/Gateway equipment
a. Modify for allowing RIP
b. VLAN to Cabled rooms
3. Add Wireless router via RIP protocol in each space
4. Configure signal to reduce crosstalk.
rip, is basic but it will allow me to shorten up the hops and transmission time. I will be dropping in wireless routers to segment the network reply all on me to maximize the connection speed by minimizing the hops. basically, a glorified arp table modification. cascading individual wireless routers will allow me to control traffic between networks. We will also have to look into QOS WMM, may be troddling the connection speed of downloading and browsing.
Charter has their line access ready to go. the serial side loopback access I was looking for has been corrected by their engineers.
Is this guy that far over my head, or is he just having diarrhea of the mouth? |
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 warwick
join:2009-06-05
Hollywood, FL | huh? - "serial side loopback access?" Give him the benefit of the doubt, ask him to explain or repeat twice, if he does the second without remorse then give him the benefit of the doubt once more, if that does not work then... well.
Don't be baited into contesting ridiculous claims or just nonsense in general, trust me - not worth it. You will always loose as the initiator will always appear the victim and you the aggressor, trying to "prove something".
In light of all things technical, I can see nothing correct in what he's mentioning...but I too may be wrong.  |
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WHT
join:2010-03-26
Rosston, TX
kudos:5
2 recommendations | reply to TheHox
If they hired another IT, that means you are out of the loop...*AND* out of any responsibility if it doesn't work. Don't make it your cause to prove he's wrong and you're right. Move on to another project and charge and additional 20% if ...when they call you back to make it work. |
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| reply to TheHox
Well since it was my project, the owner wants me to work with this guy.
In fact, he is almost 2 hours away, so this guy said he will have me do the install of the hardware. He asked for access to the router, I created him an account and gave him the IP:PORT of winbox. He can't figure out how to connect, and I'm not going to tell him to use winbox either.
The owner and I get along, and I hate to just walk away from this, but I am tempted to tell the owner that I am just not comfortable with this guy and his plan or lack there of, and would rather not work with him. (As I feel I am going to be doing all the dirty work making it work, while this guy gets the credit and money for me doing so). Seems like I'm damned if I do or damned if I don't. |
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WHT
join:2010-03-26
Rosston, TX
kudos:5 | Yeah...yer in a pickle. Though if the guy doesn't know how to use Winbox, charge him an hourly support fee. |
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 SteveI know your IP addressConsultant
join:2001-03-10
Yorba Linda, CA
kudos:5
2 recommendations | reply to TheHox
said by TheHox: He can't figure out how to connect, and I'm not going to tell him to use winbox either. You should.
Your duty is to help your customer's project, and it's so incredibly common that consultants get into turf contests and passive-aggressive behavior — to the detriment of the customer — that the high road is to always be helpful.
I have decent networking chops but can't follow the guy's reasoning, but it's not jumping out at me like it's guaranteed BS. Maybe he's really really good and you can learn something.
But deliberately being unhelpful is a bad consulting strategy from pretty much every direction. |
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1 recommendation | Well if his expertise is above mine, then yes of course I will tag along and suck up any knowledge I can. But, from what I can tell, I don't feel that is the case. I've asked quite a few people now that I highly respect and none of them can agree or confirm his approach to this. (In addition to this forum which as of yet nobody has agreed with anything he said)
So rather than be this guys patsy, I have to find a professional way advise the owner that I do not agree with this guys plan. I can either do it for him correctly, or let him go on his own, as I am not in the business of helping other IT consults do their job and make a name for themselves. I can do it myself, for myself.
Either way it does sound like I may be coming off aggressive to the owner, but I am trying to look out for him and myself. In the end the owner is just sick of the tech crap and just wants the internet working with no tenant complaints so he can move on to the next development. |
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lutful... of ideasPremium
join:2005-06-16
Ottawa, ON Reviews:
 ·TekSavvy DSL
2 recommendations | reply to TheHox
I strongly suspect he is "fresh" from some theoretical networking course in a local career college and somehow managed to fool your customer. 
However ...
a) Good old RIP can definitely be used to manually define best routes for all wireless nodes in a small network: »wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:Routing/RIP
b) Some routers do allow loop-back testing of their high speed serial interface (HSSI) for diagnostic purposes. Perhaps he was thinking of something like that without checking what features typical WISP routers provide?
P.S. I always specify a serial backdoor for emergency access to each remote node. Sometimes it is via cellular modem, sometimes POTS and a few times even Iridium. |
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 Killa200Premium
join:2005-12-02
Southeast TN | reply to TheHox
Not sure why he would want loopback access? Also it most definitely wouldn't be serial loopback on a cable modem, it would be virtual. |
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SteveI know your IP addressConsultant
join:2001-03-10
Yorba Linda, CA
kudos:5
1 recommendation | reply to TheHox
said by TheHox: But, from what I can tell, I don't feel that is the case. I've asked quite a few people now that I highly respect and none of them can agree or confirm his approach to this. (In addition to this forum which as of yet nobody has agreed with anything he said) Ok, but there's a difference between having trusted people call BS, and having trusted people say they don't quite follow. From what you've told us, I don't think we have enough information to know that this guy is a bozo, and it's premature to bail on your guy.
Dig in: I am not quite following what you're trying to accomplish here and would feel a lot more comfortable if I had a handle on the game plan. Can you elaborate a bit on this for me? Ask more detailed questions, etc. This is not only helping you understand the technical approach, but it lets you gauge the other guy as a consultant.
* He could blow you off, which means he's probably BSing
* He could explain it, and make it clear he knows what he's about
* He could explain it, tipping his hand that he doesn't know this stuff.
You should absolutely tell your customer that you have strong reservations, but be clear that it's no more than your spidey sense, you can't back it up yet. And until you have actual evidence, you're going to be helpful not because you agree with the other guy, but because you're supporting your customer.
If at some point you get the "Aha!" insight - for good or for bad - then you now have concrete information to go forward. But spidey sense is not enough - it just looks petty and petulant been there done that.
Do everything you can to support the project, which means falling all over yourself to be helpful; at some point you'll have enough information, and you won't have been engaging in a passive-aggressive turf battle (that the customer will absolutely pick up on) that makes you look bad.
When in doubt, be helpful.
Steve — who's been consulting for 30 years
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Stephen J. Friedl | Unix Wizard | Security Consultant | KA8CMY | Southern California USA | my web site |
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| reply to TheHox
said by TheHox:and secondly, "serial side loopback access" to a SMC cable modem? Really? That’s strange, unless there is more than one meaning for a serial side loopback.
Traditionally, a serial side loopback is a test feature included in some CPE routers, this allows a loopback code to be sent from the “A” end of the circuit to loop-up the CSU or HSSI card in the router on the “Z” end, proving the path either good or bad from the carrier interface or POP right into the CPE router.
If this test runs clean then the ILEC will blow off the IC or CLEC knowing the problem is outside of the ILEC network, this test is also used by IC’s and CLEC’s to determine if a dispatch out (DO) of their technician is needed versus a billable DI to the ILEC.
That stated, I have never heard of an SSLoopback in the Ethernet world, it is a DS0, DS1, DS3 test.
It could be this guy is thinking out-of-band management through a serial port, where a remote loopback, if the router was served by a DSx circuit could be initiated allowing for head to head testing. |
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| reply to TheHox
Yeah, I'm not sure what he is wanting to do either. If he VLANs each room and adds a wireless router in each room, there is no reason to add RIP unless he wants each tenant to be able to route to other rooms (which I would forbid and make sure couldn't happen)
I use RIP throughout our network currently. I just see no point at all in a building..
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»www.wirelessdatanet.net |
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| said by gunther_01:Yeah, I'm not sure what he is wanting to do either. If he VLANs each room and adds a wireless router in each room, there is no reason to add RIP unless he wants each tenant to be able to route to other rooms (which I would forbid and make sure couldn't happen)
I use RIP throughout our network currently. I just see no point at all in a building..
I had a similar thought - CPE isolation on the AP to prevent customers talking directly to each other.
Unfortunatley many of my rural customers were also into gaming with each other. So I had to do it properly and allow the CPE's to talk to each other. I can imagine this is the case in a building also.
The actual way to do this is simply to run a router in each apartment, connected to an untangle server or something to monitor bandwidth / qos, and then out the cable modem. No fancy routing needed. |
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3 recommendations | reply to TheHox
I don't think I've ever seen anything Steve has said or claimed and agreed.
IMHO its time to walk. If you install this new guys equipment and it doesn't work the blame will fall on you. That is what you are being set up for.
Take a step back and explain you aren't a equipment grunt or monkey. If this new guy wants to redo what you've already done make him own it start to finish.
This being "helpful" is BS. In the end your kindness will be mistaken for weakness. Do as Justin suggested, move on to the next project and when this one implodes pick up the pieces and charge an appropriate rate.
Ignore the "Consultant" and follow what those are telling you that have hands-on experience at this stuff. At the end of the day those who do offer better advice than those who think they can do but never have. |
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1 recommendation | reply to raytaylor
said by raytaylor:said by gunther_01:Yeah, I'm not sure what he is wanting to do either. If he VLANs each room and adds a wireless router in each room, there is no reason to add RIP unless he wants each tenant to be able to route to other rooms (which I would forbid and make sure couldn't happen)
I use RIP throughout our network currently. I just see no point at all in a building..
I had a similar thought - CPE isolation on the AP to prevent customers talking directly to each other. Unfortunatley many of my rural customers were also into gaming with each other. So I had to do it properly and allow the CPE's to talk to each other. I can imagine this is the case in a building also. The actual way to do this is simply to run a router in each apartment, connected to an untangle server or something to monitor bandwidth / qos, and then out the cable modem. No fancy routing needed. But in the case of an apartment building you would want each room/tenant to have it's own Public IP and VLAN (IMO) and you wouldn't be using CPE isolation because at this point you no longer have AP's but rather wireless routers at each occupancy (If I am reading this correctly)
I am FULLY with Wirelessdog and walking away from this project totally. If the new consultant has this "project", let them have it. I wouldn't want my name any where near it from what I can read so far. I know I wouldn't unless someone could explain the network better, I wouldn't want to be responsible for that mess. But that's just me.
As it reads currently, they plan to bounce off of each wireless router some how, and that's just, well, dumb as hell. If this building is wired, there is no reason to do that. Nor any reason to have a dynamic routing protocol running over a wired structure that already allows for independent (physical) tenant sub network structuring. If it's all home ran, no way in hell I would deal with all that RIP mess.
Something doesn't add up for anyone to even think that way IMO. But I have seen simple things go so complex by those that "know better" it made me walk away from that portion of a project pretty fast before. I did my thing, and left the rest to the other more "knowledgeable" person to handle. To each their own.
There is a such thing as knowing too much and building accordingly. I.E. the complex method, is better than the K.I.S.S. method to some.
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»www.wirelessdatanet.net |
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 DaDawgsPremium
join:2010-08-02
Deltaville, VA | reply to TheHox
" troddling "
This is your first clue... As time goes on they will become more obvious... |
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DaDawgsPremium
join:2010-08-02
Deltaville, VA | reply to Steve
Yeah, steve and then they hack your web site... =P |
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DaDawgsPremium
join:2010-08-02
Deltaville, VA | reply to wirelessdog
Totally down with this... I don't actually think I have ever seen anything Steve has said about wireless where I have agreed. Generally he is good with operating systems, hacking web sites and pretending that he understands wireless systems... whatever... but hey, he has a call sign because he is an amateur radio operator so maybe, well just maybe, naw... Call signs don't mean squat... not really.
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Once we IPv6 enable every device on the Internet we will have toasters, baby monitors, and security cameras joining the bot nets which today are populated only by idiots that can not refrain from clicking, "Yes I would like to see those titties..."
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SteveI know your IP addressConsultant
join:2001-03-10
Yorba Linda, CA
kudos:5
1 recommendation | said by DaDawgs: I don't actually think I have ever seen anything Steve has said about wireless where I have agreed. Well duh: you're a wireless expert and I'm not.
I'm not giving wireless advice — I'm not qualified — I'm giving consulting advice.
By being helpful and giving the other consultant the benefit of the doubt, you stand the most productive chance of gathering enough information to go past your uneasy spidey sense to having actual evidence one way or the other.
Once you have your evidence ("Holy crap, this guy is good" or "Holy crap, this guy is a bozo"), then you can make a more fully informed decision.
I do understand that experienced consultants can learn to trust their gut feeling even in the absence of all the evidence, and you may be at that point. Most experienced consultants have walked rather than get involved in something dubious.
In any case, don't be passive aggressive and/or unhelpful. Tell your customer what you feel and say that in your best professional judgement you can't be a part of it.
Good luck,
Steve
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Stephen J. Friedl | Unix Wizard | Security Consultant | KA8CMY | Southern California USA | my web site |
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| reply to TheHox
I would not give any consultant the benefit of the doubt. That falls under the same category of trusting a lobbyist. |
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 John GaltForward, MarchPremium
join:2004-09-30
Happy Camp
kudos:5 | reply to TheHox
I have had to deal with this many times...
If they ask about something, I tell them. If they don't ask... |
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WHT
join:2010-03-26
Rosston, TX
kudos:5 | So it that a "don't ask, don't tell" kinda thing? hahahahah |
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warwick
join:2009-06-05
Hollywood, FL | reply to John Galt
said by John Galt:I have had to deal with this many times...
If they ask about something, I tell them. If they don't ask...
...almost sounds like lying through omission. :P |
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John GaltForward, MarchPremium
join:2004-09-30
Happy Camp
kudos:5 | said by warwick:...almost sounds like lying through omission.
The extent of my professional obligation is to answer their questions, if asked. |
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SteveI know your IP addressConsultant
join:2001-03-10
Yorba Linda, CA
kudos:5 | said by John Galt: The extent of my professional obligation is to answer their questions, if asked. Most customers believe your obligation is to look out for their wider interests; whether you do so or not says what kind of consultant you really are. |
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jcremin
join:2009-12-22
Siren, WI
kudos:2 | said by Steve:said by John Galt: The extent of my professional obligation is to answer their questions, if asked. Most customers believe your obligation is to look out for their wider interests; whether you do so or not says what kind of consultant you really are. But when your customer intends to not be your customer anymore and chooses to do business with someone else, I fail to see how there is any obligation to go above and beyond when the extra effort will only go to help a competitor who's method you don't agree with.
I do agree with the advise earlier. Explain that you don't feel comfortable putting your name on this project, and let them choose. Don't go out of your way to sabotage the relationship, but there's no need to let someone else mooch off of you.
There's a happy medium, and that's usually the best path to take. |
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| reply to Steve
said by Steve:said by John Galt: The extent of my professional obligation is to answer their questions, if asked. Most customers believe your obligation is to look out for their wider interests; whether you do so or not says what kind of consultant you really are. That obligation ends when they replace you. |
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1 edit | reply to TheHox
Well he finally figured out how to login via winbox lastnight.
Looks like all he did was RIP main config change, and created new share: pub |
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SteveI know your IP addressConsultant
join:2001-03-10
Yorba Linda, CA
kudos:5 | reply to jcremin
said by jcremin: But when your customer intends to not be your customer anymore and chooses to do business with someone else, I fail to see how there is any obligation to go above and beyond when the extra effort will only go to help a competitor who's method you don't agree with. Ah, that's different.
I had the impression that he was an ongoing customer and he was using this guy for some project, but you'd still be his main go-to guy.
If you've been relieved of your engagement, your duty is to be professional but there's no reason to fall all over yourself to be helpful (even though I still do in this circumstance, though it rarely comes up). |
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jcremin
join:2009-12-22
Siren, WI
kudos:2 | said by Steve:If you've been relieved of your engagement, your duty is to be professional but there's no reason to fall all over yourself to be helpful Agreed, that's a perfect way to say it! |
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